Forum topic: What can we do to stop these deadly boy racers?

Actually very badly reported in the Enfield Advertiser. The quote from me is a complete fabrication:

What I actually said is very different:

"We (FLDRA) have been taking part in a Community Roadwatch run by the local police in which residents assist officers on recording speeding vehicles and sending warning letters to drivers.
However, we call on the police to carry out more active patrols in the Borough and to stamp down on dangerous as well as antisocial driving"

With regard to the picture of the two car crash, it does not look like the cars were racing as it appears primarily to have been a head on collision.

If I was to make an informed guess, but am perpared to be wrong, it would be that person driving the silver wagon was the victim. He must have been driving up Green Lanes towards the Triangle, whilst the smaller dark colour vehicle was coming the other way, probably at considerable speed, lost control, mounted the centre refuge. knocked over the plastic bollard and rammed in to hte front of the wagon, then spun round to face uphill before stopping.

Curiously the Smart car which appears not to have been damaged, is still there, today.

There was also another crash at the top of Aldermans Hill that has destroyed a set of traffic lights.

BTW, I've asked the paper to make a correction. See what happens.

The photo of the two wrecked cars was posted on the Better Streets for Enfield Facebook page and provoked some discussion, with two councillors participating (Daniel Anderson and Alan Sitkin).



Daniel Anderson contacted the police to find out more about the crash.

So, as Paul M has already pointed out, not a race, but a head-on collision (both cars damaged most on the offside). As the car that was hit was stationary, it means that the one that was moving must have been going pretty damn fast to have been damaged so badly.

The Facebook discussion mentions some further local collisions (eg a car that hit the lights at the top of Aldermans Hill). There is also information about a speed check done by the police on the A10 on the same night (presumably what the Enfield Gazette was referring to in its extremely muddled report). The police caught 25 speeding drivers, including one doing 100mph in a 40mph zone.

Another worrying aspect is that it turns out that the Love Your Doorstep Twitter account was used to alert drivers to the A10 speed check (not a reflection on the people running LYDS, of course, but on some of their readers). One of the tweets criticised the police for trying to stop speeding:
- in other words, this tweeter (you can substitute other words of your own choice ending in -er) considers that anti-social behaviour is more worthy of police attention that potentially murderous dangerous driving.

Another contributor to the Facebook discussion commented that "having recently moved to Enfield from zone 2, I was shocked to discover that my car insurance had nearly doubled because of the high incidence of accidents and claims on insurance'.

All the below punishments should applied for all those who use our public roads as a racing track for some sad fun without a thought and care about the public's safety.

1. Driving licence taken away from them for at least 5 years, which will help reduce those poisonous fumes from our atmosphere. Less cars means less noise to disturb the human spirit.

2. They should be heavily fined and the money used to make road improvements.

3. Unpaid, manual Community work every weekend for a whole year within the Boroughs they decided to race their cars. I am sure the Council could do with some unpaid labour.

Since moving to Palmers Green in August 2016 I have seen the aftermath of three car crashes on Aldermans Hill. Very worryingly two of them were near to the entrances of Broomfield Park where the cars had ended up on the pavement, thankfully it seems that they didn't knock over any pedestrians. I've contacted the local Councillors (who have tried to be helpful) and I received a response from a Council official who said that as it is an agreed route for emergency vehicles traffic calming measures can't be implemented. Not sure what the solution is really apart from cameras and signs??

No idea why we can't have a couple of speed cameras along Aldermans Hill, Powys Lane and Cannon Hill?

Unlike bumps they don't affect emergency traffic, good potential source of revenue for an apparently broke Council and based on some of the wideboys that race past me as I huff & puff my bicycle up Powys Lane it could do a lot of use!

I certainly agree that we need more cameras, however it is only the punishment that will put a stop to this behaviour.