thenewgalaxy

Seen quite a few posts about speeding over the years, not normally much of a speeder so usually not a worrier. I sometimes keep up with the traffic on wide dual carriageways and motorways but usually stick to what you're being told to do.

Anyway, my story.

Was coming back from Southport today on the dual carriageway as the national speed limit goes from 70 to 50 and the lane goes down to one.

As I'm coming towards it I blip the throttle to get ahead of a very slow moving car on the inside, probably touched 70-75 at a push. I let the speed coast down as I come through the sign with a clear road ahead.

Ahead in the distance I see a red car and as it goes by a roadside verge there is a police officer in yellows next to his bike with a handheld device with his arms pointed out long at the traffic. I immediately hit the brakes and could not tell you what speed I was doing. He must have been 200-300 yards up the road.

As I get closer a bike overtakes me he had been sitting offside behind me the whole time, some Y-reg thing of medium power.

I reckon I was going at least a few mph over, maybe even as high as 60-65 to be honest I couldn't tell as I was slowing down (coasting). The bike overtook me at way over 50 but the officer didn't seem interested in either of us.

He certainly didn't leave his layby and come after us both, what gives?

donny andi

iTrader: (3)

Handheld radars mate .....they come after you
I had a motorbike cop get me on a bridge (I was on the motorway) , saw him to late and braked pretty quick from 3 figures ....
As I looked up again he was literally jumping on his bike so I floored it and got off at the next junction......hid in meadowhall for a couple of hours and took the long way home

thenewgalaxy

You crazy bugger! Had they caught up they'd have thrown the book at you!

Three figures though, that is really moving many people would think that was pushing it a bit (not to mention the inefficiency of the bonnet scoop )

Can think of far worse places to "hide" than Meadow Hall though!

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Handheld laser...they send it out in the post. My wife has been caught twice

And he won't have bothered with the biker because it's too difficult to identify him. After all, it's about SAFETY, not revenue, and bikers make up only 4% of the road traffic, yet are involved in 38% of the fatalities and serious accidents, so they aren't targeted as a group...oh...wait...That must be wrong?

LuckyWelshchap

I'm a bit loathe to post something which could encourage people to break speed limits but hopefully we're all responsible enough (in Subarus anyway....).

Firstly a fact, straight from the horse's mouth, a retired senior officer responsible (at that time, not necessarily now) for the Safety Camera Partnership as it's called in Wales.
We all know that there's a margin re. limits, to take account of the margin of error in speedos and any question as to the camera. It's calculated as 10% of the limit plus 2mph. Hence if you do 34 in a 30 you'll not hear anything, 57 in a 50.

The OP's close to the mark but probably over by enough to trigger a notice.

Now comes the poker-playing part, who blinks first.
CPS have to determine whether prosecutions are in the public interest, and financial considerations are one of the priorities.
If you do nothing (apart from saying who was driving at the time - it's an offence not to) someone somewhere will have to make a decision whether to prosecute.

40+ in a 30 near a school at home time will almost certainly get you into court (if you don't cough up) but 60-ish coming into a 50 and slowing down might not.

I got caught once doing 40 in what I genuinely believed was a 40. I'd even seen the speedwagon and slowed down !
It was a 30 and I got the letter. Put my name as the driver, sent it off and waited for the penalty. It came, I ignored it.
4 years later I still have a clean licence.

You always get a second chance, so perhaps ignore any threat until then. It gives you an indication of how far things are likely to go.

thenewgalaxy

I've spoken to someone about the road, I've confirmed it on Google Maps - it is complicated but basically it goes

70mph dual carriageway
Single lane 50mph for a few hundred yards where there are some turnings
Then 70mph dual carriageway again for a short bit - this is where I was coasting down and the bike came past me
Then down to single lane 50mph

I was on the dual carriageway 70mph so I have nothing to worry about, I definitely didn't go over an indicated 75mph the whole journey, though I did enjoy getting up to speed on a couple of occasions from the roundabouts

It's confusing with the speed limit going up and down all the time, to be honest I was concentrating on being a safe driver rather than watching all those sodding signs!

Didn't know handheld lasers could send things out in the post though. Talk about a wake up call / shock to the system I was worrying until I spoke to Blackpoolrock about that road last night and he told me it was 70 and I was being a fool lol

LuckyWelshchap

Technology eh?

The police can do PNC checks from their car and it works the other way - all their officers have the ability to upload info to police computers via mobile broadband, radio/wireless networks etc.

The classic one is ANPR's.
If you're in a dodgy car, or a car is owned by a dodgy one it can be identified and if necessary intercepted.
S. Wales and Gwent Police do a couple of operations a year on the M4 just this side of the Bridge and Crossing.

As I said though, hold firm if a letter does come (unless it is 70 in a 50).

thenewgalaxy

As it stands though, I was in a 70 area, just I didn't consciously realise and worried after noticing the officer with his laser gun. I got panicked by the fact the speed limit just goes up and down so much over the route and couldn't recall what the limit actually was. So I have nothing to worry about, I wasn't even going at 70 (as I said, an indicated 65 at a push) when I came into the officer's line of sight.

Reflecting further though, it is quite scary to think these guys can just pop up on a clear stretch of road and get people. I wasn't in the Scooby but to think that can hit 70mph in around six seconds without trying and 100mph in around ten makes you think long and hard about how responsible you have to be driving one.

A few seconds of madness could get one into a LOT of trouble.

Davec30

iTrader: (2)

If he was standing at the side of his bike with a gun then that would only give the speed of the vehicle targeted and no other information( not a camera!!) so if he didn't come after you, don't worry about it;-) he may even have been aiming at a vehicle behind you or you were within the parameters!

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Sorry, but this is patently wrong.

As I said, my wife has been caught twice by a bike cop with a handheld laser.

She has six points now.

blackpoolrock

Just asked a traffic cop - if it's a laser they either come after you or stop you via another stop point a little further on. It's a lazer not a camera - so your wife must of been done by something else

thenewgalaxy

Cheers John. Would make sense, as far as I am aware they can do you via the post with a laser but it would have to be tripod mounted.

So it would appear that if I had been speeding, which I apparently wasn't as the limit was national speed limit, then his mates would have got me further down the road or he'd have come after me. The device he was holding clearly had no photography equipment attached to it, it was a small device he was looking through like this



Lancashire police apparently use something called an Ultra Lyte either portable hand held or mounted to a tripod and JVC camera in their vans. However these things have caused some consternation among motoring groups as they can cause errors of reading even if calibrated correctly. It would also appear that hand held they are only accurate to about 200-300 yards as the beam widens and also a small movement of the hand causes a huge parallax of the beam.

Tripod mounted they reckon they can get you from a kilometre away, I have read about South Wales Police mounting them in horse boxes on bridges where the motorway has long straights.

I may not have been speeding yesterday but this has made me reflect, I'm damned well going to think twice before overtaking the old dodder going 5mph slower than the limit next time...

LuckyWelshchap

What they could do though is say that the gun indicated to them that you were over the limit and hence they stopped you.

Your word against theirs.

Btw North Wales police have in the past disguised their speed traps as horse boxes.

If you are stopped remember this - cameras should be used where there is a proven high accident rate due to speed.

If the spot isn't an accident blackspot (use a Freedom of Information Request to find out) then they are being untruthful, and the Press will rip into them.

Unfortunately today policing is very much about 'political management'.
Get it wrong and the CC loses their job, like wot ours here in Gwent did.

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

But unfortunately, the law, as it stands, allows them to check the speed of traffic anywhere, anytime. They don't have to have a reason, the bit you quoted is for fixed cameras and camera vans.