went an old uni mate birthday party in stafford. she was up for buying a new pc to replace knackered laptop, partially funded by cash presents (but mostly on barclaycard
) ... the nearest PC world* is basically two minutes off my route home so i agree to offer what meagre advice i can on whats a good or crap deal... she hops in her mums shiny new 1800 astra and squirts off at a distinctly un-running-in-period pace, leaving the poor old polo sucking fumes and howling in 2nd and 3rd to keep up along the A-roads towards the m6.once on the motorway, she joins the back end of a queue of traffic - and I find myself full throttle, top gear, 5000 revs............ being left behind. all the damn way. she had to slow down for me to catch up (pulling 90 plus) three or four times. and this counts for normal on our roads. you say we had a speed limit on that motorway, again?
and the day before, m6 toll, three shoulder-to-shoulder lanes of traffic doing a few mph variation on a theme of 85..
speed kills eh......
on that line of thought, while i was at her place i read a very interesting article in the daily telegraph about the idiocy and danger - but inherent profitability - of our fixed speed limit system.... and how feasible and easily implementable a sensible and safe variable, camera-controlled setup now is... a small suite of cheap rain/standing water, visibility/fog, light level/glare and traffic density/speed sensors, an optional extra input (eg a timer for school hours, approaching trains at a level crossing, "rush hour" and roadworks switches etc) all feeding into a little computer chip (say, a 4mhz Z80, fresh from a gameboy...) running a fairly basic program, outputting to an LED limit sign variable in 5mph steps from 10 up to 100mph (or more likely a narrower range, dependent on the road), not to mention being capable of displaying other signage or helpful warnings/info, and also feeding to a camera that flashes you at, say, between 5 to 15mph over the advised safe speed (higher posted speeds having more leeway? or less??), if you insist on going faster than is actually safe for the conditions - rather than what the somewhat randomly chosen, unchanging metal sign in multiples of 10 says........ hmmmm! i'll have to see if i can get a photocopy of that from the library.... long been thinking that theres many city roads that could do with 25, 35, 45 limits - especially the 25 - instead of being stuck to a "low" 20, "normal" 30 (that may be a touch too high giving the circs), or slightly high 40 (that could in honesty go a little higher some places)
indeed something similar could work very well with the toll road, in conjunction with a charge that varies with the level of traffic on the road - or more precisely, the difference in traffic volume between the two main routes and two or three selected other "parallel" trunk route that aren't the m6... keeping the flow of vehicles on all of them roughly similar and balanced for quickest/easiest journey time for everyone... busiest period on the m6, but no-one on the toll... drop the charge to a quid, and up the limit to 90... as it becomes equal between the two, drop to 75 and up to £2.50... and if the toll road starts to jam up while the old route is becoming barer, down to 60 (m25 style) and £4 a throw... a way of controlling speed on the old m6 as well, in a way!
* yes, yes, pc world, indeed prebuilt machines in general, i know, i know already - but well.... a 20-icouldntsaywithaclearconcience year old young lady who just wants any old computer to write a thesis and play the sims on... she knows PC world sell them... pretty hard to argue, especially when "20 minutes of scanning for the blaster worm, virus program still not finished" equated to "laptop is dead" in the same mind
)
