Don't most gatso speed cameras face towards the vehicle now, and straight at the drivers face, thus it becomes a little harder to hand the points off to other people?

And no I wouldn't. I'm still learning to drive, but the way I see it, if I make the mistake I should be willing to pay for it.

Humberside police 'let me off' my last potential three points,
I had to pay £70 and attend a speed seminar, which I thought was better than 3 points and £60.

 

Returning to Humberside was not very nice though.

Gatso are specifically rear facing, but there are indeed some which show the face.

That would be a Truvelo, unless Gatso now make forward facers. But either way, yes, more forward facing ones these days making avoiding points a lot harder. Wear a helmet whilst driving?!

I should also refresh a thread after going to do something for half hour.

Do any of the cameras not need the stripes yet?

Because with those ones there's an guaranteed solution that uses a miraculous technique: slow down when you see stripes.

:T

As a side note, I wonder how many speed cameras are trigged by emergency service vehicles and how much time (and money) it costs forces to have staff filter them out?

they don't filter them out, they send out fines and rely on the emergency people to appeal

Heh. I'd have thought they had a database of reg plates for all emergency vehicles, and simply filter them out automatically.

Infact, given that they must have this info for normal vehicles, I'd be very surprised if they didn't do that. :S

I recently had a speeding fine come through the post and, on the day in question, there were genuinly two people driving at various times during the day

so I wrote back and said "no idea who was driving, can you send the photo"
they did so, and it was taken from behind, quite a long way behind
so I wrote back and said "still no clue, sorry"
they wanted to know who else might have been driving, so I told them that
they then wrote to my mate and said "Mr Cooper says you were driving .. etc"
he wrote back saying "nah, he said we don't know who was driving, cos we don't"
they then tried me again with "Mr Whatsit says he wasn't driving so was it you ... etc"
I replied "he didn't says that, he said we don't know, which we don't and the photo is no help
then they wrote again saying "you have a legal responsibility to tell us who was driving .. etc"
I replied "that maybe so, but since I have no clue I can't"

Their last reply said "ok, we give up, since you've never been caught before we'll let it go this time"

I was so tempted to write back with "what do you mean 'never been caught before '? I haven't been caught time time!"

they may do now, I distinctly remember there being quite a to-do a while ago because some ambulance admin staff were spending hours a week appealing tickets

Is your mate an oompa loompa and/or the tango man?

no, he is not orange, I just don't know as he would want his name online

Aw. I am now dissappointed. :[

Is there any chance he could be painted orange?

It would help settle any further ambiguities about who the driver is! :D

I actually belkive he would be up for being painted almost any colour (he wouldn't allow pink)
wouldn't help with the picture though, since he wasn't painted when it was taken

Great stuff.

 

I've seen a few Ambulances get caught by speed cameras. Mainly at about 5am whilst doing a milk round a few years ago.

were they not able to give you the time and exact location where the photo was taken? It would surely be a rare case that you didn't know given that information?

yes they were, but I was helping someone move house on the day in question, both me and my mate drove the car whenever suited us several/many times throughout the day and the letter came about two weeks later, we just couldn't decide who had been driving at 12:20pm

Remember that emergency services don't have any God given right to speed. It was never explained to me for Ambulances, but Police are meant to write it to the log of whatever it is they are responding. I.e.:

 

12:35 - 999 recieved, female, burglary in progress
12:35 - Unit B2 dispatched
12:39 - B2 through Speed Camera, Whatever Road, Birmingham

 

But even so, it can still be deemed speeding depending upon the circumstances. And it could also be used if that police car took out a pedestrian 300 metres down the road.

 

I'm not saying that I agree with Jons example that Ambulance workers should spend hours appealing it, but I don't think they should just be ignored.

 

For more interesting reading, ask a police officer what happens when they try and PNC a car dangerously driving and it ends up belonging to Whitehall...