stop sign

[Thorpe]

Just experienced a £60 on spot fine for not stopping long enough at stop sign! We stopped- dual carriageway clear and proceeded on. Then stopped about 100 metres further on by three gendemarie who insisted that we only hesitated before entering onto road. We observed another 3 who committed same offence- all French and no one disputed so we had to pay up!Never had a driving offence and now feeling really peeved to have been done for something so simple!

[SaligoBay]

You do have to wonder about the road-planning sometimes!   It's not always obvious why they've decided on a Stop rather than just a Give Way.

But ours is not to reason why.  By a miracle, I got off with a verbal warning in spite of pulling out of a Stop junction 5 yards in front of a big police van.

It's like being over the limit with baggage on Ryanair, there's an element of chance involved.  Sometimes you're charged, sometimes you're not!

[Ron Avery]

There was a thread on this a few weeks ago where a similar complaint was made, it semed that you have to stop for 5 seconds, even if the road is clear, it was also alleged that the flicks in "Britainy" were targetting UK registered cars, yours got UK plates Thorpe?

[Val_2]

There have also been incidents where people have stopped,counted the usual four or five seconds and then proceeded only to be had for not putting on the handbake. Modern cars with rear brake lights on the back window are a dead giveaway to sitting with your foot on the pedal - so be warned!

[Miki]

Being serious on this point, this weeks "Le Pays Malouin" our local paper, has had a large spread about how the police the previous Friday had done controles in the area (19 gendarmes took part)and said how many driving offences had been committed. There were some twenty plus infringements and 88 drivers breathalysed

What surprised me, was how many drivers had been stopped since January for breath tests, some 10,681, of which 305 proved positif.(28 more than the year before for the same period)

The following was to me, even more revealing :

29% of accidents were because of refusing priority

27% were due to excess speeed

17% Alcohol

14% poor condition of car

3% bad overtaking manoeuvres

One positive thing was (if it can be called that) that only 8 had died this year, as against 15 the year before and 17 the year before that.

They say the cameras and the surveillance by the gendarmes, may possibly have caused no less accidents to happen but the speed of the accidents have been less, so less people have been killed.

There were quite a few other statistics as well (you know the French and their statistics !) mainly on local road and driving issues but I thought the above may well have justified what is happening now. We all think we are the best drivers, so the statistsics show there are an awful lot of bad ones eh !!

[Val_2]

I noticed yesterday two new "black men" on the roads locally, one had number 59 mort en 2004 and the other was a bit less. Obviously placed where somebody had died last year in a road accident but it certainly made me realise what a serious problem it was and then seeing a french tourist overtake myself and a tractor on the brow of a steep hill without waiting to see if anything was coming up from the bottom, you can well see why the statistics are frightening here.I'm all for the gendarmes doing contrôles if it helps to cut deaths caused by stupid idiots.

[Miki]

Now here's something interesting. Spoke with a couple of Gendarmes at midday (no, not helping them with their enquiries!), one of them was a friend of or daughters and simply stopped to chat for a few minutes. Anyway, amongst other every day Q's, I asked the more senior flic what one really had to do at a Stop sign.

He said you must stop (no fool this guy !), what about putting on the hand brake, "No rule about that at all, just that you MUST stop"

How long must you stop ? "As long as it takes to be sure the road is clear but not slow down, simply brake and immediately drive on, as in some of the route "priority cases""

So how about 3 or 4 seconds " Counting is not part of the law, ensuring that you stop long enough to ensure that there is definitely nothing coming along to make your entering the route is dangerous", then he said "1,2 or 3 seconds or more whatever it takes for you drive on without endangering anyone else, is sufficient time for being stationary"

Now that advice coincides exactly with what our daughters Driving instructor told us as well....

They may be wrong (I have to say I pretty much doubt that but of course other officers may well read the individual situation quite differently) but that is what two, supposedly experts on road regulations have told me.

Anyone actually read anywhere where the time factor is rigid and lawful ?

[Thorpe]

If one is driving a RHD vehicle as we were- one has to stop to look across when entering a new road.In our case we definately stopped, looked, saw the way clear and proceeded. Strangely enough, as I observed another 3 vehicles who were stopped and charged -they all entered when the road was clear and therefore being of no danger to anyone else. Watch this space! we might take it in turns to loiter at stop signs! just to make sure that we have stopped long enough.

[Miki]

Don't joke about it, you should have done something about it if you were in the right and had a witness.

They are not always right, in fact, to my mind they are rarely right and just like in the UK, they are simply after filling up the coffers, thus the number of controles we get, although of course part of the reason will be to educate the drivers !

I have had a few shouts with the flics, make a good case, have someone arguing with you and as long as you were not caught bang to rights, you have a half decent shout !

In our old village, we had a couple of local flics, with kids at the same school as ours, sat on the side of the road pulling people over for not wearing seat belts, I got stopped, supposedly for no seat belt, they strolled across, told me to get out but first, I had to undo my seat belt. Still one of the wally's said "why no seat belt" ..........even his partner looked embarrassed.

I stayed still and slowly undid the belt (sounds like a line from a Jackie Collins book !!) giving him time to think about it BUT still he asked me about my belt. The patron from the "presse" came over (I had only just driven away from his shop), who had been observing and asked what the flic was on about, between him and me, the idiot just backed off. Never did hit it off with him at the school reunions after that !!