rsgerry

well, on saturday night we had an accident in Perth that claimed four lives. The driver at fault was a P plater who lost control after hitting the dirt at the edge of the road and crossed onto the wrong side and had a head on crash with a Kombi.

well, our state government is now considering P plate curfews, power to weight restrictions and the usual crap. I dont really have any feelings either way about the curfew idea, except to say that it is totally unworkable. there are no proper police on the roads and any half-smart P plater woudl just remove the plates anyway. as usual, it is a solution that sounds good to the mindless masses and will keep the voters happy without actually doing something.

there are two real problems here. firstly, the driver didnt know how to handle a car. reverse parking is nice, hill starts are good, but car control is a lifesaver, and it is not taught. secondly, the condition of the road is somethign that needs very careful attention. for those that know Reid Hwy in Perth, it is very poorly lit at night, it is not practical to use high beams due to oncoming traffic, so visibility is poor. secondly, there is no armco barrier along it. had there been a barrier, this accident would have consisted of one Lancer with a completely buggered up drivers side, some scratches and an angry parent. instead, as a result of our governments denial, we have instead got two cars written off and four people dead.

michelle roberts (minister for police), their blood is on your hands.

a copy of this has been forwarded to ms roberts.

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Tiges

This is really sad to hear about this. I hate hearing about these types of things as I will be on my P-plates very soon and hope nothing is going to happen to me.

But this P-plate curfew is just the governments way of spending less money, by imposing a curfew. It would be cheaper to put one in place then to repair that particular road and to light it up. And that could be the reason for the other governments to have on in place, cheaper for them.

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RICHO

It's interesting that in the latest Motor (I think) there was an little side article on the road toll in a number of European countries.

Italy's toll HUGE reduction their policies Higher speed limits and driver training
Portugal HUGE fall and again their policies higher speed limits and better driver training

and the country with the lowest fall...

Yes that's right the good old UK where speed camera's rule, limits are on their way down and like State Governments here nobody is willing to spend the money teaching kids to drive properly.

So because our governments are to thick to see through the blatant propoganda of lobby and special interest groups Aussie kids will continue to die on our roads!!!

And as rsgerry said many of those deaths can be laid squrely at the door of our politicians!!!

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dave_au

Look, I can't see too much harm in having a passenger limit in unexperienced P Plater cars for maybe the first 6 months or year - but something sensible - like two people. Of course the danger with that is that you'll potentially have more P Platers on the road.

As for speeding and Hi-po cars, well the one on the weekend I believe was a lancer ? And the driver, through inexperience paniced that she hit the soft edge and over corrected.

whippet_zetec

developing strategies to curb young driver accidents and deaths on our roads will inevitably affect at least one party more than another and finding a solution that will stop tragic deaths will probably never exist...

in my opinion placing a curfew on P platers is an unenforceable rule, P platers would just remove their P plates in order to go undetected at night and the low risk of getting pulled over would make it seem like an acceptable risk to take.

In some ways this would also be the case for limiting the size engine or power output of a car for P platers unless you also made it impossible for a P plater to register and insure such a car (which is possible and is a system implemented for motorcycles)...

In regards to this how many P platers are there of a Sunday afternoon at Brighton, South beach Wollongong, Blacktown in souped up WRX'S, Skylines, SS', Lancer', and others, all showing off and I know it is a minority but so many of them fly past you when they are driving along the arterial roads surrounding those locations its suprising more arent involved in accidents....there are even reports in todays Telegraph that two cars impounded on Sunday night were set to run on avgas...what the hell are these cars even doing on a public road, shear stupidity in my opinion??? however even such a strategy as limiting car size/power doesnt stop mummy and daddy letting their son/daughter drive their car which is high powered.

4 years back a friend of mine was killed by a P plater in a WRX all suited up, t-boning him at an intersection where he was waiting to turn. The P plater suffered serious injuries aswell but managed to survive, my mate didnt and the pain his family went through trying to understand the foolish actions of the P plater in 1. driving so fast in a built up area, 2. how a P plater could be allowed to drive such a high powered car without the necessary skills and 3. complete lack of remorse shown was disheartening.

As for proper driver training I consider it a bit like a double edged sword, give someone a little bit of knowledge and they soon become an expert (ever heard that saying), yet they really arent. This is not to say I disagree with providing more training to young/new drivers but such training should be tailored to general road conditions/driving not a "professional drivers course". Such training will also come out of YOUR tax dollars, it doesnt come free.....and I am sure that there are plenty of people on Sydney's road who are supposedly on a full licence who could do with some extra training!

At the end of the day I believe that it really is a parents responsibility to show their children responsible use of a motor vehicle....but no matter how much effort we all put into it we will never stop young people from being risk takers, we have all been there and done something completly stupid in our cars and some of us have gotten away with it and others havent been so fortunate.

All I can really say is take care, watch the traffic around you, and drive to the conditions.

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turboute

That crash was pretty horrific ( I was driving passed the road when It was closed, could see two firetrucks, couple of cop cars and about 4 ambo's there) One thing that could have stopped this would be the government fixing the road and making it double lane both ways, and having an island in the middle. The infrastucture is there, they have a huge area cleared next to the highway waiting for the funding to come.

There is also a group od residents (slightly further up the highway) campaining for this, (they started a couple of week before the crash, what irony). They claim there are around 60 crashes a year on this road. The best way of stopping these would be fixing the bloody road, but instead the government just puts speed camera's there instead. I did not see this helping those kids who were killed the other night (I think speed has been ruled out as a factor).