What is a safe speed?
Undoubtedly, if you are involved in an accident, the higher your speed the more likely you are to kill or be killed, a controversial road safety campaign carried the message ‘the higher the speed the bigger the mess’. However, it is not the speed that kills you – it’s the sudden reduction of speed or transference of energy on impact that kills.
So, with the information above in mind, maybe the safety slogans should perhaps read: Impact Kills.
So how do we square this idea with a notion of safe speed? Elsewhere on this web site you will find information about the importance of keeping a safe space around your vehicle. This space is determined by the prevailing conditions and must be great enough for the vehicle to stop safely in the event of easily foreseeable or unexpected occurrences.
Given this information we can now argue that: Impact Due To Insufficient Space Kills
Because the space around the vehicle can, for the most part, be controlled by the driver the next logical argument for our slogan is that: Impact, Due To Insufficient Space, Caused By The Actions of The Driver, Kills
OK – it’s getting a bit wordy for a slogan! But ultimately speed and space are the two variables that you can control and that when controlled properly will keep you, and those around you, alive at any speed. At Experience Driving we don’t condone breaking speed limits but there are roads in the UK where 150mph would be safe in certain conditions – the road or the speed does not control safety – the driver controls it.
So, how much space?
You can kill a toddler at speeds as low as a few miles per hour. Whatever your speed you need to anticipate likely happenings and leave enough space to cope. Most accidents happen in built up areas – That is why they have the lowest speed limits: lots of traffic, not much space. In built up areas there are also a lot of soft targets (literally). These ‘targets’ are called pedestrians.
A speed of two or three miles per hour can kill a pedestrian so what do you now understand the term ‘Speed Kills’ to mean?
Perhaps one of the biggest speed traps is that which leads drivers into thinking that they pose no danger when they are driving slowly.
