The Antidote to BRAKE

Topics relating to Advanced Driving in cars
CautiousD
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Re: The Antidote to BRAKE

Postby CautiousD » Tue Oct 27, 2015 11:27 pm

I was interested to find out who sponsors and supports BRAKE though I'm still not sure what they have to gain from doing so. I'm sure there's a simple explanation for how they attracted so many unconnected (to road safety, driving, road use etc) corporations to add their names to the list of sponsors? I don't get how that works at all and it's not as if I'm not already cynical enough about their motives, though I'm always willing to hear a balanced explanation. :roll: It stinks of the sort of political corruption you just can't quite put your finger on but would require dozens of focussed FOI requests to uncover. It's the sort of thing Channel 4 are quite good at digging up.

I'm also not sure that BRAKE has an equal and opposite antidote, unless you know of any extremist driving groups with friends in high places and parliament. I've seen this topic raised on driving related forums before but the only outcomes I'm aware of weren't much more than noisy agreement between forum members that went nowhere. Is the closest thing we have to this the IAM?

Just my 2p worth which won't make the slightest difference to any of this. I appear to be in the minority of car owners who don't have to drive anywhere eg commute and who own cars for mostly recreation.

martine
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Re: The Antidote to BRAKE

Postby martine » Wed Oct 28, 2015 5:16 pm

Whilst I fundamentally disagree with much of what Brake promote, I don't think there is anything corrupt or untoward about their motives or funding. I just believe they are misguided and naïve and perhaps worse, do themselves a disfavour by being quite extreme in some of their campaigns. (no overtaking, 50mph National Speed Limit, blanket 20mph limit in all towns/villages, discourage car use etc)

No one could not agree with their founding aims to provide support to relatives of those bereaved by RTCs...their extension into the wider road safety debate is more problematic in my view.
Martin - Bristol Advanced Motorists: IMI National Observer, Group Secretary, Masters (dist), DSA: ADI, Fleet, RoSPA (Dip)

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akirk
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Re: The Antidote to BRAKE

Postby akirk » Wed Oct 28, 2015 6:41 pm

I am not sure their name helps - it suggests only one solution - difficult with that name to accept that other options might exist!
Alasdair

CautiousD
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Re: The Antidote to BRAKE

Postby CautiousD » Fri Oct 30, 2015 9:59 am

akirk wrote:I am not sure their name helps - it suggests only one solution - difficult with that name to accept that other options might exist!
Alasdair


Funny you should say that as I was wondering if it was an acronym but as you say, it's a rubbish name.

Agreed Martine, it is skating on thin ice to criticise any organisation for charitable work, unenvious as it is, in the case of BRAKE. But there are always two sides. So do they have trained bereavement counsellors among their number or do they fund visits by independent people? How do they get their referrals to visit or contact affected people? As usual, more questions than answers right now but I think it would be helpful to hold a balanced discussion here about exactly how BRAKE operates, rather than the current narrow-band hatred which pervades the very mention of their name. Know your enemy and all that.

My current opinion of the overall situation of how to improve road safety, centres on how easy it is to obtain a driving license and to keep one without retesting but perhaps that's best left for a separate thread. As I say, my opinion of BRAKE is only of any worth to me and it won't change political will, no matter how often or strongly I state it because nobody who can change anything is listening. It's not as if there's a 'pro-NSL' lobby campaigning to raise the new and improved 50/40 mph zones back up to 60, where safe to do so.

martine
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Re: The Antidote to BRAKE

Postby martine » Fri Oct 30, 2015 10:33 am

Speaking of Brake, I had a chance to enter dialogue with a Brake representative at a company safety day we were exhibiting at (Bristol IAM Group) earlier this week. He indicated there has been a shift in some of their more extreme policies...he gave the example of their previous one to reduce the motorway speed limit to 50 - which has been quietly dropped (ridiculous idea).

I couldn't help but mention their current ones of NSL being 50mph and No Overtaking in 'free flowing traffic' and he didn't have a response.

One of their current focusses is Graduated Driver Licencing (GDL) which I broadly support and as he said, it more a shift towards continuing driver education - which makes a refreshing change.

We'll see.
Martin - Bristol Advanced Motorists: IMI National Observer, Group Secretary, Masters (dist), DSA: ADI, Fleet, RoSPA (Dip)

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exportmanuk
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Re: The Antidote to BRAKE

Postby exportmanuk » Fri Oct 30, 2015 10:57 am

No exactly related but I was reading this article today about Speed Scameras
http://www.bmf.co.uk/news/show/slam-on- ... mera-sites
Andrew Melton
Manchester 500

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akirk
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Re: The Antidote to BRAKE

Postby akirk » Fri Oct 30, 2015 5:26 pm

martine wrote:One of their current focusses is Graduated Driver Licencing (GDL) which I broadly support ...


I would support this if done intelligently, but I suspect it will simply be an excuse to restrict large swathes of the population even further - now a bit of carrot with that stick would be great... How about anyone who has passed a certain level of AD test (and retakes it every 3 years) is allowed to drive at any speed on the motorway - easy to do with electronic tags - however any abuse of that and all privileges are revoked permanently...

something creative along those lines might encourage people to pass and continue with AD tests

Alasdair

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jont-
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Re: The Antidote to BRAKE

Postby jont- » Tue Nov 03, 2015 8:53 am

exportmanuk wrote:No exactly related but I was reading this article today about Speed Scameras
http://www.bmf.co.uk/news/show/slam-on- ... mera-sites

Can't help but think much braking at camera sites is because drivers aren't confident about the speed limit :evil: Maybe you should have a pre-camera camera to spot braking? :lol:

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onlinegenie
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Re: The Antidote to BRAKE

Postby onlinegenie » Fri Nov 06, 2015 10:42 am

exportmanuk wrote:No exactly related but I was reading this article today about Speed Scameras
http://www.bmf.co.uk/news/show/slam-on- ... mera-sites


I think it's meaningless that there's an increase in braking on the approach to cameras. The accident rate in the vicinity of speed cameras is meaningful! I notice that isn't mentioned in the article.
Mark Syder (like the drink only not spelled the same way)


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