14 hours ago, catinthehat said:

As long as there is little or no enforcement/punishment for any crimes, the carnage will continue. We are all used to the sight of many many numbers of police patrol cars everywhere on the roads (holiday or not) in the civilized world. I often  wonder what would  happen if these patrols were ALL gone. One might see the same that continues here generation after generation. I guess I would call it generational conditioning. And no I am not a wannabe psychologist.

 

It would help to infuse all of this into the early point in the education process here. Anyone ever see a child seat in a Thai vehicle? $500 fine and a trip to jail with a child abuse charge in the US for not using one.

 

Child seat?

What's a child seat?

Never heard of one, my wife hold the baby of my daughter in her lap in the passenger seat, what's wrong with that?

Glad I'm living here and not in a nanny state.

56 minutes ago, bandito said:

 

Child seat?

What's a child seat?

Never heard of one, my wife hold the baby of my daughter in her lap in the passenger seat, what's wrong with that?

Glad I'm living here and not in a nanny state.

 

And for bike riders, it's kid standing up on the seat between the driver and pillion. That's the safe way.

On ‎1‎/‎20‎/‎2017 at 7:46 AM, NanLaew said:

 

And for bike riders, it's kid standing up on the seat between the driver and pillion. That's the safe way.

 

Glad you understand how it's done here.

We can talk and talk and pass the blame game around and around. But in a nutshell it all boils down to the law and how they enforce it. If it's not enforced nothing will change.

Aren't motorcycles the vast majority of the deaths? Most of them drive like morons so it's bound to be an issue. Driving a car is fairly safe around here I think.

I dont ride a bike however I'm guessing that the cost of a crash helmet would be around 4-500 Baht? the cost of attending a driving school to pass the driving test is about 10,000 Baht (depending where you live) the average daily wage is 300 Baht!
Would you pay a days wage for a crash helmet? I'm not sure I would! Let alone a months income to take a driving test. It's simply not in reach for many Thai families. I'm not defending it simply saying it's unaffordable.

This report is from a foreign news agency...the BBC.

 

Their hands are tied, lips are sealed and can only report what is allowed unless JH wants to end up in the wrong "Hilton" hotel....and he is well aware of that.

 

I was surprised the BBC are allowed to paint such a bad picture...remember there is only good news in LoS.

On 1/19/2017 at 3:46 PM, jimstar1 said:

Alcohol  talking on cell phones got to be first there no driver education Yada Yada Yada 

RTP Solution lets set up road blocks catch the tourist on Motor Bike make plenty tea money

It doesn't even make sense from tea money perspective. Yeah they could make some tea money by patrolling and fining everybody that switches lanes without signaling, people ignoring lanes, reckless drivers etc. But that would require them to actually put in effort.

And cameras would not lead to bribes... So.. Yeah.. They should make checkpoints illegal. Then they would be forced to go out in real traffic instead.. Never gonna happen. Never.

8 hours ago, WatUp said:

Aren't motorcycles the vast majority of the deaths? Most of them drive like morons so it's bound to be an issue. Driving a car is fairly safe around here I think.

The car drivers are killing the motorbike drivers yeah. I drive a motorbike and I'm rarely afraid of what the other motorbikes are doing. (Not saying they drive good), the ones scaring me are the cars. Im going to buy a car soon, it must be way safer. 

On 1/19/2017 at 8:30 PM, ianf said:

Typical J Head article that really says nothing partly because he knows nothing and understands even less.

Thai driving: They do not have driving lessons; They do not understand road markings; The police do nothing whatsoever to police traffic. The country is too corrupt; Thais with money think they own the road, ie an attitude problem; In most cases cars are dangerous and unsafe (blacked out windows, illegal but applied to 95% of the cars on the road. They can move cars but cannot drive them. And the police do nothing at all. As for motorcyclists: They won't wear helmets; they weave in and out of traffic as if they are playing in the school playground; they have no road sense and no awareness of what's going on around them, they drink, they overload their motorbikes with whole families; they allow 10 year old kids on the road driving by themselves. In short: Nothing will change because the underlying attitude is wrong and the police are grossly incompetent. If Head had any nouse he would have explored some of these issues.

I agree with you 100%. I want to add that everything you said about motorbike drivers applies to cars, pickups, trucks and minivans as well. At least here around chiang mai. I hope that if i get hit its by a motorbike and not yet another speeding vios

I see it clearly now. The checkpoints maximize the statistics and the tea money. RTP will always prefer the checkpoint over actual enforcement on the highways etc. They gotta ban the checkpoints and force the RTP to go out looking for the tea money elsewhere.

 

Once the RTP is out patrolling and pulling people over constantly (they could pull people over one after the other without much effort all day, i see violations every 5 seconds or more) we will start to see a change. 

An inflammatory post has been removed.  

20 hours ago, hobz said:

The car drivers are killing the motorbike drivers yeah. I drive a motorbike and I'm rarely afraid of what the other motorbikes are doing. (Not saying they drive good), the ones scaring me are the cars. Im going to buy a car soon, it must be way safer. 

I drive a motorbike everyday and the few times a month I drive my car I'm astonished at the way a handful of motorbikes drive. I swear they have a deathwish.