Speed Camera

[Mike Rowley]

Did anyone notice the item on Teletext at the weekend? Two female PCSOs (Plastic Bobbies) from Tiverton have been campaigning about rural speeding. No doubt hoping to get promoted to real Plods. They have now been issued with a hand held lazer gun to target rural speeding in the general Mid Devon area. D & C Police must be running short of funds and in need of boosting the crime stats again.

Sniff the air - there might be the whif of pigs about as well as diesel.

Mike

[TLS-Moose]

So what are they going to do? PCSO's (to the best of my knowledg) do not have the power of arrest - are they going to stop you and ask you to politely wait whilst they call a uniformed officer from the nearest station to deal with you?

[Mike Rowley]

So what are they going to do? PCSO's (to the best of my knowledg) do not have the power of arrest - are they going to stop you and ask you to politely wait whilst they call a uniformed officer from the nearest station to deal with you?

I think they can take your number and report you, I think that is all thats needed, after all many of the staff who operate the speed camera vans are not serving police, I confess I don't know the detail of this. I suppose if it is one of these devices that takes your picture and automaticaly generates the summons by computer link it doesn't matter much who is operating it. It didn't say in the report whether the PCSOs would be operating the device, just that they had campaigned and it had been issued for use on Mid Devon rural roads. Given the recently released stats that the majority of the 40+ fatalities on Devon roads in the last 12 months were on rural roads with national speed limits it is inevitable that they are going to target them. They are not going to divert the mobile vans from the A30/A38 and M5, they make too much money on those.

There was also something in the news recently where the Government was considering giving civilians the power to operate speed traps but I don't know whether that has gone through yet.

Mike

[Mike Daytona600]

I've seen civies with camaras in villages before, mainly Donyat (between Chard and A303). I've been told they can report you but nothing will get done unless you're reported twice. Dunno if right or not though. When I go past a handheld camara on the bike I slow down to 5-10 mph, you know how inaccurate they can be Plus it must anoy the operator

On a lighter not I heard somewhere a few years ago that some kids in a village put on flourecent jackets and took their mums hairdryer out and pointed it at cars. The police told them off for impersonating the police and told them it was dangerous because it can cause unnesercery braking

[Smiler]

We do that road thru Donyat quite a bit - are they a bit hot on speeding thru there then? Nice the old 358

Does anyone remember the fake one in Croscombe nr Shepton Mallet? some old b*gger decided he'd had enough of speeders so cobbled together this fake camera and stuck it in his front garden by the roadside. Apparently worked for quite some time, till the media started reporting it!

[jam]

We've got the local yokels in the village with a radar gun, a mate of mine received a letter from dibble telling him he'd been spotted speeding. It doesn't matter how many times the yokels zap you they cannot prosecute you on their evidence. What will happen however is that the police will target the area in the hope of catching you speeding.

[Tom L]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjMLZuuXDRQ

nuff said

[Blue]

HI yaq. Unless its changed in the last 6 months. All you will get if a civvie or plastic plod zap you for sppeding is a letter to tell you that your vehicle has been seen driving faster than the limit. Even if its real plod they have ot adhere to lots of rules which most of the time they dont. Favourite is having a speed camera sign 100 yards before them in plain view or doing the calibration certificate in the morning before running out the door to play miami vice. You can tie them up in knots if they do get you because they relie on people just paying.

[Laura]

You know why they wanna reduce speeding in "rural areas"???
So they can sit in their nice warm car, eating doughnuts watching one car drive down a country lane an hour.
Beats real work doesn't it.........they'll make fantastic police offciers - give them promotion!

[Bladerunner]

By the Highway Robbery Partnerships own figures, apparently speed is a 'contributary factor' in 30% of accidents. That's less than a third, so you have to ask yourself why they focus so much attention on it? What about the other 70%?
Then factor in that their figure of 30% has been proven to be complete crap, Advertising Standards banned them from using it, as the real figure is closer to 7%.

Then consider the huge amount of revenue involved.

I know what I belive................