Viewing 20 posts - 41 through 60 (of 60 total)
  • Average speed cameras on the A9.
  • piemonster
    Full Member

    Slightly OT Drac, but I’m curious. Do you know what the average daily call out rate for ground based paramedics is?

    br
    Free Member

    I drive along at a steady 50 in my van and I’m constantly getting flashed by HGVs that somehow manage to catch up with me

    Probably due to their speedo been accurate and yours over-reading. So they’re doing showing 45mph and actually doing 45mpg whereas you’re showing 50mph and actually doing 45mph.

    And they are paid to drive as fast as possible (within the limits).

    Maybe someone needs to check with the big trucking/retail/distribution firms what speed they EXPECT their drivers to average across the A9?

    But, I’d say that a more likely contributing factor is the unability of car drivers to overtake properly, and the cameras will just make them more likely to just sit behind slower moving vehicles.

    Drac
    Full Member

    Not daily but some info here http://www.neas.nhs.uk/about-us/who-we-are-and-what-we-do.aspx

    It’ll be easily 1k – 1.2k calls per day

    piemonster
    Full Member

    VFR weather permitting on par with what we are doing, at least for the last fortnight. Although we don’t have 2000 staff. More like 17.

    Interesting, I’ll have to dig out the Scottish equivalent of that page.

    scotroutes
    Full Member

    b r – I should have said that I do account for speedo error

    Drac
    Full Member

    VFR?

    Sorry I’m rubbish with acronyms.

    rosscopeco
    Free Member

    Coming from Inverness and now living in Glasgow, we frequently travel North and beyond to see my family. I’ve stopped counting how many time I’ve driven the A9 and been ‘stressed’ by the time it’s over. Depending on the time of day we now tend to take the slightly slower A82 as opposed to a stressed out trip up the A9.

    IMO I find it rather bemusing when people pass me a great speed on the dual bits and then cannie overtake for toffee and sit behind slower vehicles when the road is clear and safe for overtaking. Over the years I driven both roads rather swiftly and sometimes very sedately. I’ve learned that by sitting at a steady 60ish we often only take a few minutes longer than if I drive like a demon. That being said I would still seize most OT opportunities that came my way.

    Again, IME and with the exception of the summer ‘tourist’ months I’ve found the A82 offers a far ‘safer and less stressful’ road to travel on. Why? IMO it’s because the queues of traffic very seldom form in the same way as they do on the A9 and therefore there aren’t as many ‘frustrated’ folk trying to find as many ‘near death’ experiences as they can on the A9. I enjoy driving and as above the A82 usually only takes a few minutes longer if I sit at a steady 60 AND take every OT opportunity.

    Will average speed cameras work on the A9? IMO it depends on how what we mean by ‘work’. My fear would be that the queues could just get worse because some less confident drivers may be less inclined to overtake the slower vehicles because of the cameras. IMO that could lead to even more frustration and in turn result in more daft overtaking manoeuvres by some.

    Good / bad drivers are a constant. Some people are confident drivers and will safely overtake whilst some aren’t so confident and will be less inclined to overtake. All types of drivers can cause crashes. You can be the best driver in the world but if some nutter pulls out in front of you, your’e still brown bread.

    It’s a state of mind, ‘Drive prettily’ as my old man always says.

    zokes
    Free Member

    VFR?

    Visual flight regulations / rules – I assume he’s aircraft-based

    Drac
    Full Member

    Cheers Zokes.

    Aircraft doing 1,000 jobs a day errrr really?

    scotroutes
    Full Member

    Tesco trucks are noticeable by the way they stick to speed limits and regularly pull in to allow overtaking. Mind you, there are a lot less now they have their own freight train.

    piemonster
    Full Member

    Ha ha, how did I miss read that.

    1 to 2 flights a day.

    Drac
    Full Member

    Ah that’s more like it.

    😆

    geoffj
    Full Member

    We’re quite a way into this years fatality season for the A9, and it seems better than in previous years.
    Travelling north on it yesterday though, I saw some of the worst driving I’ve ever done on that or any other road. Caravans, 40mph HGVs, motorbikes and locals in a hurry can be a pretty potent mix.

    piemonster
    Full Member

    Given the chance on the A9 I find a truck moving at a decent speed and hide behind it.

    Drac, I think what I was really curious about was the number of call outs per crew per day.

    Drac
    Full Member

    Drac, I think what I was really curious about was the number of call outs per crew per day.

    Too many variants there for that as you can see it covers a big geographical area so you have city crews that have short runs to hospital and bigger workload then we have community single crewed vehicles that do well not very much at all.

    City crew sI’d say at least 12 jobs per shift, rural town crew such as where I work who have at least 50m+ round trip to hospital then 5-6 jobs per shift. All crews work more or less 12 hours per day.

    bigjim
    Full Member

    I’d have preferred them to have the signs in minutes rather than miles

    I’m absolutely sure the yellow digital signs last weekend were in minutes not miles, but I found them to be a bit misleading, probably because the traffic wasn’t going the speed the signs were calculated at!

    I’ve learned that by sitting at a steady 60ish we often only take a few minutes longer than if I drive like a demon

    Yep if it is busy and people are doing that stupid overtaking one car a time, you still arrive at the destination/next cagged up bit a few seconds or minutes behind the cars that are risking their own and everyone else’s lives by overtaking car by car in tiny gaps (which must be a small penis thing or something), so I just cruise along and pass lorries on the dual bits, stop at house of Pooar, ice cream at the Hermitage, happy days.

    IainAhh
    Full Member

    Don’t know if anyone has said this already but the A9 is a fairly unique road. It was designed as a dual road which is particulary noticable round about Aviemore. The layout and sweeping bends are for a dual carriageway which most of was never built. There are hardly any straight bits most of which were added / altered later.

    Now a lot of these bends you can overtake with a fastish car particularly if a single vehicle. But when big queues for it can get pretty crazy.

    The speed difference is the main problem. Personally i don’t really want to drive at 45mph on all the 2 way stretches.

    Coming from Inverness originally and still going up the road regularly i have driven it 100’s of times. It is much much more busy in recent years.

    My A9 driver grumbles.

    1) Nutter overtaking – trying to kill people.
    2) Slow 40-45 mph vehicles that never pull over
    3) People don’t leave gaps. and you wonder why people overtake 2 lorries and 3 cars in one go.
    4) 60 mph or less on 2 way 80-85mph on dual WHY?
    5) Wackey races on overtaking lanes & dual sections. hands up myself included.
    6) Nutter overtaking followed by 60 ish holding others up.

    Recently drove up late evening was bliss cruised up no bother. Will be doing that again.

    Inbred456
    Free Member

    20yrs ago on the A9 my wife who went on an intensive driving course in Dunkeld witnessed a full head on about 4 cars ahead of her. That has stayed with her for life. The only other incident was a drunk falling out of a pub in Pitlochry on to the bonnet of her car! We are always very careful when visiting family and friends up there. We play spot the numpty and count how many near misses there are while keeping a good distance from the car in front.

    mcmoonter
    Free Member

    I had a close call last time I drove south on the A9 between the two stretches of dual carriageway near Ralia.

    The car in front was traveling well below 60 but hugging the centre line on the single carriageway. It had tinted windows so visibility through the car was impossible and the long sweeping arc of the road made a temporary blind spot for me. I was a couple of car lengths behind him when suddenly without indicating he dived towards the hard shoulder line crossing it. A nanosecond later I realized why, some idiot in a Mini was overtaking a lorry heading towards us. I can only guess they thought they were still on a dual section, but there was the car in front of me, myself and a couple of cars behind me heading towards the oncoming Mini.

    You can never build safety into a road when people are driving with that recklessness or incompetence.

    I fear that the introduction of speed cameras will make that sort of incident more common.

    I regularly see people driving too close to each other, standing on their brakes and unable to maintain a safe diastance between the cars in front.

    Signage has improved on the road, but so too has traffic.

    IainAhh
    Full Member

    There was a fatal head on crash at the sloch a couple of years ago where a van was on the wrong side of the road.
    The first car coming the other way saw it an swerved off the road. They were ok. The second in line car didn’t and hit head on. They didn’t survive. Where it was you would not expect something coming on the wrong side.

    Not related but l totally agree mcmoonter many people drive too close.

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