What is the point of a 1 week driving ban?

[Smurfy]

How hard can it be to go a week without driving? Is it even much of a deterrent at all? Admittedly insurance premiums will probably increase, but all in all I'm struggling to see the point of this.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/cel...nned-from-driving-for-speeding-at-101mph.html

 

[raleighnut]

Isn't driving at over 100mph an automatic ban and one week the minimum length of ban, plus in a car of that nature on a motorway I'd think it was pretty safe to do so.

 

[KneesUp]

I was always told that being caught over 100mph is an automatic ban. However, as this was only 1mph over and appears from reports to have not been excessively dangerous I suppose they imposed the minimum ban they could.

What would you have like to have seen instead @YellowTim?

 

[CopperCyclist]

It's not automatic ban above 100, it's just that the magistrates Have to consider it at that speed.

I'd suggest the point of it in this case was so that the driver has a ban on their record. The insurance rise will be a side effect too of course.

 

[edindave]

Not that the average Aston Martin owner would be worried too much about the impact on his insurance premium.

 

[KneesUp]

Variable tolerances for those in possession of more powerful cars. Hmmm.

Whilst it isn't a point I've made, there is logic in the offence varying by vehicle. A car such as the one being driven will steer and stop a lot better at 100mph than, for example, my old Ford Ka, which might have just got to that speed on a long downhill with a tailwind. Ergo the former is safer at that speed than the latter. If the offence was created as a safety measure then it is logical that the amount of danger created matters. It is indeed for that reason that driving on a normal road at 30mph is legal, whereas driving on a normal road at any speed whilst inebriated is an offence.

Besides which we do already have 'variable tolerance' of speed - there are different limits for different types of vehicle.

In practice it would be impossible to codify 'danger' as such.

 

[derrick]

[QUOTE 3463140, member: 9609"]I wouldn't of thought 101 in an Aston Martin was speeding let alone much of an offence[/QUOTE]
That depends on the idiot behind the wheel

 

[sidevalve]

Just a point - a 1 [one] week ban is 1 [one] week longer that any cyclist would receive however and wherever he rode, no matter how fast and as there is no compulsory third party insurance that doesn't apply either.. [And please no 'Oh a bicycle wouldn't do as much damage as a car' we are talking principles here].

 

[Turbo Rider]

Whilst it isn't a point I've made, there is logic in the offence varying by vehicle. A car such as the one being driven will steer and stop a lot better at 100mph than, for example, my old Ford Ka, which might have just got to that speed on a long downhill with a tailwind. Ergo the former is safer at that speed than the latter. If the offence was created as a safety measure then it is logical that the amount of danger created matters. It is indeed for that reason that driving on a normal road at 30mph is legal, whereas driving on a normal road at any speed whilst inebriated is an offence.

Besides which we do already have 'variable tolerance' of speed - there are different limits for different types of vehicle.

In practice it would be impossible to codify 'danger' as such.

I get the point, but it depends what happens next really. You can't deny that any vehicle doing 101mph is likely to do more damage than a car doing 70mph. Speed limits are in place for a reason. They say that if you sneeze while driving at 70mph, you travel 300 yards and there are allsorts of things in a car to distract a driver from the task in hand, so 101mph is not safe at all IMO.

 

[raleighnut]

Variable tolerances for those in possession of more powerful cars. Hmmm.

Not just more power but better brakes, better tyres and better handling at speed on a road that was designed not to have any speed limits and Aston Martin cars are not the only ones easily capable of safe travel at those speeds when in a 'safer' environment i.e. A Motorway or an Autobahn.
Speed restrictions were brought in at the time of the 'oil crisis' and no government since has been 'brave' enough to rescind them but that would lead to 'Joe Knobhead'' in his clapped out boy racer causing chaos by driving beyond the capabilities of whatever he'd managed to 'scrape through' our woefully inadequate MOT test.

 

[jefmcg]

Whilst it isn't a point I've made, there is logic in the offence varying by vehicle. A car such as the one being driven will steer and stop a lot better at 100mph than, for example, my old Ford Ka, which might have just got to that speed on a long downhill with a tailwind. Ergo the former is safer at that speed than the latter. If the offence was created as a safety measure then it is logical that the amount of danger created matters. It is indeed for that reason that driving on a normal road at 30mph is legal, whereas driving on a normal road at any speed whilst inebriated is an offence.

I thought the difference was about weight. A HGV would do a lot more damage in a collision than a sedan, thus it travels more slowly.

A Ka weighs about 1/2 of a DB9, so obviously the Ka should be able to legally go twice as fast (physics and engine sizes not with standing)

 

[raleighnut]

Not so. Motorways speed limits were imposed before that.

Were they I certainly remember sitting in the passenger seat of my uncles 4 litre (Rolls Royce) engined Vandem Plas Princess at around 110-120 mph on the A46 in 1970 (same chassis as the Morris Oxford/Austin Cambridge)

 

[recumbentpanda]

OMG! raleighnut is an escaped petrol head from the 'Safe Speed' website!

Or possibly an alias for Jeremy Clarkson . . . .

 

[robjh]

Were they I certainly remember sitting in the passenger seat of my uncles 4 litre (Rolls Royce) engined Vandem Plas Princess at around 110-120 mph on the A46 in 1970 (same chassis as the Morris Oxford/Austin Cambridge)

The 70mph limit was introduced in 1965. Doing 110 mph in 1970 was as illegal and reckless then as it is now.

 

[EltonFrog]

About 20 years ago I got banned for a week, cant remember why now. On the day of the ban I walke to my nearest LBS and bought a bike to get me through the week. I've been cycling ever since.