EU plans to fit all cars with speed limiters

[Arthur]

I hope this doesn't happen.

 

Source: The Telegraph

 

Under the proposals new cars would be fitted with cameras that could read road speed limit signs and automatically apply the brakes when this is exceeded.

 

Patrick McLoughlin, the Transport Secretary, is said to be opposed to the plans, which could also mean existing cars are sent to garages to be fitted with the speed limiters, preventing them from going over 70mph.

 

The new measures have been announced by the European Commission’s Mobility and Transport Department as a measure to reduce the 30,000 people who die on the roads in Europe every year.

 

A Government source told the Mail on Sunday Mr McLoughlin had instructed officials to block the move because they ‘violated’ motorists’ freedom. They said: “This has Big Brother written all over it and is exactly the sort of thing that gets people's backs up about Brussels.

 

“The Commission wanted his views ahead of plans to publish the proposals this autumn. He made it very clear what those views were.”

 

The source claimed one of the reasons he was against the Intelligent Speed Adaptation (ISA) scheme is that the UK has a better road safety record than other European countries – with 1,754 people dying in road accidents last year compared to 3,657 in Germany.

 

The scheme would work either using satellites, which would communicate limits to cars automatically, or using cameras to read road signs. Drivers can be given a warning of the speed limit, or their speed could be controlled automatically under the new measures.

 

A spokesman for the European Commission said: “There is a currently consultation focusing on speed-limiting technology already fitted to HGVs and buses.

 

“Taking account of the results, the Commission will publish in the autumn a document by its technical experts which will no doubt refer to ISA among many other things.”

[elsiegee40]

Impractical. To do this they would have to standardise speed limits across the EU... and nobody would buy a new car.

[Flatpackhamster]

Impractical. To do this they would have to standardise speed limits across the EU... and nobody would buy a new car.

 

Since when did a lack of practicality stop the EU Commission from applying a de facto standard on something across 27 divergent nations?

[pete]

I can't see this working. If I get mud on the camera lens, what happens? Do I need to stop in a layby and clean it before it'll go more than 30?

 

But I also see no point in having a set speed limit if all cars are using this. Better would be to remove speed limits entirely and adjust the speed so the cars fit into the flow of traffic smoothly.

[elsiegee40]

Like the Germans will give up their right to do whatever speed they want on the unlimited sections of the autobahn?!

[synaesthesia]

Seems like a double edged knife to me. Sometimes that little extra speed is vital to escape an accident (certainly been the case for me a couple of times!) Of course everyone doing only the speed limit would help prevent that, but in both the cases I remember where exceeding the speed limit has saved my (and their!) arses the other vehicle wasn't exceeding the limit either.

Humans can react to issues like that better than any robot, unfortunately being human we also create issues like that. Personally, I'd say they're better off not bothering with this sort of mumbo-jumbo until we're all using governed, self-driving cars. (I, Robot anyone?)

[SYNACK]

Can you imagine the stink Clarkson would kick up, it would be hilarious. I agree with the above post though.

[pcstru]

Sounds like another staple of the silly season, a story about how Brussels will ban bendy bananas, force us to drink out of litre glasses and demand our first born weigh exactly 3.5Kg at birth. There is probably a grain of truth which will turn out to be something like they are looking at speed limiters for articulated passenger carrying milk floats.

[theriver]

Actually, this looks quite sensible (but then I've read the EU's version of the document on ISA, not the scary British press version ;-) )

 

EU - Road safety - Intelligent Speed Adaptation (ISA)

 

The consultant's recommendation seems to be for audible warnings, or an accelerator that provides additional resistance at the speed limit, as opposed to forced braking.

 

HOWEVER, it's also worth reading this:

 

European Commission in the UK – Euromyths and Letters to the Editor » Blog Archive » Reports of “Brussels Big Brother Bid” to impose speed controls are inaccurate beyond the limit

 

. . . which seems to be part of a series of "Oh for goodness sake, we DIDN'T SAY THAT" posts maintained on the EU website, and which states that the press:

 

'chooses to leave out the first and most important sentence given to the paper’s reporter, which was this:

 

“The Commission has not tabled – and does not have in the pipeline – even a non-binding Recommendation, let alone anything more.”'

[sparkeh]

Heh another misreported EU scare story

 

Though to be honest I can't see the issue with limiting cars to the speed limit, why do cars need to go faster? I can kinda see the argument about need a bit extra speed in certain circumstances, but then there are plenty of vehicles limited to speeds under the speed limit and it doesn't seem to effect the crash statistics for vans/trucks/lorries.

 

No, I think opposition to this idea is more about people liking to drive fast and not liking being told what to do.

Edited September 3, 2013 by sparkeh

[mats]

Heh another misreported EU scare story

..

No, I think opposition to this idea is more about people liking to drive fast and not liking being told what to do.

 

Got it in one. Speeding is antisocial, but most people think it's a harmless crime.

[broc]

Far better they invest effort in technology to maintain safe distances between cars when on the move, as pioneered by companies like Volvo & others. BMW have an adaptive cruise control option that uses front parking sensors to maintain a safe distance from the car in front which varies by speed. My satnav has an option to generate an audible alert if you exceed the speed limit, it uses speed limit data stored in the mapping info. A smarter system would be to incorporate some form of electronic tag in a speed sign that was read by the car & alerted the driver if they were exceeding the limit?

[timbo343]

I remember seeing this many years ago on eitger a news program or sonething like tomorrows world. They had the camera mounted on the dash inside the car.

 

I can see it been both good and bad but what about when the time comes when you need to use a little bit more speed to over take say a tractor or a bus or ... you get the picture.

[Arthur]

why do cars need to go faster?

How would you overtake on the motorway if car drivers are doing 70mph in all three lanes?

[Jamman960]

I'm not sure camera's could be used safely, automatic breaking certainly couldn't - what happens when someone decides to change a national sign on a motorway to 30?

 

and where do they stop? they'll either end up using satillite controlled limiting or as someone mentioned they'd need tags in or around signs although these could still be open to abuse. If they go down the limiting route its only a matter of time before they have the ability to target individual vehicles, do we really want to live in a society where our car gets slowed down to 10mph or less because we have outstanding parking fines or because someone else has used your plates to steal petrol?

 

I don't normally go for the tin foil stuff but once these things come into force they never go away, they only ever get "improved" upon

[sparkeh]

How would you overtake on the motorway if car drivers are doing 70mph in all three lanes?

Ok I'll counter with, the speed limit is 70mph, if you need to go faster to overtake, you shouldn't be overtaking

[sonofsanta]

The camera idea wouldn't work, far too many speed signs round here get spun around because there's nothing better for bored teenagers to do in Lincolnshire.

 

I think tailgating is a far more dangerous and pressing issue than speed. On a straight road in clear conditions, everyone could drive at 110mph safely if they left the recommended braking distance. The same road and same conditions could be a multiple pile-up & fatality if everyone was driving up bumpers at 40mph.

 

But as the EU have pointed out, they are just brainstorming ideas for discussion and have absolutely no intention of enforcing this at the moment. It's just an investigation. But where's the headline in that

 

The fact that the driving test is so poorly related to actual driving, and that no-one ever has to retest to confirm their roadworthiness, also don't help. Mandatory advanced testing within two years! Retests every decade! /bangs drum

[unixman_again]

I don't see it as being a problem. Many trucks have speed limiters and they managed to get from A to B just fine.

[synaesthesia]

Trucks can't ever use a little boost of extra speed to get out of a sticky situation. They don't need to, they're big.

[Flatpackhamster]

Sounds like another staple of the silly season, a story about how Brussels will ban bendy bananas, force us to drink out of litre glasses and demand our first born weigh exactly 3.5Kg at birth. There is probably a grain of truth which will turn out to be something like they are looking at speed limiters for articulated passenger carrying milk floats.

 

Re: 'bendy' bananas - there is EU legislation which specifies the bend of bananas.

[Flatpackhamster]

Actually, this looks quite sensible (but then I've read the EU's version of the document on ISA, not the scary British press version ;-) )

 

EU - Road safety - Intelligent Speed Adaptation (ISA)

 

I'm not sure I agree with the term 'sensible'. There are complex technical issues, civil liberties issues and serious questions about representation of the people.

 

 

HOWEVER, it's also worth reading this:

 

European Commission in the UK – Euromyths and Letters to the Editor » Blog Archive » Reports of “Brussels Big Brother Bid” to impose speed controls are inaccurate beyond the limit

 

“The Commission has not tabled – and does not have in the pipeline – even a non-binding Recommendation, let alone anything more.”'

 

Actually, the Commission has been attempting something of this nature for nearly eight years. The speed control system wouldn't use onboard cameras or anything as simplistic. Every car will be fitted with a GPS tracker which is tied to the EU's Galileo satellite system. That will report, very accurately, the car's location and allow speed limiting to be managed. It also allows the EU to roll out its planned road pricing scheme.

 

For those not in the know, road safety is an EU competence. That means that the EU makes the laws and applies them to member states. So even if we wanted to block this, we can't. It would be like trying to block laws on agriculture or fisheries.

[SYNACK]

Far better they invest effort in technology to maintain safe distances between cars when on the move, as pioneered by companies like Volvo & others. BMW have an adaptive cruise control option that uses front parking sensors to maintain a safe distance from the car in front which varies by speed. My satnav has an option to generate an audible alert if you exceed the speed limit, it uses speed limit data stored in the mapping info. A smarter system would be to incorporate some form of electronic tag in a speed sign that was read by the car & alerted the driver if they were exceeding the limit?

I totally agree, this is a simple narrowminded approach especially when there are way better technologies that already exist which would do a much better job at the petty eu middle managers say they want. If they are going to bother doing it they may as well do it right rather than use it as a platform to artificially boost the deployment footprint of their nav sat system, really just mandate it in all phones or something, way easier.

[Flatpackhamster]

I totally agree, this is a simple narrowminded approach especially when there are way better technologies that already exist which would do a much better job at the petty eu middle managers say they want. If they are going to bother doing it they may as well do it right rather than use it as a platform to artificially boost the deployment footprint of their nav sat system, really just mandate it in all phones or something, way easier.

 

What you're forgetting is the amount of political capital the EU has invested in the Galileo project. It has to be seen to be a success. In this case the Commission has joined forces with the green lobby to achieve an end they both desire. The Commission gets a purpose for its $10Bn boondoggle, and the green lobby gets to leash motorists ever more tightly. Motorists will have to pay to have these GPS thingies fitted, although how they're planning to retrofit it to older cars, particularly those with carburettors, is beyond me.

[Gibbo]

Heh another misreported EU scare story

 

Spot on, same as the one from last year about how they'd make modified cars illegal:

 

Millions of modified and classic cars could be banned from the roads as meddling European Union try to shake-up MOT rules

Millions of modified and classic cars could be banned from the roads as meddling European Union try to shake-up MOT rules | Mail Online

 

And the truth:

 

Tabloid Watch: 'None of the newspapers checked the facts with us before publication'

[flyinghaggis]

I suspect it's only a matter of time until all cars are fitted with onboard 4G and GPS units which will automatically limit speed based on location. They'll bring it in under the auspice of 'road pricing' initially for electric powered vehicles once the government start losing revenue due to motorists switching from fossil based fuels to electric!

 

One thing you can be sure of is that motoring will never get cheaper as the gov know fine motorists are cash cows there to be milked for every penny....