MANGAWHAI'S NO.1 NEWSPAPER
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Worzels World - Lies, damn lies, and statisticsPrior to Christmas a police spokesman was interviewed regarding the lower tolerance holiday period policy. The 10 kph buffer for those exceeding the posted speed limit would again be reduced to 4 kph. Speedometers are only certified to be accurate to within 5 percent yet the police insist on a 4 percent compliance margin. He insisted this was in the interests of road safety. The interviewer astutely brought to his attention that this policy had not resulted in a lowering of the road toll in the previous three years that it has been applied. The insinuation was that this measure was a revenue collecting exercise. A kind of holiday tax. Unsuspecting motorists unfamiliar with local roads, customs, and signage are easy meat for smart speed cameras. Momentarily lost for words he then proceeded to truck out the tired old justification that research shows speed is a major contributor to road deaths. I have not seen this research. I wonder how thorough it is. It does not hold true in Germany where the roads and vehicles are better engineered and people commute at very high speeds on the autobahn. Their per capita road toll is less than ours. How was this data collected and by whom? As a defence against the revenue collection argument he made the point that all revenue collected through infringement fees are destined for the Government 'consolidated fund'. He neglected though to elaborate that the police are funded directly from that same consolidated fund. By New Years eve the nation’s holiday road toll had already reached a five year high. Research depends on accurate data arranged to produce meaningful statistics. Various mathematical formulae are then applied to these statistics. Sometimes the result can be helpful in revealing general trends. Personally I love this stuff. In my later school years my favourite subject behind rugby and partying was applied mathematics which comprised such things as statistics, probability, combinations, permutations, binomial distribution from the mean, Bell and exponential curves and growth rates. Like my computer, this science can be useful but also like my computer rubbish in equals rubbish out. Whenever someone says 'research shows', my advice is to check the research. In fact if anyone had bothered to check the research behind the decision to safeguard Mangawhai's harbour with the white elephant waste water system, they would have found, as Commissioner Robertson has noted, there wasn't any. Since the Mangawhai EcoCare wastewater system has been installed the beach was closed to swimmers in 2014 for the first time in recorded history due to high levels of Ecoli. These facts would indicate that either the wastewater system is contributing to harbour pollution or that the source of the pollution lies elsewhere. Regards the road toll statistics, I have conducted my own research. It is no more scientifically rigorous than that done by the police and the data is not complete, yet the results are as you might expect and are line with common sense. The police took credit for steadily lowering the holiday road toll over recent years. If their researchers noticed that the road toll decreased as the price of fuel increased they made no mention of it. A previous holiday weekend that I recall, when gas was expensive, there was much less traffic about. The lady at the local gas station said things were pretty quiet. I did not have to wait many minutes (as I must during some holiday periods) to pull out onto State Highway 1. During these latest holidays I could listen to the news, and send a text or two before finding an opportunity to squeeze into the almost constant traffic flow. It looks to me that lower gas prices lead to more people and cars on the road and consequently a higher road toll. The formula is a simple one: Increasing the numbers of cars on the road results in more accidents and a higher road toll. If you want to do your bit to lower holiday road toll stay home. Likewise if we want to avoid any possibility of personally adding to those statistics stay off the roads. The police took credit for steadily lowering the holiday road toll over recent years. If their researchers noticed that the road toll decreased as the price of fuel increased they made no mention of it. |