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Old 09-11-2003, 02:48 PM   #1
Grendal
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Join Date: June 18, 2003
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It was pointed out in another thread how many of our youth are dieing in drinking/driving instances. I think I may have a solution to cut down at least part of the carnage on our roads. Let me know if you think this could fly. On the west coast of Canada here we have a serious problem with young drivers. Yes alot of it has to do with drinking and driving. Kids get drunk they race and kill themselves or worse yet kill an innocent bystander. IMHO its not so much the drinking as it is the speed. A 16 yr olds parents should not be buying a new driver with zero driving experience a new 5 litre Mustang which happens more often than not out here. Not only does the kid now have a fast factory car but then they take their Mcdonalds paycheck and since they still live at home and have no bills they start modifying it. Case in point...The wife and I went out for dinner the other week and were seated next to a young asian couple (MAYBE they were seventeen) We finished our supper then left at about the same time they did. So we exit the restaurant and this 16 or 17 yr old jumps into a completely tricked out Mercedes SLK Kompressor! Give me a fricken break! This kid should be in a chevette! Anyways...my idea...put horsepower restrictions on new drivers and graduate it up over say 3 or 4 years. I have been driving for 20 years but even with all that experience I dont consider myself to be able to drive an F1 car like Mario! Im not sure how you would enforce a rule like this but it would save lives.
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Old 09-11-2003, 03:25 PM   #2
B_part
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The problem is, a Fiat 500 (the new one of course) can run as fast as 120 km/h. At that speed you can kill yourself and some bystanders quite easily, especially if drunk. My scooter hits 85 km/h: same thing as above - run someone over at that speed and he's dead. Or seriously injured. And it has only 3.621 hp.

IMO A horsepower limitation policy wouldn't work: either you outlaw anything faster than a bike or it's useless.

Also low-horsepower cars tend to be small and less secure than big ones: a Mercedes SLK at 140 km/h is more secure than a Fiat Punto at 120. Better brakes, better handling, better everything. A limitation policy might favor small cars instead of bigger ones, to the detriment of those who drive safely who would be compelled to use the smaller, less secure vehicles.

IMO there is only one way you can solve the problem: zero tolerance policy, and more frequent controls.

[ 09-11-2003, 03:26 PM: Message edited by: B_part ]
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Old 09-11-2003, 03:25 PM   #3
Faceman
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Something about the laws in Austria and why they are better when the situation is not (actually it is statistically but the frontpage accidents happen anyway)

I'm not sure how car insurance is handled in the US/Canada but here it is obligatory and the younger the driver the higher. And car tax here is based on hp. Also young drivers with high-powered car are paying even more and that's not 5% but rather 30-40% - aside from the fact of course that a new car owner always pays more and that after some years of accident-free driving you can halve the cost of your insurance.

Drinking age is low here. It's 16 for beer, wine,... and 18 for booze. This is however controlled very leniently (no ID checks, no harsh punishments,...). In fact if he's lucky a 6-year old could buy a bottle of vodka and a pack of cigarettes claiming it's for his father. And if he's 13 he'll probably get a beer or a scotch at a bar. But juvenile alcoholism is not the point here
Driving age however is at 18 so basically a normal youngster when he starts to drive has already made experiences with alcohol and lived through his wild years. They still get drunk but not quite as often and the punishments for drunk driving (anything over 0.01 BAC) on a first year licence are harsh as they are on speeding. In fact speeding at 15mph over the limit can get your licence revoked in the first year.

This does work okay with ost kids in the city. It's also better than in some countries overall. But the weak spot is the country where people will drive to a disco get drunk and drive home usually at very high speed because streets are deserted at night.

Counter-measures the speeders take to avoid high insurance ...
The buy low-powered cars and tune them without adding that to the deed. Thus they pay insurance/tax for a 60hp car and drive a 160hp car. Or they buy/register the car over their parents. Insurances and government are however working on closing these gaps (e.g. car insurance goes up if you have a juvenile driver in the family).

What did I want to say [img]graemlins/confused2.gif[/img]

Yeah,

As long as alcohol is a legal part of society let kids learn how to handle it.
Try to ensure that no kid can drive a Porsche.
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Old 09-11-2003, 03:32 PM   #4
Faceman
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Quote:
Originally posted by B_part:
The problem is, a Fiat 500 (the new one of course) can run as fast as 120 km/h. At that speed you can kill yourself and some bystanders quite easily, especially if drunk. My scooter hits 85 km/h: same thing as above - run someone over at that speed and he's dead. Or seriously injured. And it has only 3.621 hp.
Yes but at 120km/h you can control your car better than at 190 or 250
I can tell you that even on a borad "Autobahn" a speed of 200 km/h makes me feel insecure as a young and inexperienced driver. While at 140 I feel just fine. Of course you can kill somebody if you run him over at 30kmph but you're much less likely to.
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Old 09-11-2003, 03:57 PM   #5
RoSs_bg2_rox
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yeh thats a good point Faceman. This doesnt really hae that much to do with it but i went to Austria last year on holiday and just after coming out of the airport we saw a crashed motorbike on the road with police all around it and what looked to be the driver on the ground.
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Old 09-11-2003, 04:14 PM   #6
Grendal
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Good points made all around. B part...I know what you mean, you can get a whole lot of horsepower out of a small engine these days. But the 3.6 hp scooter you also have to look at power to wieght ratio so yes it will go that fast. Faceman thats what I was talking about. When I was a teenager learning to drive, speeds of 120 or 140k was commonplace.At 120 you may still have a chance to recover if something goes wrong. But the speeds the kids are reaching these days (around here anyways) are anywhere between 200 and 250k! Handleing, breaking, airbags or no, dont much come into play when your 16 years old, your super hot girlfriend is beside you laughing histerically (sp?), when all of a sudden you hit a pothole you didnt know was there (and you couldnt see it because your eyes and brain were evolved to see things go by at a max of what? 7 mph?) and your high power BMW that mom and dad got you 2 weeks ago breaks lose at 225 kph, you slide thru a bus stop instantly killing a 34 yr old mother of 2 and then hit a concrete embankment that leaves you a quadrapalegic and your girlfriend dead. WOW pretty graphic! This happened about two years ago here. My feeling is that if the kid had been driving a ford festiva this would not have happened, or maybe it would have but may not have been as tragic an outcome. Hence...the HP restriction idea...but alas as you have pointed out B. it would practically impossible to enforce. Ok how bout this...no one with less than three years driving can drive a car worth more than $500 ??? Hey someones got to solve the worlds problems!!! [img]smile.gif[/img]
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Old 09-11-2003, 04:16 PM   #7
B_part
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Quote:
Originally posted by Faceman:
quote:
Originally posted by B_part:
The problem is, a Fiat 500 (the new one of course) can run as fast as 120 km/h.
Yes but at 120km/h you can control your car better than at 190 or 250
I can tell you that even on a borad "Autobahn" a speed of 200 km/h makes me feel insecure as a young and inexperienced driver. While at 140 I feel just fine. Of course you can kill somebody if you run him over at 30kmph but you're much less likely to.
[/QUOTE]Controlling a car at 120 can be difficult if you are drunk. And obviously I was talking about the lamest car I know to say that you would have to limit a lot before attaining any result. Anyway my old Punto, perhaps the second lamest car after Fiat 500, with 60 hp would reach 170 km/h. 170 ain't much slower than 190...

You can take for granted that a drunk youngster will run as fast as he can. And even if it's only 120, it's far enough to kill. REmember that at 120 km/h means you move at 33.33 meters /second. The average reaction time for a sober man is something about 0.3 seconds. That gets at least doubled when you are drunk, so a drunk man at 120km/h will make 20 meters before he even starts to break.

So, either you limit horsepower so that the car won't go faster than let's say 80, or you will not get much in the way of results. That's not a NO result, but zero tolerance and capillary control will do much better.

Edit: forgot a piece

Quote:
Originally posted by Faceman
I'm not sure how car insurance is handled in the US/Canada but here it is obligatory and the younger the driver the higher. And car tax here is based on hp. Also young drivers with high-powered car are paying even more and that's not 5% but rather 30-40% - aside from the fact of course that a new car owner always pays more and that after some years of accident-free driving you can halve the cost of your insurance.


This is what happens here in Italy. And I am afraid to say that's just a way to enrich the insurance companies. In Naples a newly licenced driver has to pay € 4000 a year for the compulsory insurance! That's because car accidents and insurance frauds are really common in that city. But here in Milan things aren't better. Insurance on my car is under my mom's name. with my 4 years licence, and not one accident (and hopefully none to come), I'd have to pay double!

[ 09-11-2003, 04:29 PM: Message edited by: B_part ]
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Old 09-11-2003, 04:23 PM   #8
B_part
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Quote:
Originally posted by Grendal:
Good points made all around. B part...I know what you mean, you can get a whole lot of horsepower out of a small engine these days. But the 3.6 hp scooter you also have to look at power to wieght ratio so yes it will go that fast. Faceman thats what I was talking about. When I was a teenager learning to drive, speeds of 120 or 140k was commonplace.At 120 you may still have a chance to recover if something goes wrong. But the speeds the kids are reaching these days (around here anyways) are anywhere between 200 and 250k! Handleing, breaking, airbags or no, dont much come into play when your 16 years old, your super hot girlfriend is beside you laughing histerically (sp?), when all of a sudden you hit a pothole you didnt know was there (and you couldnt see it because your eyes and brain were evolved to see things go by at a max of what? 7 mph?) and your high power BMW that mom and dad got you 2 weeks ago breaks lose at 225 kph, you slide thru a bus stop instantly killing a 34 yr old mother of 2 and then hit a concrete embankment that leaves you a quadrapalegic and your girlfriend dead. WOW pretty graphic! This happened about two years ago here. My feeling is that if the kid had been driving a ford festiva this would not have happened, or maybe it would have but may not have been as tragic an outcome. Hence...the HP restriction idea...but alas as you have pointed out B. it would practically impossible to enforce. Ok how bout this...no one with less than three years driving can drive a car worth more than $500 ??? Hey someones got to solve the worlds problems!!! [img]smile.gif[/img]
For $ 500 I could buy an old Fiat 500 Abarth. A 180 km/h flying coffin. There is always a way around.

I mentioned my scooter because motorbikes pose the same problem than cars, so along with the lamest car I got the lamest bike...

BEsides, I totally agree with you that for a young and inexperienced and maybe drunk/high kid a big car is a highway to hell. Just I was pointing out that the law you proposed not applicable. Here in Italy they did something similar some 5 or 6 years ago. No result. Now that they are applying zero tolerance, results are coming.
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Old 09-11-2003, 05:05 PM   #9
Timber Loftis
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I don't know if horsepower limitations would work. A Mazda Miata has a teeny tiny lawn-mower four-banger, but you can get it up to speed and whack yourself pert good. Admittedly, my first car was a V6 Z24, and yes I buried the needle at 120 mph several several times. I raced it, I careened and careered about in it, I scared my girlfriends, I pissed off other drivers. I found out the governor kicked in at about 140-145 mph, causing a power-down. So, I should not have had so powerful a car I will admit. But, that was my parents' failing. I watched them make that mistake, and I won't do it. My 16 or 17-yr-old will get a crap jalopy to drive. I'll pay for college if I can, and may help with a car when and if they show me they deserve it. Teens have a 98% rate for wrecking their first car, anyway (insurance companies say the 80% of accidents are caused by the 16-20 and 70+ crowd).

But, let's not once again make the legislature impose more rules to protect us from each other. We can't legislate every single thing. Accidents will happen (there's a reason they're not called "on-purposes" y'know), and it's not our place to protect people from themselves. While I agree with the goal of getting teens into crappy cars, I think this idea wanders to far into nannyism for my support.

Oh, by the way, here's what drinking and driving were like for me

Back when Mark Walhberg was Marky Mark
This is how we used to make the party start
We used to mix Hen' with Bacardi Dark
And when it, kicks in you can hardly talk
And by the, sixth gin you're gonna probably crawl
And you'll be, sick then and you'll probably barf
And my pre-diction is you're gonna probably fall
Either somewhere in the lobby or the hallway wall
And everything's spinning
You're beginin' to think women
are swimming in pink linen again in the sink
Then in a couple of minutes that bottle of Guiness is finished
You are now allowed to officially slap bitches
You have the right to remain violent and start wilin'
Start a fight with the same guy that was smart eyin' you
Get in your car, start it, and start drivin'
Over the island and cause a 42 car pile-up

(Actually, it's Eminem, but I can pretend, can't I?)
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Old 09-11-2003, 05:08 PM   #10
Faceman
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well a price limit is not going to do any good because cheap car are also unsafe cars. I can get a used car with 150hp for 500$ but there will proabably be something wrong with the brakes

Of course I know that ANY car can reach speed which is lethal but HPs are about acceleration and acceleration is what gets you going in speeding.
If my car needs 30+ secs to climb from 0 to 100kmph I don't get excited, I get bored even when I'm drunk.
Also a Ford Festiva is no car to show off and race your friends (while I know that at this age you're even speeding in an old VW beetle if you get the chance to).
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