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> street racers have killed many innocent bystanders, You're not responding to the point. The parent was talking about solitary drivers, and used remote parts

> street racers have killed many innocent bystanders, You're not responding to the point. The parent was talking about solitary drivers, and used remote parts of scotland as an example.

scott_w 6y ago
The reality is you never know if you’re really alone. Plenty of people are killed on “empty” country roads because the driver didn’t see them due to inappropriate speed, distractions or a combination.
- generalizations 6y ago
  Unless you know the area. The parent has a couple of counter examples to that. Seems like the caveats, that sometimes you do actually know you're alone, are exactly the scenarios we're talking about.
  - viraptor 6y ago
    Unless you have constant surveillance on the km in front of you, you cannot know you're alone. Things happen. They may not be likely at all, but as a whole we're not good judges of probability. Also, even if you crash with nobody around at the time, someone else may crash into the rescue team just arriving to help you.
  - petre 6y ago
    If you know you are truly alone, then you know there's no police. Plus there's animals. I see dead foxes, dogs and cats all the time on the road.
    - noizejoy 6y ago
      At least in the more remote parts of Canada, hitting a moose at high speed has a very good probability of taking you out along with the moose. So driving respectfully at night is a really good idea.
est31 6y ago
IDK to me that sounds like downplaying the issue. Drunk driving is not ok, not even in remote parts of Scotland. As for driving 35 in a 30 zone... I can agree that it's not much of an issue if it's next to a school and you drive in the middle of the night: there won't be any children entering or leaving the school at that time. But generally, these racers drive way faster, and don't give a fuck about any of these rules, red lights, etc. They see the roads as a racetrack. On the computer or console, they can play GTA V or whatever, I don't care. Just if they do it in the real world they deserve harsh punishments, as the risk of killing people is so extremely high.
- Fnoord 6y ago
  The thing is expectations and boundaries. As a participant of traffic you need to be able to feel secure, regardless of day or night. So in your example (and I live near a school and 30 km/hour street near it), if there is hardly any traffic at night you don't expect anyone either. Which might make someone driving 50 km/hour even more dangerous than when everyone is driving too hard constantly during day.
  - est31 6y ago
    Hmmm that's a good point indeed. I never said that you should drive 35 in a 30 zone, just that it's less of an issue than say drunk driving or road racing. Accidents can still happen though.
- whoooooo123 6y ago
  30 v 35mph is not a trivial increase. It's nearly 20% faster. And kinetic energy scales quadratically with velocity. According to a popular UK road safety campaign, if you hit a pedestrian at 35mph you're 2.5x more likely to kill them than if you hit them at 30mph (50% chance vs 20% chance) https://www.roadwise.co.uk/using-the-road/speeding/the-chance-of-a-pedestrian-surviving/ https://www.roadwise.co.uk/using-the-road/speeding/the-chanc...
Fnoord 6y ago
Surely there are animals frolicking around in these remote parts of Scotland. Think of deer. Traffic rules generally make sense, you should follow them. I live near a school. Its 30 km/hour around the school. People drive 50-60. Its dangerous, even for me. This selfish behavior has to stop.

> street racers have killed many innocent bystanders, You're not responding to the point. The parent was talking about solitary drivers, and used remote parts of scotland as an example.

scott_w 6y ago

The reality is you never know if you’re really alone. Plenty of people are killed on “empty” country roads because the driver didn’t see them due to inappropriate speed, distractions or a combination.

generalizations 6y ago
Unless you know the area. The parent has a couple of counter examples to that. Seems like the caveats, that sometimes you do actually know you're alone, are exactly the scenarios we're talking about.
- viraptor 6y ago
  Unless you have constant surveillance on the km in front of you, you cannot know you're alone. Things happen. They may not be likely at all, but as a whole we're not good judges of probability. Also, even if you crash with nobody around at the time, someone else may crash into the rescue team just arriving to help you.
- petre 6y ago
  If you know you are truly alone, then you know there's no police. Plus there's animals. I see dead foxes, dogs and cats all the time on the road.
  - noizejoy 6y ago
    At least in the more remote parts of Canada, hitting a moose at high speed has a very good probability of taking you out along with the moose. So driving respectfully at night is a really good idea.

est31 6y ago

IDK to me that sounds like downplaying the issue. Drunk driving is not ok, not even in remote parts of Scotland. As for driving 35 in a 30 zone... I can agree that it's not much of an issue if it's next to a school and you drive in the middle of the night: there won't be any children entering or leaving the school at that time. But generally, these racers drive way faster, and don't give a fuck about any of these rules, red lights, etc. They see the roads as a racetrack. On the computer or console, they can play GTA V or whatever, I don't care. Just if they do it in the real world they deserve harsh punishments, as the risk of killing people is so extremely high.

Fnoord 6y ago
The thing is expectations and boundaries. As a participant of traffic you need to be able to feel secure, regardless of day or night. So in your example (and I live near a school and 30 km/hour street near it), if there is hardly any traffic at night you don't expect anyone either. Which might make someone driving 50 km/hour even more dangerous than when everyone is driving too hard constantly during day.
- est31 6y ago
  Hmmm that's a good point indeed. I never said that you should drive 35 in a 30 zone, just that it's less of an issue than say drunk driving or road racing. Accidents can still happen though.
whoooooo123 6y ago
30 v 35mph is not a trivial increase. It's nearly 20% faster. And kinetic energy scales quadratically with velocity. According to a popular UK road safety campaign, if you hit a pedestrian at 35mph you're 2.5x more likely to kill them than if you hit them at 30mph (50% chance vs 20% chance) https://www.roadwise.co.uk/using-the-road/speeding/the-chance-of-a-pedestrian-surviving/ https://www.roadwise.co.uk/using-the-road/speeding/the-chanc...

Fnoord 6y ago

Surely there are animals frolicking around in these remote parts of Scotland. Think of deer. Traffic rules generally make sense, you should follow them. I live near a school. Its 30 km/hour around the school. People drive 50-60. Its dangerous, even for me. This selfish behavior has to stop.