Speed limiters could be fitted to all new cars under government plans to fall in line with a controversial European Union ruling.
We don’t need to so why would we?
Speed limiters could be fitted to all new cars under government plans to fall in line with a controversial European Union ruling.
We don’t need to so why would we?
Our politicians will be chomping at the bit to have this power. Sadiq Khan will enforce a blanket 25km/h speed limit across London (yes, he’ll do it in km/h to infuriate his opponents).
The truth is, Britain already has the safest roads in the world (depending which metric you use we’re tied with Sweden). Europe should follow our lead, not vice-versa.
Our betters just cannot allow law breaking or tolerate the idea that some people actually enjoy the driving experience, so will do everything in their power to stop it.
It’s ok, it won’t happen, because we’ve got a Conserv….
Oh.
They may have second thoughts about it when they realise the loss of “income” when “speeding” is no longer a possibility. Also, the additional unemployment boost when the “safety camera” partnerships are made redundant.
@ Baron J
They are printing and borrowing money we don’t have and will realistically never pay back – I can only assume that they have bigger plans in mind and the loss of jobs and tax revenues doesn’t concern them at all. If it did I can name a dozen other things they wouldn’t be doing eg quadrupling the cost of energy.
I’m going to make myself very unpopular here & say, despite the fact I drive a performance car, I’m actually in favour of the idea.
Came home along our 3 lane coast highway last night. Limit 120. There’s trucks in the nearside lane & because there’s some long uphill drags, speeds in that lane can drop below 80. I’m in the middle lane doing just under the 120. The outside they’re nose to tail at 140. Then you get the clowns, that’s not fast enough for them. So they’re trying to undertake in the middle lane. I’ve even seem them trying to do it in the nearside lane when there’s a long clear stretch. Had one of those pushing my back bumper & flashing his lights. I just ignored him. Move into the nearside lane & you’ll never get back out of it. Then the inevitable happens. Somewhere up ahead one truck tries to pass another, cars behind try to get into the outside lane to pass & the brake lights go on for as far as you can see ahead. So probably 2 or 3 kilometres back behind those overtaking trucks, we’re down to walking pace. Took several kilometres of crawl before things got going again. No accident. Just bad driving. That Spanish drivers shouldn’t be trusted with a vehicle doesn’t have a leg at each corner is a given, but Brits are no better. Exactly the same thing regularly happens on the M25 with much bigger hold ups.
You can model traffic flows with fluid dynamics. You get smooth flows when the difference in speed of the parts of the flow are low. The greater the difference, the more the turbulence. Which is what those hold ups are. There’s a lower limit on speeds because some of the vehicles on roads are incapable of going any faster. Those heavy trucks on hills. So anything going faster than them will create turbulence. The faster the more. If everyone stuck to the 120 limit, we’d all go a lot faster. But the greater the traffic density, the lower the efficient flow velocity. Busy Friday nights, it’d probably be quicker at 100. The cunt in the outside lane thinks he’s Lewis Hamilton is making your journey slower.
I just wonder if this is a slippery slope type of thing. First they introduce things that warn you but don’t prevent you going faster than the speed limit. Then they change the software and all speed infractions are uploaded to a central place and fines automatically issued. They they change it again and it won’t allow you to speed.
…and if I stick fake foreign plates on the car from some country that doesn’t have a chip regime?
Business Opportunity.
Hacking speed limiters to disable them, just like remapping an ECU.
Be illegal of course, but so what? Doesn’t stop people unlocking phones and changing IMEI.
And another reason to become Cuban in your motoring.
We don’t need to so why would we?
Homogenisation. Manufacturers aren’t going to make a special Brexit version unfortunately.
@BiS – that’s not a speed issue, it’s a moron issue. If people used lanes appropriately and made brisk progress when passing then returned to the nearside lane – and, importantly, remain in the nearside lane until they can do that – the problem of turbulence disappears. It’s just that we are surrounded by people who managed to drive well enough for half an hour to convince an examiner that they deserved to have a licence.
BiS
I experienced something like what you’re describing when one of the counties (Wiltshire iirc) started doing speed cameras on the M4. Everyone drove at 70 on the nearside lane, moving out only to overtake slow moving trucks and cars. Very smooth.
It isn’t just the Lewis Hamiltons of course, the flow is also impeded by the moron in the middle lane doing 55 – which also causes ripples.
What new cars? ICE cars banned and no electricity for unaffordable EVs.
I suppose nit having a car is a speed limiter.
BiS
Roads are not always as congested as your experience. Even the M25 in the small hours is relatively empty.
Hence, you are arguing for sensible changes to driving habits, even intelligent flexi-speed limits according to conditions on major routes, not speed limiters in cars.
On the basis that it’s only a tiny minority who continually push for all this stuff, how on earth did we get here? Why do the majority allow these people to exercise such extraordinary power over us?
And yes, we know we’re a majority. Consider how many people you personally know that would be champing at the bit for all the crap that is continually pushed. In my case, and I can’t believe that I’m simply lucky in this context, it’s an insignificant %, and often easily identifiable (or confirmed) by their wider behaviour.
Where I’ve driven on roads with average speed cameras (rather than a few fixed positions the morons all suddenly brake at before darting off again) it’s been noticeably smoother.
These speed limiters are not going to physically prevent the car from speeding but they are going to do something annoying like a chime sound if you do. If they become a required feature presumably they’ll be tested at MOT so people don’t disable it.
I thought it would be obvious. They’re going to hand-wring and talk about the added complications for the car manufacturers, but the truth is they want everyone tracked and identified. Same reason they tried to get everyone using QR codes for the last 3 years.
Speaking of ripple effects, back when I was regularly driving the M25 we used to joke that if someone dropped their change at the Dartford tunnel toll booth, traffic at the Woking junction would grind to a halt.
So they brought in variable speed limits which appeared to do absolutely nothing to fix the problem.
But as John B says, the problem will soon go away. We’ll own nothing and be happy.
@Longrider: yes, I saw this seriously put forward when this was mooted a year or two back.
The Coninental manufacturers can make cars with the wheel on the right for UK usage. But refraining from fitting the speed limiter would be technically impossible.
@Longrider
“Homogenisation. Manufacturers aren’t going to make a special Brexit version unfortunately.”
I don’t buy this argument. They already make RHD cars for a small number of markets. How hard would it be to leave out the speed limiter module, or disable the firmware or something?
If this happens it’s because the government wants it.
Come to think of it, this is a good demonstration of revealed preferences.
If the EU brings this in, and Mercedes, BMW etc truly believe they can’t not fit the speed limiter, then let them offer speed-limited RHD cars to the UK market.
British drivers can then choose what cars they’d like to buy.
And wot LR said BTW. This has been direction of travel (hah!) for the automotive industry for a while now. Along with other things like automatic braking for pedestrians. The scale car manufacturing works at, it’s wishful thinking to believe there were ever going to be extra-dangerous Brexit cars just to satisfy the British need for added excitement in life or the fact we tend to drive surprisingly safely compared to peers even without such aids. The way features work, a sufficiently large market can have a say in requiring standards to be higher – California shove their weight around on this front – and shunt them in a direction they find preferable, but you can’t do much about forcing standards down by imposing laxer ones, since manufacturers will work to satisfy the more stringent ones.
The main problem group for car accidents is young (late teens to twenties) and largely male. They don’t always drive sensibly and if a bit of tech keeps them alive and without serious injury, so much the better. Costs a small fortune in NHS treatments and benefits when they get disabled in car crashes. Don’t ask me how I effing know this but I have some stories and the selfish turds annoy me – if you weren’t safe to drive, don’t drive, and for goodness sake don’t take the consequences at my expense. Even if they die, which is cheaper, they’re still a net tax negative, having been funded through childhood and education without having paid it back. Plus there’s a decent chance if I die in a multi-car collision or get knocked down when walking, it’s going to be by one of these brats. It’s going to take years before modern safety tech works its way through the second-hand market down to the kind of bangers these kids drive so might as well get on with it.
Sadly I don’t foresee a world where different ranges of additional driver aids are going to be compulsory based on the age of driver. So if I have to live with my dashboard bleeping at me when I need a bit of extra speed to complete a manoeuvre more safely, I’ll take it.
“truth is they want everyone tracked and identified”
Gonna be an issue if they bring in road pricing.
Speed limiters is different tech – cameras plus GPS figure out local speed limit, bleep at you if you break it. Doesn’t send your info anywhere.
@Longrider & ken. Sorry, that’s bollocks. It’s the lane changing that causes the turbulence. The ideal situation is slow traffic in the inside lane, say 15 mph below the UK limit in the middle, 70 in the outside. Reduces speed differences to a minimum & makes lane changing easier. The worst thing is having someone doing the limit in the middle lane then trying to pull out into the faster stream to overtake slower cars. That’s what ends up as 4 mile tailback.
Good idea, Mr Nerd. After all, BMW don’t fit indicators, do they?
PF, the M25 is relatively empty in the wee small hours because it is shut for maintenance, as I know to my cost and frustration!
If I wrote the rules of the road, I’d ban anyone from driving wearing a hat….
Anither thought has ocurred to me- a boss move for debating with people advocating thus stuff.
If people are seriously contending that carmakers can make their UK-bound cars RHD, but can’t leave out the EU-mandated speed limiter:
‘…what that DOES prove is that YOU think we’re stupid.’
If I wrote the rules of the road, I’d ban anyone from driving wearing a hat….
The hat is a symptom. The best thing would be to leave hats as an identifier and remove the wearers for some other reason.
Just ban young males from driving cars – motorbikes should do for them. Then they may happily kill themselves but are unlikely to kill many others. If they are too sissie for motorbikes they can use electric scooters.
We don’t need to so why would we?
Because we haven’t really left.
.
It’ll be interesting to see what effect speed limiters have on the car market. Surely people will eventually feel like idiots buying performance cars that can’t perform, and if that happens then a significant chunk of marketing disappears.
The US has passed legislation mandating “kill switches” for new cars by 2026:
https://www.musclecarsandtrucks.com/biden-infrastructure-bill-vehicle-kill-switch-2026/
so soon the police and carjackers will be able to stop you dead.
DM
“Just ban young males from driving cars”
As products of modern education, if pulled over they’ll just identify as girlies and tell the officer that they’re being gennie-phobic.
I first heard this shit 20-plus years ago, back in the days international broadcasters were still on short-wave. Radio Vlaanderen Internationaal had a weekly feature allegedly on the environment that was nothing more than anti-car nutters pushing a bunch of shit, including automatic governors that wouldn’t allow you to go faster than the speed limit. I wrote in telling them I couldn’t wait until hackers changed the system to keep cars from going above stalling speed on the roads to the seaside resorts, and forced the cars to do 100mph through school zones to try to hit more children.
@Anon
Yes, had a quick go-ogle and these things won’t limit the actual speed or engine power (which would be very dangerous), just make a stupid noise, flash a light, vibrate the accelerator slightly or something when you exceed a given speed. A profound disappointment – nay outrage! – to all those wannabe block wardens who imagine that cars will be physically unable to exceed certain speeds
Something to be treated with the contempt it deserves in other words, although cliff knows when a car made in 2022 will find its way into my hands and I can take suitable satisfaction from ignoring it.
I suppose the logical end point of this dictated sanctimoniousness would be a beacon/speaker on the roof which would flash and play la cucaracha or something to provide the requisite trigger warning to the citizenry.
PJF,
“It’ll be interesting to see what effect speed limiters have on the car market. Surely people will eventually feel like idiots buying performance cars that can’t perform, and if that happens then a significant chunk of marketing disappears.”
Do many people even buy performance cars now? I remember in the 80s how many of my work colleagues bought XR3is, Golf GTis or Sierra Cosworths but no-one seems to bother now. I think a combination of factors: even the non-performance versions are reasonably fast cars now, speed cameras, increased insurance costs for young men.
Telegraph front page story here:
https://twitter.com/gregsmith_uk/status/1515254563087003652?t=1EKrfZhIJ-qBlcOyqqa1sQ&s=19
My 6yo motor has an (optional) alerter that beeps if you exceed the speed limit (or a speed that you set). I assume it works, I’ve never tried it.
Bloke on M4, by “performance” I was thinking more in terms of Bentleys and Astons than modern equivalent XR3is, although that level would be affected by the lack of romance trickle down.
. . . even the non-performance versions are reasonably fast cars now . . .
I saw a Jensen Interceptor the other day, which was a muscle car from distant youth. I checked the specs and my mostly bland Skoda Superb (which JC doesn’t like) beats the best one in every way. Modern cars are very good but I think it’s a peak.
So this compulsory limiter is really going to be an alert system – beep or flash if you go over. Sounds like something for an app. DVLA can offer a free download from the app store and I’ll consider.
@Bongo
Yes. Something that could override the driver and take actual control of the car, which is what many people assume, certification and safety wise, would be a distinctly non-trivial exercise. And it has to go on ALL cars remember.
There are apps, Waze and Google Maps will do this for you now, I imagine Apple maps does as well.
Also it’s been a feature of GPS systems for ages, can handy when you are somewhere unfamiliar
Does the technology to do this actually exist? My Toyota has road sign reading, but it’s crap. Sometimes it misses signs, leaving the display at the wrong limit. Other times it hasn’t seen a sign for so long it displays nothing.
If using GPS to get the speed limit, how up to date are the maps? Can they handle variable speed limits such as on the M25?
I don’t think we’re there yet..
I don’t buy this argument.
You don’t have to buy it, this is the reason that will be given and you will lump it.
@Longrider & ken. Sorry, that’s bollocks.
No, it isn’t bollocks. It’s not using the lanes as designed that’s the problem, not the lane changing per se. If you use them appropriately and move back promptly when the overtake has been completed, traffic will flow smoothly. It’s the idiots who move out, don’t get on with it and sit there all day clogging up the overtaking lane that causes the problem.
Surely people will eventually feel like idiots buying performance cars that can’t perform,
That’s a feature, not a bug.
@KyleT
If the speed limiter is something which is a spearate module, it’s useless as people would deliberately remove them – it has to be built into the design to an extent that it’s not removable – hence it’s even in vehicles for markets that don’t requite it.
It’s interesting seeing how people react to speed limiters compared to self-driving cars. In both cases the driver is not in control but one is seen as a safety feature and the other is seen as exceptionally dangerous and needing lots of special testing.
@BNiC / Raffles
Yes my GPS seems to enjoy telling me off if I stray above the limit, has done for ages (decade old I think) but backing that up with in-car cameras that can spot temporary speed limits the GPS can’t is the new bit.
@CJNerd
“If people are seriously contending that carmakers can make their UK-bound cars RHD, but can’t leave out the EU-mandated speed limiter:”
But aside from the obvious, the car-makers make their RHD and LHD identical. And even in the European market, RHD isn’t synonymous with “UK-bound” as it includes ROI and Cyprus too. Can’t see manufacturers wanting to slice up their (already small) RHD segment into even smaller sub-segments unless they absolutely had to, e.g. if UK and EU mandated specifications that are absolutely incompatible with each other so they couldn’t just build cars that tick both sets of boxes. If any UK govt pursued that route, it would push up the price of UK cars much more than it would EU cars, so that’s not a particularly attractive option.
@dearieme
Death rate on motorbikes is atrocious for young lads, and there are fewer technical fixes to reduce it. Uni students driving 15 year-old cars still have massively more modern safety features than they did 20 years back. Is there anything coming round the corner that might cut death rates on bikes?
Distraction surely, get annoyed over this while they make sure we can’t afford to run a car anyway…
Devil’s in the detail of course, limiter vs alert, level of consequent driver distraction etc. Drove a rental car recently that had a small unobstrusive indication of current limit below the speedometer, and single chime when exceeded, with accompanying blink of that limit indicator… Once I’d figured out wtf was going ‘bing’ (eyes tend to be on road rather than instruments), it was pretty useful on roads I didn’t know well.
A limiter or wheel or belt movement alert would be a whole other game
Reminds me of the Mount St Helens story. A couple of motorists observed the explosion and started to get the heck out of there. One drove at the speed limit, the other like a bat out of hell. Only the bat made it out of hell.
If they had limiters, none would have survived. Corner case you say? “If it only saves one life.’
@Mohave
If they had limiters, they’d have had their dashboard beeping at them a lot. Given a choice between that and a volcano, I suspect they’d just have kept their foot on the gas.