New Traffic Lights for Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna

Select traffic lights in Vienna will feature same-sex couples as part of this year's Eurovision Song Contest

A spokeswoman for Vienna's city lighting department told Reuters, "the campaign is intended to present Vienna as an open-minded city and also to improve traffic safety as the unusual symbols attract the attention of drivers and pedestrians."
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Driver speeding in the UK ordered to pay £11,000

David Pickup was caught speeding and has to pay £11,000 for challenging his ticket after a prosecution expert hired an airfield and a sports car to prove him wrong.

David Pickup, 45, was clocked doing 101mph in his Audi R8 on the A55 at Lloc in Flintshire in April 2014.


Flintshire Magistrates' Court heard a police speed camera caught him and he asked officers: "Can we call it 98?".


Mr Pickup who is from Wilmslow in Cheshire, who has a holiday home in Abersoch, Gwynedd, was convicted of speeding.


He denied breaking the 70mph speed limit and said that a number of people from Cheshire had second homes in Abersoch, which he called a millionaire's paradise.


The defence questioned the accuracy of the in-car police speed camera so the prosecution hired an expert who rented an airfield and an Audi R8 to carry out tests, the results of which were presented to the court.


Pickup was fined £675, given six points on his licence and ordered to pay the full prosecution costs - which included the testing - of £10,384.

How to maintain your awareness whilst driving

So we've come across this gem of a gadget called "StopSleep" it helps maintain awareness by alerting to the first signs of a drop in concentration brought on by the on-set of driver fatigue

It does this by continually measuring your levels of awareness and concentration via electrodermal activity. Your electrodermal activity, represents your brain activity, and by measuring this activity, StopSleep can accurately gauge your levels of awareness and concentration. As soon as your levels of concentration start to drop, StopSleep will alert you immediately via it's 2 stage alarm system.

Anyway you can read more about it on the site, we were thinking what a great thing especially for those that do shift work and drive long distances, jobs such as mobile sales persons, truck drivers, pilots, air hostesses might find it a useful or even as a "care of duty" product that fleet managers might be interested in

Drive Safely

Gadget that police want banned because it would allow people to speed

A gadget that alerts speeding drivers when emergency vehicles has faced calls by police and motoring organisations to be banned.

The £799.99 Target Blu Eye is a dashboard-mounted device which, astonishingly, is perfectly legal, according to its makers.

It can detect when police cars – even unmarked vehicles – are more than half a mile away by picking up encoded radio signals, and then sends a warning to the motorist.

When a 999 vehicle is within 1,200 yards, it sets off a green light on the display. As it gets nearer, the lights go to amber and finally they go red when it is just yards away. The device can even detect the radio signals from police officers on the beat and force helicopters.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk

5 British sports caught speeding by French helicopter

off-duty officer who was overtaken by 5 sports cars racing down autoroute phoned on-duty officers and the Gendarmes swooped.

French gendarmes sent a helicopter chasing after five British-registered sports cars - including a Lamborghini and two Porsches - after an-off duty officer in a private car spotted them speeding down the A63 motorway near Biarritz in the southwest 

The British vehicles overtook him at speeds far above the French maximum limit of 130 kph (80 mph). The Britons were traveling on Friday afternoon in the direction of Hendaye, on the border with Spain. The convoy slowed to permitted speeds once the drivers spotted the chopper following them. 

The cars were tracked down to a toll booth where several police cars hauled them over and imposed fines for speeding. Police said they did not know exactly how fast they were going because the helicopter that had followed them was not equipped with speed radar.

First person to pass UK driving test using a sat nav

Credit: SWNS

Grant Ferguson, 17, has become the first person in the UK to pass his driving test – using a sat nav.

His local driving test centre was chosen as one of 20 in the UK to trial the revised practical exam with the help of a GPS navigation system.

The examiner set up a route on the device for the first twenty minutes of the test and Grant followed the sat nav verbal instructions - with the instructor still in the vehicle.

The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) expects 1000 learner drivers will take part in the revised tests which are set to continue until the end of the year. If successful, it could be the biggest shake up of the test in almost 20 years! the last big change was when the written theory exam was introduced in 1996.

Grant Said:

"I had been learning to drive for about a month when the opportunity came up to try out the new test. I felt like I was part of an important change. I'll definitely be buying a sat nav because that's what I know and it gives you a bit of freedom to go where you want.
I was a bit relieved that I didn't have to do the reverse around the corner in the test."

 

The changes could see the three-point turn and reversing round a corner scrapped. These will be replaced with more commonplace manoeuvres such as reversing out of a parking bay.

The DVSA say that candidates will also be asked safety questions while on the move, instead of at the start, and asked to operate switches such as screen heaters.

Motoring groups have urged caution in removing manoeuvres like a three-point turn,saying it can be essential if sat navs lead drivers down a dead end road.

What do you think? would this be a good permanent change, should tests just be made longer to include more rather than scrapping other useful things? alternatively should the range of things you could be asked to do increase to at least ensure the manouvres are learnt?

Have your say below

eCall to be introduced in the EU to allert emergency services of car crashes

The European Parliament has voted for an EU-wide emergency alert system dubbed eCall to help ambulance crews get to road accidents faster, potentially saving lives and reducing the severity of injuries.

In the event of an accident (where the airbag sensors are set off) the eCall device will alert rescue services automatically, using the existing 112 emergency number. It is thought that response times could be halved, especially in rural areas.

The information that will be provided to the emergency crews will be:

• type of vehicle
• fuel used
• time of accident
• location

From 31 March 2018 new cars and light vans will have the system as standard. The technology was first proposed in 2012, but legislation was delayed amid privacy concerns.

You can already have this technology in your car by purchasing a Road Angel Gem  which has it as an inbuilt feature (eAssist)

The European Commission says installation of the device is likely to add about €100 (£72; $109) to the cost of a new car.

A standard accident alert system is needed in Europe, because "when you cross a border you have a language problem and often do not even really know where you are", said Czech Social Democrat MEP Olga Sehnalova, the parliament's lead negotiator on the issue.

But Jan Philipp Albrecht from the Greens said the technology should not be mandatory.

"The consequence of being connected all the time means that we are also subject to more possibilities to track us," he told the BBC.

"We reduced the data being processed to a very minimum, but nonetheless it is technically possible for companies, or for an authority, to track your position and to even surveil you. So I don't think this should be obliged to everybody. Everybody should have the chance to opt out."

The UK government objects to the plans. UK Transport Minister Claire Perry said "the benefit of making eCall mandatory in all new cars does not justify the cost of implementing it.

"We do not support the measure, because it is not cost-effective for us."