Note to readers

I'm spending more time at a rather more versatile site - http://amberlight.ning.com - so see you there perhaps. This was todays' post: With all due disrespect for one-dimensional regulation, and for “campaigns” such as 'Driving for Better Business', which fail in their duty to question authority and pursue liberating change - if the ban on in-car phone use is justified because it distracts us from concentrating on the road, should traffic lights, speed cameras and speed limits be banned for the same reason?

Coercion v context and commonsense

Depressing announcement from the Association of Chief Police Officers. They propose average speed cameras instead of traffic calming measures in built-up areas to deter "speeding". You can understand the rationale, but isn't it misguided to extend state control at the expense of personal responsibility? Speeding is a fabricated crime, like jaywalking. It's not speed that kills, but inappropriate speed, or speed in the wrong hands. Don't policymakers realise that people behave worse when herded and hounded, and better when free to act on commonsense and context? Is it time to start installing traffic lights at cashpoints, and speed cameras on pavements, or time to start treating road-users as grown-ups?