Coroner says: 4WD licence!!

Plodder wrote:

Another mitigator is that a bump is more
easily felt in a small car, so the driver is more likely to brake quickly.

This isn't even close to reality.

At least, according to the woman who changed lanes in front of me, and
didn't even realise anything was wrong till she HEARD her rear window smash,
(courtesy of my elbow).

Her statement, it's in the police report.

These idiots wouldn't realise they'd been run over my a Mac Truck till
they're parked in the wrecking yard wondering why their car isn't going
anywhere...
--
Linux Registered User # 302622 http://counter.li.org

"John Tserkezis" wrote in message
u...
Plodder wrote:

Hmmmm... just a thought: What about making 4WDs incapable of road
speeds?
Speed limited to, say, 80kph, with torque and so-on suited to the skills
needed for off-road driving.

Er, aren't those just a couple of the limitations of existing 4WD
vehicles
anyway? Or have I been associating with real 4WDs for too long now? :-)
--
Linux Registered User # 302622
http://counter.li.org

He he... I remember a friend's old Landrover (a REAL 4WD!)... wouldn't do
more than 80 downhill with a tailwind! PTO, built for off-roading. Modern
ones are capable of speeds comparable to a road car. I had a Nissan Patrol
for a while. It easily kept up with other traffic. I reckon if the lumbering
brutes were manufactured and marketed AS lumbering brutes there would be a
lot less lumbering brutes buying them to run Sarah to school...

me

Absent Husband wrote:
Yes!! Finally someone gets it!!

This comes out of a very sad, tragic event. I don't know how much the
pollies listen to the coroner - but we can only hope!!

Read it all he
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117...-37995,00.html

Title: "4WD licence recommendation"


Cheers all,
Absent Husband


I'm all for something that reduces the number of 4x4's that are
unnecessarily on our roads, but how will a 4x4 licence work? What will
the law determine is a 4x4 vehicle? They can't say that all commercial
vehicles now require a different licence, as this would include car
sized utes.

The easiest way would be to say that if the vehicle qualifies for the
lower 5% 4x4 tariff, then it's officially a 4x4. However, some smaller
4x4's might miss out on this reduced tax. We also have the problem of
discriminating against farmers who genuinely need a 4x4, who's lives are
tough enough as it is thanks to the drought, and who wouldn't need the
added burden of having to drive a few hundred K's to the nearest city to
do a course to show them how to drive a vehicle that they've been
driving for decades without a problem thanks to a few city slickers with
low IQ's and too much money.

What about the people who live in the city yet have a genuine need for
4x4's? Such as those who own caravans, those with hobby farms, those
who pull horse trailers, those in 4x4 clubs?

Then there's truck drivers, amoungst the safest drivers on the road.
Would they need to do the course?

Wouldn't extra compulsory training for drivers clash with most state
govt's policies of "extra training will give people too much confidence,
make them drive faster and result in more accidents". That is their
absolutely absurd policy for young drivers. How will they justify extra
compulsory driver training for grown adults, and in the same breath
explain their position on not teaching new drivers how to control a car
properly?

The concept of a special licence sounds good on the surface, however
implementing it will be too complicated, and unfair on too many people.

Educating people on the dangers of 4x4's in a city environment through
vigorous government advertising might do the trick, but wouldn't this
**** off a whole lot of rich CEO's in the US and Japan? Johnny Howard
wouldn't have that.

How about pulling the UK's trick of 400% tax on petrol... nope,
Australian farmers and anyone else in rural areas would be screwed.

I'm all out of ideas... anyone else?


--
SL

"The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over
to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they
succumb to it utterly and can never again escape from it"

Joseph Goebbels - Nazi Minister of Propaganda, 1933 - 1945

"John Tserkezis" wrote in message
...
Plodder wrote:

Another mitigator is that a bump is more
easily felt in a small car, so the driver is more likely to brake
quickly.

This isn't even close to reality.

At least, according to the woman who changed lanes in front of me, and
didn't even realise anything was wrong till she HEARD her rear window
smash,
(courtesy of my elbow).

Her statement, it's in the police report.

These idiots wouldn't realise they'd been run over my a Mac Truck till
they're parked in the wrecking yard wondering why their car isn't going
anywhere...
--
Linux Registered User # 302622
http://counter.li.org

I did write "MORE easily", not "will always be felt...". There are always
going to be clowns on the road and people who have a momentary lapse of
concentration (we're not all perfect...). That includes peds, cyclists,
drivers, whatever. We've all been caught either on the giving or the
receiving end, thankfully it doesn't always end in tragedy, just a shock or
a squeal of tyres.

me

Henry wrote

To me, it's not as much the lack of skills that matters, but rather
aggression by drivers. If you could have some test to weed out
agression..... unlikely, but nice to think about.

Henry.
Agreed 100% regarding the aggression and a lot of people buy these large
4WD vehicles just so they have the upper hand on many smaller vehicles to
intimidate them, and there's lots to be intimidated about when you see a
massive big bullbar of a Landcruiser/Pajero/Patrol beaming down into your
rear vision mirror with only inches from your rear bumper. So, what happens
if you have to take immediate evasive action when a child/dog/another
vehicle crosses your path unexpectedly? that's right....you're gunna be
sandwiched!!
4WD vehicles by themselves are a harmless vehicle untill some dingbat gets
behind the wheel and the problem lies today that the modern 4WD's are almost
as sophisticated as the modern late model cars and are driven with the same
mentality. Perhaps if the 4WD's weren't designed to be modern and kept with
their utility aspect, there wouldn't be anywhere near 20% of them on the
roads today but no.....they have electric windows,ABS, multistack CD players
blah blah blah!! Car makers have lost lots of sale of Station wagons due to
the ever increasing amount of RV's on the market that to even such a point
that Mitsubishi has plans to scrap it's Magna wagon which is a bloody shame
as if equipped with AWD I reckon it'd be a better proposition than subaru
due to the larger capacity inside but it's still car like and not mega bulky
like it's Pajero models.
In NSW about 15 yrs ago, it used to be that if the vehicle tare weight
exceeded 3 tonne, you had to upgrade your licence to a class 3 but that i
think has been moved up to 4 tonne+and the licence is LR(light rigid).
Just a bit on the poor little child that was killed in the school, where was
that child's supervision in an area where there is high vehicular movements?
It's a damn tragedy but I beleive that the 4WD user is not only to
blame.....small children have to be supervised in these situations at all
times.

End of rant

DJ

On Tue, 17 May 2005 at 23:01 GMT, Stuart Lamble (aka Bruce)
was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea:
On 2005-05-17, SteveA wrote:
I thoroughly support only allowing people to use 4WDs like mine if they
have the skills, the same as I support only letting any diver loose if
they have the skills for the type of vehicle.

*confused* Divers don't have vehicles, as a general rule. Air tanks,
regulators, BCs, fins, and wetsuits, yes ... but no vehicle, unless
they,re doing a boat dive. Even then, it takes them there and back ...
not underwater ...

*ducks*

Ducks in the open sea?

*penguins*

--
TimC -- http://astronomy.swin.edu.au/staff/tconnors/
-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
Version: 3.12
GS d- s:- a-- C+++(++++) UL(SOBI)+++(++++) P+++ L+++ E++(----)
W++(--) N+++ o K+++ w---(++) O- M--(+) V PS++ PE-(--) Y PGP t-+
!5 X R? tv- b- DI+ D--- G e++++++ h* r(--) y?
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------

Plodder wrote:

Hmmmm... just a thought: What about making 4WDs incapable of road speeds?
Speed limited to, say, 80kph, with torque and so-on suited to the skills
needed for off-road driving. That is, as you mention, driving slowly,
dealing woth restricted vision, etc. I'd like to see how many people would
buy a 4WD then! Geez, we do it with mountain bikes (lower gearing, etc.),
why not with cars meant for off-road?

me (it'll never happen... But wouldn't it be better if it did?)

What about 4x4 drivers in outback NT where there is no speed limits?
It's perfectly safe to operate a vehicle at 130k's out there, 80k's
would send drivers to sleep. Any sort of mechanical or electrical speed
restriction just introduces new problems.

I'm aware trucks are limited to 100 by law, but it's not possible to
compare 20 - 150 tonne trucks and road trains to 2 - 3 tonne 4x4's.



--
SL

"The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over
to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they
succumb to it utterly and can never again escape from it"

Joseph Goebbels - Nazi Minister of Propaganda, 1933 - 1945

John Tserkezis wrote:
Plodder wrote:

Hmmmm... just a thought: What about making 4WDs incapable of road speeds?
Speed limited to, say, 80kph, with torque and so-on suited to the skills
needed for off-road driving.


Er, aren't those just a couple of the limitations of existing 4WD
vehicles anyway? Or have I been associating with real 4WDs for too long
now? :-)
Yeah, a friend of mine has a real 4WD (really low gears, proper whiney
gearbox, no damping on the suspension, the whole lot...) it tops out at
about 100kph on the flat and at that speed the engine is really revving.
Modern 4WDs (ie SUVs) will do that without raising an whimper. They are
waaay overgeared.

"Sir Lex" wrote in message
...
Absent Husband wrote:
Yes!! Finally someone gets it!!

This comes out of a very sad, tragic event. I don't know how much the
pollies listen to the coroner - but we can only hope!!

Read it all he
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117...-37995,00.html

Title: "4WD licence recommendation"


Cheers all,
Absent Husband


I'm all for something that reduces the number of 4x4's that are
unnecessarily on our roads, but how will a 4x4 licence work? What will
the law determine is a 4x4 vehicle? They can't say that all commercial
vehicles now require a different licence, as this would include car sized
utes.

The easiest way would be to say that if the vehicle qualifies for the
lower 5% 4x4 tariff, then it's officially a 4x4. However, some smaller
4x4's might miss out on this reduced tax. We also have the problem of
discriminating against farmers who genuinely need a 4x4, who's lives are
tough enough as it is thanks to the drought, and who wouldn't need the
added burden of having to drive a few hundred K's to the nearest city to
do a course to show them how to drive a vehicle that they've been driving
for decades without a problem thanks to a few city slickers with low IQ's
and too much money.

What about the people who live in the city yet have a genuine need for
4x4's? Such as those who own caravans, those with hobby farms, those who
pull horse trailers, those in 4x4 clubs?

Then there's truck drivers, amoungst the safest drivers on the road. Would
they need to do the course?

Wouldn't extra compulsory training for drivers clash with most state
govt's policies of "extra training will give people too much confidence,
make them drive faster and result in more accidents". That is their
absolutely absurd policy for young drivers. How will they justify extra
compulsory driver training for grown adults, and in the same breath
explain their position on not teaching new drivers how to control a car
properly?

The concept of a special licence sounds good on the surface, however
implementing it will be too complicated, and unfair on too many people.

Educating people on the dangers of 4x4's in a city environment through
vigorous government advertising might do the trick, but wouldn't this ****
off a whole lot of rich CEO's in the US and Japan? Johnny Howard wouldn't
have that.

How about pulling the UK's trick of 400% tax on petrol... nope, Australian
farmers and anyone else in rural areas would be screwed.

I'm all out of ideas... anyone else?


--
SL

"The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over
to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they
succumb to it utterly and can never again escape from it"

Joseph Goebbels - Nazi Minister of Propaganda, 1933 - 1945

Introduce the new class of driver's license, say, any AWD/4WD vehicle over a
mass of 1700kg (kerb weight, not gross). This will exclude tradies' utes and
vans and smaller AWD cars. Possibly specify a height of COG or something to
catch and exclude the appropriate vehicles. Bring this in at the same time
as dumping the tax break for 4x4s. Also, introduce a "primary producer" spec
on your income taxation, that radically reduces tax paid on things like
vehicles and fuel. Just provide your TFN and you get the break. If you're
not eligible to qualify as a primary producer, you catch a hefty fine. Have
an amnesty on this license in rural areas for 12 months while you send
testers around to small towns throughout each state so that farmers only
have to get to the local town, not the nearest major population centre.

This is all straight off the top of my head, so there are probably holes
that a soccer mum could drive through in it.

Resound wrote:

Introduce the new class of driver's license, say, any AWD/4WD vehicle
over a mass of 1700kg (kerb weight, not gross). This will exclude
tradies' utes and vans and smaller AWD cars.

But will include such vehicles as the Holden Adventra which is an AWD
Commodore wagon.

Possibly specify a
height of COG or something to catch and exclude the appropriate
vehicles. Bring this in at the same time as dumping the tax break for
4x4s. Also, introduce a "primary producer" spec on your income
taxation, that radically reduces tax paid on things like vehicles and
fuel. Just provide your TFN and you get the break. If you're not
eligible to qualify as a primary producer, you catch a hefty fine.
Have an amnesty on this license in rural areas for 12 months while
you send testers around to small towns throughout each state so that
farmers only have to get to the local town, not the nearest major
population centre.

Farmers have a tax break on AWD/4WD now as well as on diesel fuel. Why do
you think farmers drive 4WD diesel sedans for private use?

AWD vehicles have better traction on bitumen and are becoming more common in
smaller sedan type vehicles. Their only drawbacks are their higher centre of
gravity and their height to other drivers visibility. They give the driver
increased visibility.

Why not just let people buy the vehicles they want to drive/ride. Try to ban
a particular class of vehicle and bicycles may be next.

I have four bicycles, which I don't use very much now that I've moved out of
the city, one motorcycle, and drive a 2WD ute. My wife drives an auto RAV4
(her choice, not mine. I think the ute handles better). On the weekends I
drive a real AWD. (11 tonne fire truck) for which I need a Medium Rigid
licence.

Theo