|
Title: Gatso's Post by: Sippo on Tuesday, July 15, 2008, 07:16:08 Swindon the first county to abolish speed camera's?? :)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/wiltshire/7506689.stm Title: Re: Gatso's Post by: Batch on Tuesday, July 15, 2008, 08:02:10 [pedant]
Swindon isn't a county. [/pedant] As I understand it the issue is really about how much cash the council is getting back from fines v how much it costs to install and maintain the cameras that generate it. I think the implication was that the Government creams off some of the fine money, which surprised me as I always thought 100% of that came back. Anywho, even if the council withdraw funding to the partnership their is no guarantee that they won't be funded from other sources. Title: Re: Gatso's Post by: @MacPhlea on Tuesday, July 15, 2008, 08:34:48 The way it works is the governement get the council to declare how much they 'think' will take from speed cameras and as a result that is how much they get to keep - anything more and the governement get to keep the surplus anything less and the council has to pay the difference back to the government- hence why it is considered a stealth tax rather than a road safety initiative.
As you can imgine most councils under estimate how much they will earn from fines because they don't want to end up giving money back - in reality, they always make more... and so either way the governement get most of the cash... I think this is one of the few times I think the council has actually made a positive stance and been sensible - they are looking to spend cash on interactive warning signs as they are now deemed more effective Title: Re: Gatso's Post by: Leggett on Tuesday, July 15, 2008, 10:16:48 i was loving the bit in that adver yesterday, labour hanging around the cash machine/speed camera on queens drive, saying drivers use it as a race track and there's no crossing for kids. only one slight problem with that. you can just make out the crossing behind them. kinda gutting that, i guess...
Title: Re: Gatso's Post by: Arriba on Tuesday, July 15, 2008, 10:49:39 i've noticed higher speeds and more bad driving on queens drive since the camera was covered up.
Title: Re: Gatso's Post by: michael on Tuesday, July 15, 2008, 11:00:34 The Queen's Drive camera was in a horrible spot: It's essentially a dual carriageway, yet there is a right turning into Lawns so lots of slow drivers in the over-taking lane, and sometimes even queues there. What a shit bit of road planning that was!
Title: Re: Gatso's Post by: Sippo on Tuesday, July 15, 2008, 11:05:37 They're talking about it on radio 2 if anyones interested.
|