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Sensational headlines - Bryan Gunn banned for 6 months for speeding. Here was me thinking maybe he was doing 100+ on the motorway or maybe 10 or 20 mph above the limit. But no - just after midnight he was clocked doing 38 in a 30 zone and then at lunchtime was pulled up for doing 35 in a 30 zone! (what happened to the 10% + 2 mph guidelines?). Finally he was done for speeding  at 59 mph in a 50 mph zone on the M6.

I don't condone speeding in built up areas or even where workmen are being employed on road repairs on a motorway. HOWEVER, a certain amount of  common sense needs to be applied. He drives tens of thousands of miles a year for his job and this is the sum total of his offences. By all means levy a hefty fine and make him go on a speed awareness course, but 6 months ban???

My gut feel is that the magistrates were being particularly anally retentive - especially given that his job depends on his ability to drive as well as supervising other scouts. Obviously not helped by the prosecutor referring to him as a "totter" having racked up 9 points in 2017.

Almost feels like some people "had it in" for him. Very sad. 🤢

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Ok Angus!

some might say that when you’ve been caught a couple of times you might get the message and slow down: there’s a clue in the term ‘speed limit’ - the second word.

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ABC, you speak of the three speeding offences as being the "sum total" of his offending. I read the EDP report and understood it to say that these were all committed at a time when he already had nine points on his licence. Not really that clever if that was the case, so dumb in fact, that even hiring Simon Nicholls didn't get him off.

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4 hours ago, ABC (A Basingstoke Canary) said:

Sensational headlines - Bryan Gunn banned for 6 months for speeding. Here was me thinking maybe he was doing 100+ on the motorway or maybe 10 or 20 mph above the limit. But no - just after midnight he was clocked doing 38 in a 30 zone and then at lunchtime was pulled up for doing 35 in a 30 zone! (what happened to the 10% + 2 mph guidelines?). Finally he was done for speeding  at 59 mph in a 50 mph zone on the M6.

I don't condone speeding in built up areas or even where workmen are being employed on road repairs on a motorway. HOWEVER, a certain amount of  common sense needs to be applied. He drives tens of thousands of miles a year for his job and this is the sum total of his offences. By all means levy a hefty fine and make him go on a speed awareness course, but 6 months ban???

My gut feel is that the magistrates were being particularly anally retentive - especially given that his job depends on his ability to drive as well as supervising other scouts. Obviously not helped by the prosecutor referring to him as a "totter" having racked up 9 points in 2017.

Almost feels like some people "had it in" for him. Very sad. 🤢

"Just" 38 in a 30 and 59 in a 50...

Edited by Ian
Double quote
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4 hours ago, ABC (A Basingstoke Canary) said:

Sensational headlines - Bryan Gunn banned for 6 months for speeding. Here was me thinking maybe he was doing 100+ on the motorway or maybe 10 or 20 mph above the limit. But no - just after midnight he was clocked doing 38 in a 30 zone and then at lunchtime was pulled up for doing 35 in a 30 zone! (what happened to the 10% + 2 mph guidelines?). Finally he was done for speeding  at 59 mph in a 50 mph zone on the M6.

I don't condone speeding in built up areas or even where workmen are being employed on road repairs on a motorway. HOWEVER, a certain amount of  common sense needs to be applied. He drives tens of thousands of miles a year for his job and this is the sum total of his offences. By all means levy a hefty fine and make him go on a speed awareness course, but 6 months ban???

My gut feel is that the magistrates were being particularly anally retentive - especially given that his job depends on his ability to drive as well as supervising other scouts. Obviously not helped by the prosecutor referring to him as a "totter" having racked up 9 points in 2017.

Almost feels like some people "had it in" for him. Very sad. 🤢

Well 10% of 30 plus 2 is 35 so a tad unlucky with one but the other two have him banged to rights. Seems like a serial offender but some might agree with the great Kenneth Williams' " Infamy, infamy.....they've all got it infamy ".

Nicked for speeding ? Dems de rules....

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Are you Julia Bradbury in disguise? (She was on the One Show last night and had a right un-scripted rant against the Police, on a  piece that Matt Allwright did on speed/speed cameras) 

P.S. I am not sure if Til's affection for her, will now wane a bit...............

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Speed limits are there for a reason and whether they are appropriate or not in certain situations is irrelevant.

Speed controls are clearly marked on our roads. Driving cars requires everybody behind the wheel to adhere to the rules in order to make the process safer.

Rule breakers cause accidents, among other factors of course. Breaking speed limits is breaking rules that we all have to obey for the safety of drivers and pedestrians alike.

Driving can be dangerous so it is our responsibility to address the process with care, this includes keeping to the rules.

Bryan Gunn broke the law. He endangered others. He got off lightly.

Why the need to be in such a hurry all the time in any case. Was Gunn perpetually behind schedule? I doubt it.

 

By comparison with most other countries British roads are safe (among the safest in the world.) Let's keep it that way!

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Its a shame for Bryan to have the news spread across the papers, but he has no one to blame apart from himself in these instances.

Caught by a bright yellow, static, road side, speed camera, not the police it seems (not that it matters). Should have learnt his lesson a bit earlier. I did.

As for Julia Bradbury? Sounds jumped up and importantly opinionated without the full facts, typical 'celebrity.'

Just trying to be popular, and failing badly. She should try speaking to the family of deceased in road deaths when speed is part of the problem. 

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Wasn't it once worked out that should there be a 60 mph speed limit on all motorways then nobody would arrive at their destination any later?

Something to do with the weaving in and out at speed, the need for sharp breaking and other factors I cannot recall. It would surely SAVE LIVES whatever.

Similarly in towns (20 mph.) We can all recall instances of the speed merchant tailgating us anxious to pass and the after he has managed it ends up next to you at the next traffic lights, having used up all that extra petrol by constantly breaking and going faster in spurts.

Why is it that when human beings get behind a wheel their one aim is to save time and get to their destination as quickly as possible even when there is no real need? It's usually only a few minutes in any case.

Similarly with supermarket check outs. People seem to stroll round these places at leisure for hours, apparently in no hurry. As soon as they approach the checkout they anxiously seek the shortest queue, switch queues to save "time"and even show frustration at some oldie who takes their time  when checking out in front of them. 

Hurry is stress. Stress kills, and is no fun in any case.

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Six months of having to walk everywhere......It'll do Gunny the world of good......Get rid of some of his unwanted 'timber'... ;-)

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Oh, thank Christ! There are some others in the world who think like me. I'm a follower of 'Idiot UK Drivers Exposed' on Facebook and it really isn't good for my blood pressure. Although there is generally appropriate condemnation of every clip showing somebody performing an overtly dangerous manoeuvre, whenever the topic turns to speeding (and particularly fines/cameras/speed traps) there always seems to be a proliferation of people moaning about 'pointless' speed limits and attempting to justify routinely travelling faster than they are legally entitled to. Most of their justifications bear little direct relevance to the actual issue concerned and even where people think the set limit is inappropriate or outdated or they think that speed cameras are only money-generating 'scams' (yes, that word actually gets used; as if people are somehow being tricked into breaking the law), it doesn't excuse the act. What other laws do these people routinely break just because they disagree with them?

There is far too much complacency and inattentiveness on the roads and the main reason people speed is because they are so used to getting away with it. To add to the observation made by Broadstairs, I think many drivers have a distorted sense of how much time they are 'losing' when having to drive 10mph slower for half a mile and this gets allied to a general sense of entitlement that pervades British society both on the roads and off them. Safety should be everybody's number one concern on the roads, not shaving one or two minutes off the overall journey time. There seems so little awareness of the danger many drivers pose every time they get behind the wheel, to themselves and to others.

The OP seems to me to reflect this lack of self-awareness on the roads. The odd few mph over the limit here and there is likely to be just the tip of the iceberg. These were the few times over a relatively short period, when somebody was there to catch it. The fact that it was several instances over a short period will not be because he was unlucky and happened to be passing a speed camera on the two two or three occasions a year he slipped marginally over the limit; it will be a reflection of his general attitude to driving and his belief he is entitled to drive faster than the law permits. Even if he was inattentive for a few brief moments every so often, that would still be no excuse. Drivers should be fully in control of their vehicles at all times; if their speed wanders then they are not in control and they are not driving with due care and attention. If all motor vehicles had a needle in the seat that jabbed an inch into the driver's backside every time they strayed 1mph over the current limit I am sure every single one of them would quickly find it within their capabilities to keep below the limit. You don't have to driver permanently on the limit; just keep below it. It's Bryan's attitude to driving that has got him the ban; not bad luck or a harsh judge. I'm afraid I have no sympathy with him on this one.

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I'm afraid the 10% + thing doesn't apply. I got done for doing 34mph in a 30 once.

Sorry, Gunny, but getting caught three times in a matter of moments is absolutely stupid in the extreme. Maybe he needs to lose some weight as he clearly has a heavy foot.

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The 10 per cent thing I always thought was to account for the equipment/speed cameras used to do the measuring being slightly out. In other words, if you go at what your car says is 30mph but you’re clocked doing 32 because of the camera being slightly out, that wouldn’t be fair to punish you. If you’re caught doing 36 in a 30 zone though, the camera wouldn’t be that wrong, meaning you must have been going over what your car said was 30mph. 

I haven’t got much sympathy for him on this one. If he’d been caught once, doing 60 in a 50 zone on one of those roads where it feels like it should be a 60 and he just didn’t realise, I’d sympathise as it probably was just a mistake. Persistently being 5-10 miles over though, it isn’t going to save you much time, it isn’t that hard to go 5 mph slower and if you’ve already got a few points, why would you not pay more attention to how quick you’re going?

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What drives me potty, are these 'Smart Motorways' when for no reason they put it down to 60 or 50mph

Then there's times when I'm on the M4 outside Swindon and it I'm doing 70 mph I'm the slowest around !

Edited by SwindonCanary

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I've been driving twenty years and don't have any points on my licence, which doesn't mean I don't speed.

A policeman friend says that there's either a police presence because residents have complained about speeding traffic, or you get cameras because it's potentially dangerous. Unless you've got a bad attitude, it's pretty hard to get banned.

Edited by Icecream Snow
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Unless I'm mistaken that 10% + 2 rule is actually the minimum speed you would get done for under those guidelines. so getting done for doing 35mph in a 30 would be correct. 

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I had to spend a few days near Birmingham the other week, and on one part of the M6, for quite a few miles, there was a 60 miles an hour limit. It was very noticeable (over each of those days) how smooth the traffic flow was, with nobody breaking the limit by more than a 1 or 2 miles an hour! No inadvertent braking/pulling out etc, causing temporary problems. Quite a stress free environment 🙂  

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1 hour ago, Icecream Snow said:

I've been driving twenty years and don't have any points on my licence, which doesn't mean I don't speed.

A policeman friend says that there's either a police presence because residents have complained about speeding traffic, or you get cameras because it's potentially dangerous. Unless you've got a bad attitude, it's pretty hard to get banned.

🎖🏆🏅🥇🥈🥉😁

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10 hours ago, Crabbycanary3 said:

I had to spend a few days near Birmingham the other week, and on one part of the M6, for quite a few miles, there was a 60 miles an hour limit. It was very noticeable (over each of those days) how smooth the traffic flow was, with nobody breaking the limit by more than a 1 or 2 miles an hour! No inadvertent braking/pulling out etc, causing temporary problems. Quite a stress free environment 🙂  

Yes; it's based on fluid mechanics. When there is the same number of vehicles heading down a narrow channel then a load of the vehicles trying to travel faster than the others doesn't help; it only causes disruption and a rough ride. Think of emptying a bottle of water; you tip it upside down to try to get the liquid out as swiftly as possible and you can feel the resistance and see the disruption. Or you give it a squeeze to force it out quicker but then there are repeated delays (stop-start, stop-start) while the air feeds back into the bottle for you to press again. The quickest way to get the water out of the bottle is to slow down the flow so it leaves the bottle smoothly. It feels as though it is taking longer than it should but it is quicker than the alternatives that require less patience. Too many drivers still don't seem to 'get' that about busy roads; they are only interested in how quickly they think they can get out of the area and can't see they are the ones causing the congestion and the bottlenecks. This is what the 50mph or 60mph sections of smart motorways are designed to achieve. Very few things are done "for no reason"; the frustration road users feel is usually from not knowing what those reasons are.

Edited by Chip20
Because I'm a fat-fingered fool.

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The traffic would also flow a lot more smoothly if everybody would:

a) check their mirrors before changing lanes

b) indicate their intention to pull out and wait for a suitable opportunity instead of just pulling out regardless (sometimes blinking the indicator once after they have commenced the manoeuvre as something of an afterthought)

c) Be continuously aware of the impact their actions are having on other road users (and actually being bothered about it).

As I mentioned above, there is far too much complacency on the roads and, I would add, lack of risk awareness. People get away with it, and get away with it, and get away with it until one day they don't and the results can scar whole families for life. There were 1,793 deaths on UK roads in 2017 and I bet not one of the people who caused the respective accidents spent one second between setting off and the moment of impact thinking to themselves "I could kill somebody by my actions today". I bet they all thought they were good drivers (or cyclists or pedestrians) because they had never caused anybody's death before.

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8 minutes ago, Chip20 said:

The traffic would also flow a lot more smoothly if everybody would:

a) check their mirrors before changing lanes

b) indicate their intention to pull out and wait for a suitable opportunity instead of just pulling out regardless (sometimes blinking the indicator once after they have commenced the manoeuvre as something of an afterthought)

c) Be continuously aware of the impact their actions are having on other road users (and actually being bothered about it).

As I mentioned above, there is far too much complacency on the roads and, I would add, lack of risk awareness. People get away with it, and get away with it, and get away with it until one day they don't and the results can scar whole families for life. There were 1,793 deaths on UK roads in 2017 and I bet not one of the people who caused the respective accidents spent one second between setting off and the moment of impact thinking to themselves "I could kill somebody by my actions today". I bet they all thought they were good drivers (or cyclists or pedestrians) because they had never caused anybody's death before.

Yep, my thoughts exactly. Too many selfish people, which is indicative of more than just driving on motorways, I am sad to say

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No sympathy here, 9 points already on his license and these offences means he has been speeding 6 times! Think of all the times he wasn't caught, I bet it's in the thousands. He's a repeat offender that clearly believes the rules don't apply to him, needs to be taught a lesson, 6 months is soft if you ask me, lucky to not be disqualified completely.

Just do the speed limit it's really not that difficult, there is no excuse for it.

Edited by Ginja

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This is selective reporting op you forget to mention that prior to these offences he had already accumulated 9 points on his license in 2017. Clearly he did not learn his lesson.

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36 minutes ago, Ginja said:

Just do the speed limit it's really not that difficult, there is no excuse for it.

Even the most concsientious drivers can be caught out.  I try my hardest to stay under the speed limit but got caught out overtaking on a dual carriage way passing a lorry in what I thought was the safest manner - by accelerating - and went just over the 70 limit just as a camera van "got" me. 

My view was always that you drive to conditions, but the modern way seems to be that your awareness is now focussing on instruments rather than what road conditions are like.   Travelling along a 40mph motorway "average speed" restriction for 15 miles at 7.00am on Christmas morning, when the road was completely empty was a bizzarre experience.

Cameras are clumsy in what they do and cannot judge circumstances.  For all that, they are probably useful in making people drive slower, but they catch the conscientious drivers as well as the serial offenders and that is their downside.

Technology applied well is useful, but too much technology applied badly is  not - if you want good driving, teach people how to drive to conditions, not turn them into robots......oh I forgot...most people are conditioned into robotic behaviour anyway, it's what computers and smart phones have done to us.....

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Your post needs expanding on LDC

You try your hardest? Don't press the accelerator so hard?

Safest manner to over take a lorry at above the speed limit? I don't get that. Was it raining/icy? What was the lorry actually doing?If so, it's just one of those times where you have to hold back (and under the speed limit) 

As for driving to the conditions, then why not, on a sunny clear day, when there is an empty lane in front of you, do as the europeans do, and bomb it at 120 mph? The instruments you talk about focusing on, have been in cars since the dawn of (motoring) time.

If drivers were that conscientious, they wouldn't get fined

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1 hour ago, lake district canary said:

oh I forgot...most people are conditioned into robotic behaviour anyway, it's what computers and smart phones have done to us.....

No I think it's what societal expectations and pressures have done to us... Such as, "You must learn to drive" or "BUY A HOUSE" or "get married and have 2.4 children"

One can choose, in life, whether they want to aspire to these things. Same as they can choose to have a smart phone or computer.

I am not sure how you're posting on this forum without either, LDC 😉

Edited by BobLoz3
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1 hour ago, lake district canary said:

Even the most conscientious drivers can be caught out. I try my hardest to stay under the speed limit but got caught out overtaking on a dual carriage way passing a lorry in what I thought was the safest manner - by accelerating - and went just over the 70 limit just as a camera van "got" me. 

Everybody makes mistakes is true, which is why we have leeway like the 10% + 2 and the Speed Awareness Course but ultimately if you are a good driver and make the effort to stay within the speed limits it's very unlikely you'll ever get points on your license.

If you are caught speeding there is no one to blame but yourself. Breaking the speed limit to overtake a lorry that couldn't be doing more than 60 is not an excuse. Just drive the speed limit, it really is simple.

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On 19/02/2019 at 18:52, Mello Yello said:

Maybe those speeding offences were committed whilst he was reversing....?  😉 

Reminds me of the time when a colleague of mine was taken to court for speeding and got off quite lightly.......

.......because the prosecution forgot to mention he was towing a boat at the time.

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