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news
NMotD 752Near 25% increase in video submissions since Highway Code changes
The head of road safety at Nextbase, the dash cam manufacturer that runs the National Dash Cam Safety Portal used by many police forces, says video submissions, particularly from cyclists and pedestrians, have been on the rise since the new Highway Code came into effect in January.
Bryn Brooker told the Express there has been nearly 25 per cent more submissions since the changes, bolstered by more cyclists and pedestrians reporting motorists to their police force.
"We are seeing an increase in road users submitting video to the Nextbase Dash Cam Safety Portal," Booker said. "Particularly from cyclists and pedestrians, reporting motorists to their local police force. There has been a nearly 25 percent increase in submissions since the new Highway Code rules were announced."
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the employee of the dash cam manufacturer also recommended, "All motorists protect themselves and their vehicles with a dash cam."
Nextbase's National Dash Cam Safety Portal (NDSP) is described as "a response to the ever-increasing submissions of video and photographic evidence from members of the public in relation to witnessed driving offences" on the website.
Any type of footage, whether filmed on a dash cam, mobile phone or any other device can be submitted, with the portal being used by various police forces to address dangerous driving.
The Express' interview is predictably representitive of certain sections of the media's output since January's Highway Code changes, and asks Booker to comment on the clip featured in our Near Miss of the Day 752.
Since that footage was widely shared online, various news outlets have published articles centred around the 'debate' about who was in the wrong? This comes despite the police, Crown Prosecution Service and court all finding fault with the driver's actions.
"This video is a reminder that all road users should follow the Highway Code, and motorists should take additional caution around more vulnerable road users, such as cyclists or pedestrians," Booker says when shown the footage by the Express.
"The new Highway Code changes, which changes the hierarchy of the road, mean the responsibility is with motorists more than ever. They must now take extra caution when overtaking or passing vulnerable road users.
"Where motorists cannot prove they acted properly, it is likely they will take most, if not all, responsibility for damages after an incident."
It is later said that thousands of cyclists and drivers have invested in dashcams or helmet cameras since January.
Last week, Detective Chief Superintendent Andy Cox of Lincolnshire Police, said: "The police can’t be everywhere all the time, but the public can be," and urged riders to invest in helmet or handlebar cameras to catch law-breaking motorists.
Dan is the road.cc news editor and joined in 2020 having previously written about nearly every other sport under the sun for the Express, and the weird and wonderful world of non-league football for The Non-League Paper. Dan has been at road.cc for four years and mainly writes news and tech articles as well as the occasional feature. He has hopefully kept you entertained on the live blog too.
Never fast enough to take things on the bike too seriously, when he's not working you'll find him exploring the south of England by two wheels at a leisurely weekend pace, or enjoying his favourite Scottish roads when visiting family. Sometimes he'll even load up the bags and ride up the whole way, he's a bit strange like that.
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12 comments
I've been submitting footage for the last year - got a few updates saying action had been taken. Until one dude decided he was going to play the system and go to trial. He may have been gambling that I wouldn't turn up, but he didn't count on my justice boner.
Asked some bs questions, but the footage was clear as day. Made the point that go-pros and such cameras make things look closer than they are, but it was clear that he was a lot closer than any of the other cars that passed me.
4 points and £822 fine.
4 points and £822 fine
Great result!- as far as it's possible to tell nobody has ever been given points or fined for close-passing a cyclist in Lancashire, and there is no shortage of videos of the offence from me alone. However, Lancashire Constabulary must be an outlier in its reluctance to impose any penalties for any traffic offence, so Lancashire is heaven for offending drivers- regular readers have become bored with these, which is because there are so many derelictions of duty by Lancashire Constabulary, but this is grey Toyota ProAce van PE18 KYV about to go through a red light on 9th May. That offence will just be ignored by LC, as will the absence of an MOT. They ignore failure to pay VED as well- HY66 ZZB, a Transit lorry I have seen twice on the public road, will soon reach 3 years since VED was last paid.
What force area?
Great job, well done!
Let's keep increasing the focus on those poor and dangerous drivers out there. Especially those mobile phone addict drivers. The close pass ignorance. The smidsy's. The abusive. SEND your footage to your local POLICE force.
It's guaranteed income for our understaffed emergency services.
These ignorant drivers will have to change their behaviour or big brother will (eventually) fuck them up.
It's going to take time. Keep sending the police your phone or cycle camera footage. You could be saving the life of a future cyclist. A pedestrian or child.
The time will come where these law breakers will have no alternative other than recognise ignorance is not bliss. Keep to the rules or face consequences.
SNAP THEM ALL!
Much as I support the catching of wrong'uns, I feel I must correct you on the emergency services getting money from fines. I believe the police get some of the money paid for driver awareness courses, but fines go to the treasury. So enforcing the law costs the police money, and the more they enforce the more it costs them.
In general I'm happy that the cycle cam massive does their thing. That needs doing while we go about removing the hazard (e.g. separate cyclists from lots of cars / fast cars and reduce number of cars in general). However:
There probably ain't a police force on the planet big enough to cope with all them. And SMIDSY is at least partially a function of poor design (vehicles / road junctions). I'd think we could do a little to reduce ignorance but I fear the mobile bird has flown (or tweeted) until we have cars which allow people to pay even less attention while in them...
I'm genuinely interested to know how the offending and harm are distributed e.g. do these cluster into categories? In the simplest possible version is it closer to "all the people some of the time" or "some people (e.g. a few) all the time"? If the former policing may run into a law of diminishing returns. If the latter - and they can be identified - possible low hanging fruit.
Next question then. Assuming it is notable wrong'uns e.g. serial offenders either causing most of the carnage or at least being massively more likely to threaten / crash into someone. Can our system a) identify and catch them before they trash others and b) prevent reoffending? For b) we need a) to be very efficient (unless we execute them) and they also need to give a monkey's about the possible punishment. I would suggest in the case of "driving with no licence" the answer's "no" because penalties like "must take an extended retest" or a driving ban for these individuals is pointless.
Didnt we cover this one already last week ? Stats presented like this are meaningless, a 25% rise based on what ? the months before? last year? there might be a multitude of reasons why numbers of submissions rise, like for instance forces adopting a centralised dashcam service that just makes it easier to report things, that have nothing to do with the HC changes, correlation is not causation.
and how do you judge if its cycling/pedestrian numbers increasing submissions anyway,my local & neighbouring force never categorise them to that level.
Conduct a straw poll among cyclists you know or readership here, have you as a result of the HC changes submitted a dashcam video ? Yes or No. My answer is no,because I'd likely have submitted it anyway regardless. I suspect most people who run dashcam on bikes are similarly minded.
"Motorists are advised to give cyclists at least 1.5 metres of space when overtaking cyclists, a change that has caused a lot of confusion."
Why has this caused confusion?! It seems pretty clear to me. Ah well, at least with the tabloids losing their heads over this, there's a good chance these confused motorists will start to think they might get caught if they ignore the new rules.
I think it is that there are now actual distances/measurements quoted in the HC, and that makes it much easier to decide if something was a close pass rather than just feeling like a close pass, and that encourages people to report it.
I think it is that there are now actual distances/measurements quoted in the HC, and that makes it much easier to decide if something was a close pass rather than just feeling like a close pass, and that encourages people to report it
It rather depends on whether your local constabulary features in the UK's 10 Worst and Most Bent Police Forces list where the local OpSnap or 'DashCam Portal' is just a quick route to the bin. I hereby swear that this case, reported as OpSnapLancs case APL103575 involving Clio PE69 OOC on 5.4.22, never received any response or action. I found it very easy to decide this was a close pass at 50+ mph on the Blackpool A586 Death Road
The reading age of some tabloid frequenters is pretty low, and there are several polysyllabic words in that quote.