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Near Miss of the Day van and cyclist.JPGPolice forces across England and Wales sign up to single portal for road users to submit video evidence
An online platform has been launched today that will provide a single resource for road users across England and Wales to submit video evidence of dangerous driving to police forces signed up to the initiative, which has been welcomed by Cycling UK.
Set up by dash cam manufacturer Nextbase, the National Dash Cam Safety Portal will allow motorists, cyclists and motorcyclists alike to submit footage they have captured showing examples of poor driving.
For the forces involved, it will substitute the various one-off systems they have in place for people to submit video footage.
It follows a similar portal initially launched by North Wales Police and subsequently picked by other forces across the country as part of Operation Snap.
> Campaigners call for national guidelines on submission of dash and helmet cam evidence
Cycling UK’s head of campaigns and advocacy, Duncan Dollimore, commented: “Public cuts have led to road police numbers plummeting in recent years by nearly 50%, whilst casualties have increased among all road users.
“Given that reduction in resources, it’s crucial that efficient and standardised online reporting systems are introduced to facilitate the submission of dash, bike and helmet-cam footage of irresponsible road use.
“Our police cannot be everywhere at once, but with Nextbase’s portal we have the next best thing – a one-stop shop for the collation of evidence our forces can rely upon. It can only lead to safer roads for everyone.”
Joshua Harris, director of campaigns at the road safety charity Brake, said: “This is a fantastic initiative which couldn’t be more timely.
“The increasing popularity of dash cams is a huge positive for road safety. However, with more drivers than ever seeking to report illegal behaviour the burden on the police has increased.
“This portal is an elegant solution which enables the police to process this vital data without wasting their scarce resources. We fully support this initiative and urge its swift adoption across the UK."
In the case of a force not yet being signed up to the platform, the system will generate a witness statement and reference code which can be taken directly to the relevant force for processing, where your footage can be viewed securely.
According to Cycling UK, police forces linked to the portal via their own platforms include Avon and Somerset Constabulary, Cheshire Constabulary, Essex Police, Hampshire Constabulary, the Metropolitan Police Service, Norfolk Constabulary, North Yorkshire Police, Suffolk Constabulary, Surrey Police, Sussex Police, Thames Valley Police, Dyfed-Powys Police, Gwent Police, North Wales Police and South Wales Police.
Other forces that will receive footage directly through the portal include West Mercia Police, Warwickshire Police, West Midlands Police and Wiltshire Police.
Superintendent Paul Moxley, head of operations at West Mercia Police, said: “While the benefits to motorists of this ground-breaking portal are clear, this convenience extends to police forces, since a process which previously took hours can now be reduced to a matter of minutes.
“The key in making this work for us has been determining a way of providing footage in an accessible format, whilst the creation of a witness statement is also integral to ensuring the process is as efficient as possible.
“In embracing this new technology, it enables the concerned road user to help us positively influence driver behaviour to make our roads a safer place for all users,” he added.
Nextbase director Richard Browning said: “The surge in dash cam usage in recent years is beneficial to motorists looking to protect themselves in the event of incidents on the roads, but it has meant an increase in the amount of footage sent to police forces.
“Until now forces have not had the means to process this footage so the National Dash Cam Safety Portal has been developed with this in mind.”
He added: “The portal allows all road users to submit footage captured on devices, such as dash cams, which will enable the police to reduce such offences, ultimately making the roads safe for all users.”
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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45 comments
People seem to want it both ways. Intrusive cameras for all to catch wrong doing but yet number plates and insurance for cyclists is wrong. What have you cyclists got to hide? Mandatory cameras to be fitted to bikes? Jerseys with registration numbers on? If it stops one fixie rider from killing a pedestrian it's got to be worth it?
I'm all for stopping serious wrong-doing but we seem to be headed towards trivial wrong-doing if you watch what people think is a near miss in most car incidents on Youtube. It'll end up like it is with the Twitter police and 'perceived' hate.
We've already lost the war on privacy by selling ourselves out for mobile entertainment. Why not dive right in.
The public road is not a private place and there's no expectation of privacy whilst in a public place.
They are all quite different things though.
I think driving has got worse and I have eventually got fed up with the number of incidents in a car and a bike that I observe (most of which I have mitigated by defensive driving and cycling). I'd rather have some record now for when the inevitable happens.
Number plates is just a massive initial cost and on going cost for no real benefit. It just doesn't stack up.
Most people have insurance via their household insurance policy and anyone who doesn't regardless of whether they cycle is taking an unnecessary risk given how low the premium is.
When did anyone suggest mandatory cameras? Or are you conflating two totally unrelated issues. People protecting themselves by collecting evidence for crimes committed against them is totally unrelated to cyclists having number plates. Two totally different issues and privacy has nothing to do with the use of a camera. Or do you think the law only applies when a police officer can witness a crime?
I thought I would look at the portal Nextbase created. I don't know if it's currently down or I can't drive it but this is all I got?
No links work
Screenshot_20180928-180432_Chrome.jpg
I was hit by a driver on Monday, which wrote my bike off. I was basically uninjured, thank god, but that basically means the police won’t take it any further. So I guess getting hit by a car is just normal now.
Has been for a while, I was hit last year, no real injury apart from a sore back for a few days, police said not enough evidence despite the driver stating exactly what she did to a police officer who was only half a dozen cars back.
We're basically fucked given the let's bash cyclists' investigation into making harsher laws, the police make a rod for their own backs by not dealing with low level stuff because this in turn creates more problems further down the line as we see every day now because people know they can do what the fuck they like because plod will rarely do owt and even if you do go to court a magistrate will just put up one of the usual excuses to slap them on the wrist if at all or for a death basically get a jury of motorists to let them off because that's exactly how they would behave and well it was only a nasty, smelly cyclist who got killed and deserved it just because.
What's needed is a change in the attitude of the police and judiciary, such that dangerous driving is investigated and prosecuted under existing, and entirely adequate, laws.
What's not needed is a Stasi-style operation. There's plenty of awful driving on the roads but there's also a not entirely small amount of daft buggers on bikes, the latter seemingly being the government's number one priority when it comes to cracking down on miscreants.
Be careful what you wish for...
This is all a bit Orwelian if you ask me. Some of those Black Mirror episodes are becoming more real by the day.
<p>[quote=Yorkshire wallet]</p>
<p>This is all a bit Orwelian if you ask me. Some of those Black Mirror episodes are becoming more real by the day.</p>
<p>[/quote]</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“The police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>One of Peels founding principles of the police. It is incumbent upon all of us to uphold the law. Just because there is no police around does not mean that people should feel free to do as they wish, and if we fail to encourage behaviour respectful of the law and others then we end up in the same state of sink estates run on the basis of “snitches get stitches”. This is not thought crimes, political descent or moralism. This is about people wanting their communities to be safe. I cannot understand what is wrong with that, or do you think the law should only count when a police officer can see it?</p>
I've done my first submission ever, but I'm not confident
" To allow further action, the incident will have to be at the higher end of the ‘careless driving’ scale or worse which means in some cases where offending has occurred, there may be no further action if the incident does not pass the threshold set to allow it. As a guide, if the incident is something you would expect to see on an average journey, while it is still not acceptable, no further action will be taken under this process."
I see crap driving all the time, so I guess crap driving is the normal standard !
What is the "higher end of the ‘careless driving’ scale" ?!
So a bit like saying, only if you were sexually assaulted on the 'higher end' of assaults we'll allow further action. Fuckwits don't even grasp that it's the small stuff that leads into the bigger stuff, so much for vision zero/broken windows and all that.
I'll just swing my sledghammer near your head as you walk past me on the street constable, what, you're going to take further action, hang on, surely that's not at the higher end of assault is it, didn't even touch you so you can fook right off with youer double standards sonshine!
Just uploaded a couple of incidents myself.
It's a bit annoying that they've (or at least Avon/Somerset) got a yes/no answer for whether the footage has correct timestamps. I had the correct time on my rear one, but the front one was reset and has reverted to 2015, which of course you don't notice until after the event.
Well, this is timely, I've now reported and uploaded video of a narrow escape from a T-Bone that might have had me over the canal bridge on the Lifford Lane/Pershore road junction in Brum on Sunday morning.
This one was so startling it even received a comment from another cyclist a while later at the cafe in Cannon Hill Park, along the lines of "Was it you I saw having a narow escape earlier". Shame to say I didn't get his details in case the video footage isn't enough!
New txtspk?
Two things spring to mind
1, Nextbase have just got themselves a free source of clips for countless more bad driver TV shows one wonders how much revenue that will produce for them?
2, Why have Thames Valley signed up for this? Since they have already released a statement (I believe it was on one of your "near miss of the day" seg recently) about ignoring the LAW and NOT doing anything about dangerous driving unless there's a collision!
They can say they are committed to doing something... Really, it's just a black hole for complaints and videos to go into while they probably continue to not give a damn. They failed to identify the local driver who assaulted me, filed the case. The only thing I could have done further was to give them his name.
I submitted a video of a close pass to TVP about three months ago. Not long back I got a letter to say the driver accepted a driver awareness course, which seemed fine to me.
Police access is fine, but what's really needed is Insurance company access. If the same registration numbers (especially backed with video evidence) appear are reported as dangerous drivers and that evidence is avaiable to insuance companies then it can begin to impact premium costs - significantly more effective than a slap on the wrist from plod I'd imagine.
Thanks Henry.
Question : What's the best camera to capture close pass?
I've put it off buying one, but I'm sick of twats either close passsing out of stupidity or hatred.
Something cheap is fine. I use an SJCAM SJ4000 which does the job. I bought a slightly better handlebar mount because the one that comes with the camera wasn't that sturdy (like this https://www.amazon.co.uk/Fone-Stuff-Bicycle-Handlebar-Extended-Adaptor-Black/dp/B06W5CT8VZ/ref=sr_1_24?ie=UTF8&qid=1530604515&sr=8-24&keywords=camera+handlebar+mount). I've reported two close passes so far to the Met Police's online form. The first one they wrote back to me and said they were going to prosecute the driver; the second one they said there wasn't enough evidence in the clip to prosecute - so, not too bad.
Henry
Should this not be a government run site rather than commercial?
From the terms of use......
11. Rights you license
11.1 When you upload or post content to our site (including, but without limitation dashcam videos), you grant to us a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, non-exclusive, sub-licensable, royalty-free and transferable licence to use, exploit, copy, store, disclose, reproduce, publish, distribute, prepare derivative works of, display, perform and otherwise use that content for any purpose across any media including, but not limited to, promoting the site and its content, promoting our business, and promoting our products and services.
Sounds like a great place to go for news outlets to get lots of "cyclists run red lights" footage.
Ideally, yes, but the UK government (of all political colours) doesn't exactly have a great track record of IT projects.
I believe there has been twitter-storm & they have updated the T's & C's...
reporting bad drivers wont stop bad driving...
but the government will make few extra quid, so ill be looking forward to an increase in new hospitals, new schools, some extra fine bubbly at the lord majors ball, a massive overahaul of the current road infrastructure, and a reduction in taxes
Dash cams should be made compulsory in all vehicles. I'm pretty sure bad driving would drammatically reduce, simply because the chances of being caught breaking the law would be high as opposed to the current very unlikey.
Surely there are enough self appointed police out there who already have dash cams and driving is geting worse. The solution is to increase tax/distribute tax better/manage police budgets, but basically get more real plod out on the streets.
Self-appointed, self-righteous YouTube warriors are not at all the same as an external and internal dashcam, or ideally black box (recording position, speed, acceleration, braking, G forces) which police and insurers automatically interrogate in every incident. Or even better, which insurers interrogate on every renewal.
Black boxes are quite common in cars in the USA and have proved drivers to be lying about speed etc in many cases.
Hopefully, there'll be a generational shift. There are a few early 20somethings in my team at work. The only way they can afford car insurance is via having black boxes installed, so the initial uptake is there...
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