Road Safety Policies not working
January 2nd, 2005 at 8:14 am by David FarrarThe 2004 road toll was 435, and this confirms to me that the current policies are not working. Targeting all motorists exceeding the speed limit, rather than those driving too fast for the conditions (the policy changed in 2001) has been a flop.
The toll is 26 lower than last year, and this is of course good, but one has to look at this over a longer term. You see last year there was a massive increase in the toll by 57, so the 2004 toll is 31 higher than the 2002 toll. This is the only increase over a two year period since 1990 where on average the toll would drop 8% every two years.
Over three years the toll has dropped only 18 from 453 in 2001 to 435 today. To make the target of 300 would take 23 years at this rate.
No tag for this post.
January 2nd, 2005 at 9:44 am
The road toll is meaningless. The figure should be fatal accidents. Six people dying in a car because of a driver error is not more significant (from a road safety viewpoint) than two separate accidents each involving a single driver.
They won’t change the figure because 6 looks more impressive than 2.
b.
Vote:January 2nd, 2005 at 10:00 am
We can assume near enough that the distribution of deaders per accident is relatively constant, unless car usage patterns have changed significantly. Then fatal crashes or fatalities per annum provide some kind of useful and equivalent statistic.
With respect to a shorter period like the Xmas/New Year then possibly fatal crashes would be a more significant statistic but again the sampling period is so short the whole statistic is bollocks. Even comparing this year and last year is bollocks – trends matter over longer terms.
Knee jerk responses because of one-off incidents (a New Zealand political tradition) don’t fix anything. Groups like the LTSA and the police that have a vested interest in greater enforcement and regulation will push for them without doing any real analysis of the stats beyond looking at the totals and how they can spin them into more money.
Shortly we’ll see opposition MPs telling us how its bad and its time to change govt and fix it, and Government MPs telling us how well their policies are working.
I vote for all traffic enforcement to concentrate on the crowded roads of the North Island and no enforcement in the South Island! Or perhaps no enforcement in the North so we get rid of lots of jafas …. tricky.
Vote:January 2nd, 2005 at 10:42 am
Just getting the totals to stay the same or fall a bit is a big achievment, as the number of cars and the KM driven each year is increasing. I havent seen the numbers here but in Victoria where they got down to 300 deaths with a population of 5 million, the ‘young women’ group is rising fast.
Vote:There is a researcher who has been doing detailed analysis of road accidents for years but his position was de-establised in the funding cuts for science research. maybe he should have a job in the PM’s department to do this work.
Where I live , i have noticed a lot more fences/power poles demolished in the last few years this in roads just 1Km away.
My guess is that we are going through a ‘speed’ phase, encouraged by the car makers. 2 weeks before Xmas flyers advertising a brand new car for only $499 pm lease were in the letter box. At $6000 per year plus GST this is LESS than the depreciation you can expect if you paid cash. The car was a Ford XR6, which has a turbo motor and all the ‘look how fast i can go’ extras.
January 2nd, 2005 at 11:05 am
Time to make 3rd party insurance obligatory in NZ, which would keep young, foolish and poor drivers off the roads. Also the driver’s licence system should be tightened up, including 5 yearly re-testing, driving age at 18 (swap drinking and driving ages!), and no longer be included in cereal packets. Of course, infrastructurally, all SHs should become dual carriageway, with fixed median strips, not lines on the ground.
Vote:January 2nd, 2005 at 11:14 am
I agree Hans that re-testing is a good idea. And improving the main roads also. They would make real impacts on the road toll.
Vote:January 3rd, 2005 at 9:38 am
The govt goal if it really was for minimisation of the roadtoll, should start with 4 laning SH1 in it’s entirity , SH2 in the nth island and the road from the bombays to tauranga. Median strips would help in the areas of greatest risk (known blackspots).
Vote:This of course will not happen in our lifetime as the RMA will kill any attempt to do so, even if the road user charges were appropriately expensed.
We are more likely to see flying cars before useful outcomes like the above.
January 3rd, 2005 at 10:57 am
David as an admitted speeder( which you euphemistically refer to as within the tolerance for prosecution) its a bit rich to refer to ‘policies that aren
Vote:January 3rd, 2005 at 11:55 am
The problem ztev is not speeding but driving too fast for the conditions.
Vote:January 3rd, 2005 at 4:07 pm
The only speed I do is the powdered kind. Learn to be more responsible everyone.
Vote:January 3rd, 2005 at 8:00 pm
Interesting to see more people willing to speak against the host here, than they have on the same topic in the past. David, you know, and yes, you acknowldge, that you are rowing against the tide on this.
The LTSA do an annual review of New Zealanders attitudes. Here are the latest results: http://tinyurl.com/5o5ql. I will not try to pick out my favourites from the review, rather people can make up their own minds if they care to take the trouble. Suffice to say, it is refreshing to see, David, that your “threshold”/”conditions” attitude is becoming very old-fashioned.
Vote:January 3rd, 2005 at 8:49 pm
Incidentally, #1 above, the LTSA web-site gives both deaths and fatal crashes (the word “accident” is so yesterday, btw). So who is “They”?
Vote:January 3rd, 2005 at 9:05 pm
Oh yeah, last one I promise.
How many again was it? Hours that is? How many hours in a row? How many hours on the trot? Consecutively? One after the other?
That driving to the absolute maximum that the conditions will allow? How many hours was it? Seven as I recall. Without a break? HHmmmmmm.
Vote:January 4th, 2005 at 8:57 am
The last refuge for those who have no argument is to claim merely most people agree with them, rather than argue for why their view is accurate.
I think the road toll stats speak for themselves – the policy is not working.
And it is simple common sense to drive to the conditions. If it is raining for example you drive slower. If there is no other traffic on a straight road you can drive faster. This is not rocket science but common sense. During a trip one changes speed hundreds of time regardless of the speed limit – this is driving to the conditions.
Vote:January 4th, 2005 at 1:07 pm
David, the problem is that last time I argued my case, you banned me from your site and removed my postings, which were in no way offensive. They simply disagreed with you. So now you say I do not argue my case. I dare not.
Why is such a highly intelligent man as yourself, so blatantly (censored) on the issue of speed.
One movement from one set of statistics to the very next one, does not in any statisticians nightmare represent a trend.
Does driving to the conditions include the condition of the driver, and the fact that they have been belting along at 110 kph for seven hours non-stop? How exactly can the cops police this?
My last on the topic, else you’ll ban me again.
Pity really, because you have a wonderful blog here otherwise.
Vote:January 4th, 2005 at 2:26 pm
Oh its you back again. I thought you swore never to read this blog again, let alone post.
I have no desire to revisit what you said both on the blog and in private e-mail.
Yes of course the condition of the driver is a factor. Several times I have stopped driving (napped at side of road) or driven slowly due to tiredness. This is not just a function of how long one has been driving, but how long one has been awake for and the time of day.
Vote:January 4th, 2005 at 2:56 pm
Nanny staters behold!!!! We have a disciple in OEPA. Sod off git. Tards a little more extreme than you want cars and private transport banned altogether.
Vote:January 4th, 2005 at 8:47 pm
Your blog. So no discourtesy returned in kind. But God, I enjoyed tonight’s TV3 news. And this – http://tinyurl.com/5cdqp
Vote:January 5th, 2005 at 9:06 am
It’s sad to see the same old dross trotted out again.
The stats are rubbish as they are tracking the wrong thing. If we want to see if the roads are getting safer we need to track accident numbers (readily available from ICNZ). As cars have become safer over the years of course deaths will reduce regardless of other policing initiatives. (As an interesting aside it would appear
Vote:January 5th, 2005 at 9:13 am
Crashes, not accidents.
Vote:January 5th, 2005 at 12:37 pm
the aussies are now onsidering having their learner drivers undertake advanced driver training, which in my books would save more lives than ticketing every driver doing 110kph.
Vote:January 18th, 2005 at 9:13 pm
David, you’ll have seen the wonderful start to this year’s stats – yes early days, and not statistically relevant. But fingers crossed that something might be working right.
Vote: