Friday, March 30, 2012
Drivers may suffer from small car syndrome
The stereotype of the disrespectful 4X4 driver has long proliferated among the motoring community. Owners of vehicles such as the Ford Fiesta and Morris Minor have been thought of as the victims rather than the perpetrators of road rage.
However, a shadow has been cast over the traditional thinking by Australian provider of cheap car insurance AAMI. After questioning a sizeable group of native drivers the company arrived at the conclusion that female drivers of small cars are the most likely to act aggressively.
The women motorists apparently feel so vulnerable when driving alongside big gas guzzlers that they see no other option but to lash out. Some exercise their anxiety by waving the two fingered salute, while others go so far as to shout and scream obscenities.
A spokesperson for AAMI said, “Because of the rising cost of motoring, we're seeing a trend towards smaller cars becoming popular, so it's worrying if people feel the need to overcompensate for their smaller assets by displaying risky driving behaviours.”
Whether British motorists should be looking out for women driving Ford Ka's or elderly people cruising about in Honda Civics is questionable…but being a considerate driver should stop anyone suffering from road rage due to your actions behind the wheel.
Photo © PinkMoose via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: 4X4, cheap car insurance, driver, Ford Fiesta, Ford Ka, Honda Civic, Morris Minor, road rage, small car, vehicles
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Space miles
Imagine if you were looking for a car insurance quote and received one that said £300,000.
Well, according to Elon Musk, the co-founder of PayPal and CEO of the American commercial rocket-making company SpaceX, we’ll be able to enjoy a round trip to Mars within a decade and that’s what it will cost each customer. Ok, we admit that this large sum of money will get you 280,000,000 miles of rocket travel – but how long will it take to get there? Days? Years?
And once you get to Mars, what will there be to see? We doubt being stood on the red planet will be as pleasant as experiencing the British countryside or exploring one of the UK’s many idyllic villages, welcoming towns, or vibrant cities.
One hundred and forty-one point six million miles from the Sun and only -65 degrees centigrade on average, the only ‘land mark’ available for tourists at the moment is the solar system’s largest dead volcano Olympus Mons.
Hmm, we’re not sure we’ll be saving up for a ticket. Leaving the third rock from the Sun for what is essentially a freezing wilderness doesn’t sound that attractive a proposition to us.
Photo © oliverj819 via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: car insurance quote, Mars, PayPal, red plant, rocket, round trip, SpaceX, sun, tourists
Friday, March 23, 2012
Leaving a window open is not enough
It’s that time again...the sun is coming out more often and the inside of your car is likely to get very hot, very quickly!So, if you’re travelling with a dog in your car, or any live animal for that matter, you need to be aware of the dangers posed to animals in hot cars.
The RSPCA’s campaign – Dogs die in hot cars – carries the message that you should not leave your dog alone in a car and passers-by who see an animal in a car on a hot day are encouraged to call the police.
It’s also probably a good idea to be aware that you could be prosecuted under the Animal Welfare Act if you have put your animal at risk.
The RSPCA advises that leaving a window open or putting a sunshield over the windscreen is not enough and that heatstroke in a dog can be fatal.
To find out more about heatstroke in dogs please go to the RSPCA website and remember DOGS DIE IN HOT CARS!
Photo © jetske via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: animal, Animal Welfare Act, car, dog, heatstroke, hot, hot cars, RSPCA, window
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Gold-standard travel
Usually having car insurance is enough protection on the road for drivers, but apparently not the new owner of one particular Rolls Royce Phantom.
The car – which is expensive enough as it stands – has been decorated inside and out with 120kg of gold (reportedly worth more than £3million) and has been customised so that it is bullet-proof and grenade-proof!
If you want to know just how difficult this car would be to break into, it will apparently withstand 570 AK47 bullets and two grenades. Very precise. Would the car be ruined by 571 bullets? Who tested this?
Anyway, in case you're wondering who on earth might need this amount of protection, the car has been given to a super-rich Middle-Eastern businessman as a gift from a Liverpool-based designer who, guess what, works with gold.
Right, well the women among us are off to research this businessman and the designer to see whether they are eligible bachelors, and the men are going to see if they have an unmarried sister.
My Renault Clio could definitely do with a lick of gold.
Photo © The Car Spy via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Friday, March 16, 2012
Bar staff shaken, not stirred
It’s the kind of thing that you think of as the apogee of cool when you’re still young enough to be in primary school – four business-suited men go into a 55th floor cocktail bar, order some flashy £14 drinks then step onto the balcony.
Although that in itself might sound suave and upwardly mobile, it’s what the young men did next that is exceptional.Yes, they downed their drinks, but once they’d done that they then shocked horrified bar staff by flinging themselves from the balcony.
But this was no morbid suicide pact – instead, the men were base jumpers in disguise who had a getaway car waiting for them on the ground below.
After making their vertigo-defying jump they engaged their parachutes and gracefully descended to the ground where one brave or foolhardy (I’ll let you be the judge) young driver waited to help them make a quick escape.
But spare a though for the staff at the cocktail bar. It must have been quite a shock, traumatic even, for them to, however briefly, think they had been helpless witnesses to a suicide. "I ran from the kitchen into the room and I just saw a flash of them jumping over, and at that stage none of us knew what the hell was going on," said one.
"They had cameras on their helmets so I'm sure we'll all see it on YouTube soon. I hope they are caught – they need to pay their bill,” he added.
I hate to sound like a grown-up but this kind of thing has all kinds of implications in the insurance world, too. For example, the bar may have more difficulty finding cover next time they want it if it is thought that there is a risk of the same kind of thing happening again. And what of the young getaway driver, maybe his car insurance company would not be best pleased to know that his vehicle was being used for to aid a daredevil stunt that stretches the bounds of safety and legality.
Photo © mountainhiker via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: base jumpers, car insurance company, getaway car, men, young driver
Monday, March 12, 2012
Littering motorists grind our gears
No one at the Hoot offices enjoys seeing litter on the ground, so we’re welcoming the news that soon there may be a fining system coming into effect for drivers who drop rubbish out of their car onto the road.
As difficult as it might be for the car-proud among us, it is important that we keep the UK’s highways clean by keeping the rubbish we’ve made in our cars until we arrive at our destination and can throw litter away in a bin. By the end of the month, authorities in London will be able to fine littering motorists up to £100 for their offence, and we’ve got our fingers crossed (like the Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman) that authorities all over Britain will soon be able to fine drivers who litter too.
It isn’t fair that some road users think it’s alright to make a mess of our roads and have councils and other authorities clean it up, usually at a cost to all tax payers.
The Highways Agency has said that if all of the rubbish thrown on UK roads annually was collected and put into bin bags – 700,000 of them would be filled.
So, it you never litter the roads we applaud you – and if you do, don’t.
Photo © riverofgod via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: bin, clean, councils, drivers, fine, highways, Highways Agency, litter, littering, motorist, offence, road, rubbish
Friday, March 9, 2012
The friendly woonerf
Apparently, in about ten years’ time, the UK government may begin using a traffic calming measure already in use in Amsterdam.
If I write ‘woonerfs’, you might think I didn’t check my blog through for typos, or perhaps you might think that I’m about to tell you about some strange woolly animal.
Well neither of those thoughts would be correct, because a woonerf is a type of road layout which is slowing motorists in Amsterdam down to about 12mph without much work.
Meaning ‘road for living’, or ‘living road’, a woonerf provides motorists, cyclists and pedestrians with a more equal amount of space.
Drivers are forced to slow down by strategically placed plants, play areas, buildings, and an unnerving lack of pavement kerb, making it difficult to tell where you should be driving and where pedestrians should be walking.
The Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM) undertook a survey and out of 4000 people, only 27% were against the appearance of woonerfs in Britain.
Unfortunately for the individuals who’d happily see them in the UK right now, it might not happen for a while yet. The executive director of the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety has explained that at the moment councils just haven’t got the money to be introducing these new road layouts.
However, he believes that when the UK starts building things again, as our economic situation improves, woonerfs may begin to help reduce the number of accidents on our roads.
Well we can’t wait to see these woonerfs, they sound friendly.
If I write ‘woonerfs’, you might think I didn’t check my blog through for typos, or perhaps you might think that I’m about to tell you about some strange woolly animal.
Well neither of those thoughts would be correct, because a woonerf is a type of road layout which is slowing motorists in Amsterdam down to about 12mph without much work.
Meaning ‘road for living’, or ‘living road’, a woonerf provides motorists, cyclists and pedestrians with a more equal amount of space.
Drivers are forced to slow down by strategically placed plants, play areas, buildings, and an unnerving lack of pavement kerb, making it difficult to tell where you should be driving and where pedestrians should be walking.
The Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM) undertook a survey and out of 4000 people, only 27% were against the appearance of woonerfs in Britain.
Unfortunately for the individuals who’d happily see them in the UK right now, it might not happen for a while yet. The executive director of the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety has explained that at the moment councils just haven’t got the money to be introducing these new road layouts.
However, he believes that when the UK starts building things again, as our economic situation improves, woonerfs may begin to help reduce the number of accidents on our roads.
Well we can’t wait to see these woonerfs, they sound friendly.
Photo © La Citta Vita via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: accident, Amsterdam, cyclists, drivers, government, IAM, Institute of Advanced Motorists, motorists, pedestrians, road layout, slow down, traffic calming, UK, woonerf
Monday, March 5, 2012
Intel to invest $100 million in “smarter cars”
In science fiction the car is usually so much more than just another vehicle. These models sometimes come with extras like holographic interfaces, on board AI and even in one crazy case – a flux capacitor.
Needless to say, we can only dream about most of this technology...or could it soon become a reality?Chipmaker company Intel, is introducing a $100 million fund to finance technological innovation within the vehicle industry.
Over the next three to five years, Intel will invest in hardware, software and services companies which will provide in-car apps and establish connectivity between other vehicles and devices.
Intel hopes their investment will lead to a new line of vehicles which are wirelessly linked together. For example, if a driver notices a traffic accident, he may be able to send a warning to other motorists in the immediate area.
The company is also planning to improve driver safety by integrating technologies such as gesture detection, text to speech voice recognition and eye tracking into upcoming vehicles.
Agreements are already in place between several car companies, such as BMW, Hyundai, Toyota and Kia, who all want new technology incorporated into their vehicles.
For those drivers who like to personalise their cars, Intel has already employed social anthropologists to examine other possibilities, including the introduction of soothing lighting and music to calm stressed motorists while on the road.
Photo © Robert Couse-Baker via Flickr under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: driver safety, Intel, Science Fiction, technology, traffic accident, voice recognition
Friday, March 2, 2012
Drivers may be able to order McDonalds products via their sat navs
Do you ever drive close to a fast food restaurant, smell the aroma and think, “I could really go for some chips right now?”
If this sounds like you, you may be interested in a new piece of software currently being tested in Japan.
Using the Japanese in-car “Intel Transport System” (ITS), a hungry driver can communicate food orders to the nearest McDonalds branch. Once the order has been processed and paid for, the motorist is given directions to the store via their sat nav – and they just have to pick up their order.
If the first test in March is successful, the service will be introduced nationwide and may cross over to the UK if ITS appears outside of Japan.
If the McDonalds software proves popular, other retailers may also send vouchers and other discounts via the ITS network to interested parties.
However, if the technology does become available in the UK, drivers should only use it when parked in a safe location.
Personally, I’m loving it...
Photo © dave_mcmt via Flickr under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: Intelligent Transport System, McDonalds, sat nav