GEOFF SMEDLEY
With one person dying every 4 days on Tasmanian roads in 2009 its time to take a realistic look at modern technology to control the speed of the cars being sold today.
53 Reasons to change things around
The motor industry has grown rich on human failings to become aware or understand the dangers of the modern car, an item that is today considered to be very much a necessary part of our life, but has also become the largest destroyer of human life ever devised, this along with playing a major roll in making the planet unliveable for the human race, this is a pretty serious mantle to hold.
I beleive the major concern should be how to control the growing problem, a dramatic phase down in numbers of vehicles traveling on the road is needed, while credible action is long overdue for modern day public transport system that provides the option so desperatly needed in Tasmania, a fast wide gauge efficient electric passenger rail service between cities could well be a starting point, then and only then an upgrade of our 19th century road system to provide a safe carriageway for driver of vehicles deemed responsible to use this new revised system.
Driving licence issues must come under far greater scrutiny while the cost of the creditation must match the responsability needed to hold such a document, in other words to hold a licence to carry and be responsible for other users should be regarded as high priviledge and not simply a right. Operating potentially lethal equipment in public must be far more respected. It can be witnessed on any given day that people in charge of their own “weapon” could never be taught even the basic princibles of car control but have been issued with this licence to disaster.
I think it’s true to say that technolodgy can provide many answers to the situation if the will is there. Imagine if the car of today was fitted with 21st century electronic control that would automatically control the vehicle through its own computor system, a feature of the modern car, this system would be controlled by electronic signals replacing todays mostly unread speed signs governing the cars speed automatically via its own computer. All the cars speed behaviour can be recorded, to be assessed on demand by a simple card swipe and dealt with without the fuss and dramatics we see today, a black box if you like, similar to the much valued aircraft flight control recorder.
It’s possible this equipment could be designed by school students today if such a suggestion was allowed, but in Tasmania things are a little slower and of course discussion time tends to go on and on and onnnnnnn!!!
Geoff Smedley
