Shut Up And Drive

I’ve always thought of speed cameras as a bit like a Diana inquest – annoying, expensive, never ending, and largely ignored by the public. Unlike the princess, however, it looks like they’ll be with us for a long time to come.

I’ve enjoyed a clean licence for twenty years but, recently, I received points for exceeding the limit by four miles per hour. I paid the fine and did the time – in this case three points over three years – and then a few weeks back found myself limping along at twenty miles per week behind a lorry at three in the morning. I was signalled by the driver that the road was clear and I should overtake and, as I accelerated, there was a flash and I was caught on camera.

Feeling about as lucky as Sharon Osborne’s seat cushion I waited for the inevitable admonishing letter, but when it came I was offered the chance to miss out on a further three points if I took a Speed Awareness course. Could this be a bit of common sense? Happy Days! So, on Wednesday, I set off for the classroom. Of course I soon ended up running late and needing to speed.

In Richmond Park some old Miss Marple lookalike was treating the twenty mile speed limit as some ridiculously fast pace dreamed up by NASA engineers to escape gravity and obviously imagined a man with a red flag and a limp walking in front. I swear I missed at least one Christmas sitting behind her.

When I did escape, I then had to stop at a level crossing featuring the slowest train in the world, teasing us as it crawled along with the stoker obviously running out of coal and throwing on bakelite instead - with his arm in a sling.

And then, and I know you’ll think I made this up, three police motorcyclists slowed me down to a complete stop as I had to wait for a manky old Range Rover to pass by surrounded by outriders. In it, unless I’m a bad judge of hairstyles, was either Princess Anne or Amy Winehouse’s granny.

The perfect end to this story would be that, as I was late, I got done for speeding on my way to the course, but fate didn’t write that punch line and I arrived very rushed with all parking places gone, and having to drive around for ten minutes to find a space.

Eventually I checked in and wandered through to the lecture room where I had my first surprise. I expected the place to be full of young hoodies caught showing off for their smackhead mates but instead I was faced with what looked like a Led Zeppelin audience; row after row of London citizens who made Bruce Forsyth look alive. The Stena Stair Lift may have taken them up their Stairway to Heaven but they can still, obviously, cut up rough.

Our instructor welcomed us and then asked if we knew what determines the positioning of speed cameras. Some smug, attention seeking, Scotsman spoiled the whole serious tone by shouting out "Revenue". As the room laughed I knew I’d said the right thing. We were off to a flyer.

I was then distracted by one man constantly talking to his mate along my row but discovered he was his translator, putting the instructor’s words in to Chinese for the old man. Now, call me Enoch Powell, but how on earth did this man ever pass his UK driving test? By the time his translator had put the examiner’s "Emergency Stop" in to Mandarin you get the feeling the moment might have passed.

I was thinking this over when it all started to get a bit serious. We had to look at videos and guess speeds, distance, hazards, likely outcomes and so on with each of us getting a personalised print out of how we had done. I had expected Road Rage but my report said "AveRage" instead.

After a short break we ploughed through statistics and I found that three quarters of people killed in motorway accidents die standing on the hard shoulder, that at 30 mph 80% of pedestrians survive an accident and at 40mph that falls to 10%.
We were shown photos of accident scenes and I was beginning to see the purpose of the day at last. Our lecturer went for the matey approach and got his message across effectively, though he was perhaps a bit too matey when he tried telling a joke and said "I missed my punchline. Bastard!"

He asked when I felt the need to speed and I admitted that tailgaters who drove up my bum made me speed up to get away from them. He told me in future to just keep steady, let them worry about it, and never lose my temper. Apparently my anger was simply due to me imagining other drivers’ aggressive thoughts but the reality was they are very nice people just going about their business, placidly.

Sounded like good advice, and I was able to put it in to practise almost immediately. On the way home a red BMW drove right up to my bumper and sat there whilst I stuck to the speed limit. He eventually overtook me and, mindful of the instructor’s advice, I smiled as he went past. The driver looked at me, smiled back -and gave me the finger.