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Speed camera under suspidon
Page 24
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Guy Sheppard reports on a truck clocked travelling at an impossible speed.
A UNION LEADER is questioning the reliability of speed cameras after a member claimed he was recorded driving a truck at a physically impossible speed.
Malcolm Williams, regional officer for the United Road Transport Union. says John Woodcock received a prosecution notice for exceeding the 0mph speed limit while climbing a hill on the A303 out of Chicklade in Wiltshire.
"Bearing in mind that HGVs have to go through the village at 30mph, truck drivers would be hard pressed to reach 40mph before hitting the slope and the speed camera is a third of the way up the slope so the truck would be slowing down by then."
Williams believes that Woodcock was mistakenly recommended for prosecution because the speed of his Volvo FL7 and trailer was confused with that of an overtaking car. Although he says police realised their mistake when Woodcock complained, he believes the images need to be handled with greater care. "It would be nice to receive an assurance that police do carefully scrutinise these images before they issue potential prosecution notices.
"Members are cynical and suspicious about the real purpose of these cameras on the A303 on the basis that they may be there to generate fines."
However. Dave Frampton, manager of the Wiltshire and Swindon Safety Camera Unit, says there is no record of a John Woodcock ever being prosecuted at the Chicklade location. "We'N only had one case of an offenc being withdrawn and that wi when it was shown that the vehic was sub-HGV weight.
"One thing we don't want is 1 put this system in disrepute, so NI bend over backwards to make sui it is accurate."
He says police officers alwa: check camera images and woul always detect a 'double-bounc incident, where the speed of or vehicle is confused with that 1 another overtaking vehicle.