Safe Speed Forums

Are you honestly a camera operator?

Was that your dream job when you were little, or did you just turn into a failure raising money for the state?

Deezil Moment. Sorry for not getting back sooner, but I always understood those emoticons to be purely humourous rather than direct incitements to go out and shoot up a theft camera.
However, I would agree that these days, there are always some who are daft enough to take these things literally

It must be a tough job though, being cooped up in those vans and knowing
what most people feel about you. Having said that 'bailif' is worse.

C.

Just to reassure you camera operator, I for one appreciate the work you do.

But I recognise that on this site, the opposite viewpoint is the overwhelming majority!

Sorry, that was a bit OT. RE: burnt out gatsos. It just engenders similar disappointed feelings at the actions of a minority as any other piece of vandalised street furniture.

go on then i will humour you for a while

when i left school a long time ago i went to college, bought my first car and planned my future, then i had someone putting stickers on my car saying not to park there, but being lazy i did not want to walk 15 minutes from the next free parking space, so i continued to park there, next thing i was the victim of a parking scam, my car was clamped and towed away, i fought tooth and nail to get it back and ended up paying double its value in costs.





i then found a job in industry but that was too hard for me, so i started to work for the police, applying for various internal jobs over the years but the after getting totally fed up with the moaning, whinging self centred public,

i become a vouyer within the CCTV control room, trying to juggle shifts with a young family life, a part time job as a fire fighter i became very stressed and i developed an addiction for doughnuts and coffee, hence a swap onto an early dis organised ANPR team but again this was too disruptive for my addiction to doughnuts,

so i morphed myself into a Camera Operator, as you said raising money from the state, millions of pounds a day, ahhh but think of the doughnuts, but alas the medical department said because of the doughnuts i was getting too obese to hide in my little invisible van, so they said i had to go, i was carried kicking and screaming , i took my LTI hostage and after a stand off, they agreed my demands, chocolate covered doughnuts





in fact you are right, flatulence is a terrible thing



sorry mods could not resist

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now retired

I think there is more to it than that. I don't think it's bored teenagers that are doing this. I can't be 100% sure, but I would say that most attacks against speed cameras are:

1) Politically-motivated attacks by organised groups:
Captain Gatso and M.A.D. are well-known, but I know for a fact that there are other, similar groups out there. I was speaking just the other week to a breakdown recovery contractor who claimed to be a member of such a group. His role within the group was to go out in the dead of night and pull speed cameras out of the ground with his tow truck. I have seen a few uprooted GATSOs in the area in which he operates so I have no reason not to believe him.

He went on to explain that although they are partially motivated by the excessive amount of revenue generated by speed cameras and the lies told about their effectiveness, they mainly do it as a protest against the "Big Brother" surveillance state this Country is turning into. That may have just been his personal opinion though.

2) Revenge attacks by individuals
This is just speculation, but I'm sure there must have been cases of men who've lost their licence, their job and possibly their house, marriage and access to their kids and have decided to take revenge on the speed camera that put them there. Does anyone have a link to a news story covering such a case? Does anyone know somebody who has taken revenge on a camera?


So, would I vandalise a GATSO?

No. It would achieve nothing. The LA would no doubt compensate for any lost fines revenue by exaggerating the repair/replacement cost of the camera which, of course, comes out of the public purse. If I got caught, I would be made out to be a villain, discrediting (in the eyes of some) the genuine democratic campaign against speed camera policy.

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“For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.” - H. L. Mencken

Do I advocate breaking the law? No!

Is the law always right? No!

So what do you do when the law is an ass?

If I thought for one moment that speed cameras were were catching motorists who were a real danger while letting off those who were not, (have never been), a danger on our roads then I would probably be on here with a very different viewpoint.

Maybe I would be tonejeg2 or spintone?

I feel the need to swear, so I'll just sign off instead...

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

I suspect such cases are common.

I also suspect that our "Toady press" have an agreement with central government not to report on them.

(along with their other "Toady" censorship agreements )

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"The road to a police state is paved with public safety legislation"

Sounds about right.................

Think on, gentlemen - if Cam-o did not do the job he does, someone else would. Someone who doesn't have the bottle to stand his corner with us, someone who underlines that we are not a forum of speed-crazed psychotics and someone who can fill in the view 'from the other side'. Also, he doesn't take himself too seriously (which is just as well...)

At least he isn't a Civil Enforcement Officer (local 'new' name for bloody parking attendant) that even lice steer clear of!

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Aquila



Licat volare si super tergum aquila volat...

I know of one person!

If I'm going out with the intension of having a few beers I use a local small taxi service and I know the one taxi driver quite well now.

He recently told me he once chalked up enough speeding charges and was banned. In my ignorance, I said that I thought 'they' were lenient with people whos livelyhood depends on driving. (This is what people have told me more than once)

"not a bit of it!" he replied.

He got a six month ban and the bread-winner's income went with it causing terrible hardship and family problems

(Oh, and we paid for him to be unemployed during this period BTW)

I said to him that I imagine he does some 100,000 miles or more each year and that he would obviously be more at risk of getting done but would be amongst the safest drivers for all the experience.

"yes" he said "I have never been involved in an accident"

That pretty much says it all IMO.

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

That's the kind of thing which makes me think that people who insist on fully supporting cameras, despite being aware of the facts, must quite often have an underlying dislike of motorists. Why else would someone wish such a thing on such a driver, who was accident-free and clobbered only for doing what every other driver does (speeding)? It's ludicrous and dishonest to pretend that this guy was dangerous enough to be banned. Yet supporters of cameras frequently find themselves having to make such ridiculous statements to maintain their stance.

Why would they be so keen to maintain their stance at all costs, however ridiculous it obviously was, unless there was an underlying, emotional, irrational reason for it? A hatred of cars and the freedom that they provide seems to be the most likely scenario to me, not that I can understand it.

I find it very hard to believe that there are many, if any, people who genuinely and honestly think that that taxi driver was such a dangerous driver that he deserved to be banned.

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Paul Smith: a legend.

"The freedom provided by the motor vehicle is not universally applauded, however: there are those who resent the loss of state control over individual choice that the car represents. Such people rarely admit their prejudices openly; instead, they make false or exaggerated claims about the adverse effects of road transport in order to justify calls for higher taxation or restrictions on mobility." (Conservative Way Forward: Stop The War Against Drivers)

Absolutely Bombus. They want it to become elitist.



That's my take on it too.



Unfortunately there are such people and we've seen them appear here all too often.

Worst of all, they seem to dominate positions of power or rank where they can wield their speed kills axe, via legislation and the media, and permeate impressionable weak minds who have neither the integrity to admit they also speed nor the mental capacity to see what it's really about.

(Hence my signature)

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

Folks,

I sympathise with the last two posts.

A camera near us was demolished by a guy who drove his car into it, and then set fire to the camera and to his car as well. IMHO this guy must have been so far gone that he was temporarily insane. Of course he was caught, although there has been no story in the local press and now there is a shiny new camera in place.

"There but for the grace of God"

C.

"This includes those driving light vehicles who speed by 30-39km/h getting a hefty $700 fine - double the current $350.

Drivers of heavy vehicles who speed by 30-39km/h will be fined $850, a huge increase on the current $500.

Drivers charged with reckless driving, which includes speeding by 45km/h or more, face $2000 fines for a first offence, double the current $1000.

They face a $3000 fine for a second offence and a $4000 fine for subsequent offences, up from $1200 and $2400, respectively."


http://www.news.com.au/perthnow/story/0 ... 61,00.html


In other words, if you are rich it won't bother you. A tax on the poor, once again.

I knew I should have been a pop star - except I can't sing and I'm talentless. Oh, hang on...

I'd fit right in nowadays. Sign me me up Waterman. I do a good Bat Out Of Hell in the shower

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

You could make the fines £1M here in the U.K. and it wouldn't make a jot of difference. The people with throwaway cars, no tax, insurance etc. (even if caught) have no assets and are on benefits and so will not pay any significant fine.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

Britain’s gone soft, and consequently some blokes are emotionally overwhelmed by these trivial concerns. Vulnerable men like this will not be resilient enough to cope when significant challenges are thrown at them by life. Only time will tell what happens to them, but it doesn’t look good.

I would not damage a camera not do I think SafeSpeed should be associated with such actions.

Seeing a vandalised camera does make me smile though !

I tend to agree that we're turning into a nation of emos. But nobody is listening to our angst you see..

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/itn/20080325/t ... a1618.html

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Political Correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical, liberal minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.

Yeah... the ones who get caught are grassed up after boasting to their mates in the pub. There was one on the tele a while back, bleating about his “mistake”. It makes me smile when I think how those petrol-bomb cry-babies fare on their first night in prison!