Traffic Police Safety Talk for Bikers!

Restricted Area.
Once-in-a-lifetime experience visit visit TP HQ.

This week, I get to kiao kar.
Because I am very fortunate. I got england powerderful powderful BooFeng, also from www.SingaporeBikeForums.com, as my guest/celebrity blogger (next time then I invite Dawn, or Jamee OK?).

BooFeng is going to tell you about our trip to the Traffic Police HQ at Ubi, for a Road Safety Talk specially for bikers only. It is by the Road Safety Branch.

I must declare first ah. The main text is by BooFeng. The caption below the photos are by me, in case you mistaken my english for BooFeng's english. Here he goes:

*****

Saturday morning, 8:30am, and I was up and on my way down for a “Dialogue Session” between the Traffic Police’s Road Safety Branch and Singapore Bike Forums (SBF). In spite of the early hour and the haze, things got off nicely as our bikes (some NIE dudes I cajoled into coming along) rolled in and friendly marshals led us to… the impound yard!

Hmm… quite a good catch this weekend: I see some huge bikes in there – an R1150GS, ST11s, a couple of fazers (including Frost), Mr Lau’s CB1300, plus plenty of sportbikes big and small (we’re a sportbike loving nation), among all the naked bikes and cubkias. Turns out that’s our exclusive parking lot for today, woohoo.

Lots of people seemed to be turning up. Some of them wore sensible protective kit, unlike me. Well, I’ve been working on it, seeing as the last time I turned up here in PT shorts, crummy t-shirt, with skinned palm and elbow. There were some familiar faces (mostly the NUS folk), but also many new ones.

Anyway, after diddling about for a good bit, we got guided into an LT. It looked so empty, which was quite a downer. 45 persons had registered on the forum. I’m sure others invited friends who didn’t register too. There were perhaps 30-ish present today.

The TP from Road Safety Branch giving the talk is Staff Sergent Neo.
Here, MrLau is giving tips to SSG Neo on how to capture the attention of the audience.
MrLau,"Ai ya, very simple. You just ask them, Do you want to know the loopholes of our speed camera?"

The talk is very pro and interesting siah.
SSG Neo is very interesting. There is also SSG Nora Bachor.
I never feel bored.
Maybe because got many buang video scenes of motorcyclists to see.

Some chap gave us a presentation, I’m really sorry to say I forgot his name. I think it was really an eye-opener for many of us present.

There was a short bit on statistics. If I remember right, 55% of our road fatalities are motorcyclists. Ouch. Compare that with 30+% pedestrians (I was shocked, that’s quite a lot!), and 8% cars. However, Singapore has one of the world’s lowest per capita road fatalities. Cynics will say that’s because most of us can only afford to travel by public transport.

Then there was a bit on causes of accidents, along with tips on what can happen and how to avoid them (lots of vids and pics, a very visual-oriented presentation). I grouped the accident-causes mentally as:

a. Self-induced accidents

b. Right of way violations

It’s like… (a) your fault, or (b) others’ fault, isn’t it? Yes in a way but no, not really. If you ride a motorbike, it doesn’t matter whose fault it is; you go down, you get hurt. Often quite badly. Point is: motorcyclists have a lot at stake. From my point of view, letting others hurt you is a kind of fault too.

We had a look at some vids then, and it’s amazing what can happen on the expressway, actually:

1. Some folks don’t look ahead when they drive. We saw a couple of high speed crashes into stationary vehicles on the road.

Moral: Look where you’re going (duh!!!!), and get your vehicle to the side of the road if possible after accidents. Disputing in the middle of the road invites blind folks to hit your car, bike, or yourself. Not nice. Or it could hit the tow-truck, which is kindof blackly funny. Imagine: “Hello, EMAS? Er… this is the EMAS truck… we’ve crashed. Can you send someone to get us?”

2. Most folk don’t stop to help at accidents. A rubber-necking motorcyclist hits a stationary bus, goes down and doesn’t come up. Nobody stops for a good SEVERAL minutes. The bus driver finally STROLLED over, after dallying for a long time. @#!$%.

Moral: Don’t rubberneck! And most important, DO STOP TO HELP INJURED PEOPLE!! This made me really mad and upset.

3. This is similar to the “slow-down-for-automated-speed-cam” syndrome. Some folks see a patrol car, and think “oh shit I’m too fast”, then grab the brakes and try to stop. And crash. Horribly. Like, what for. >.<

4. There was lots of drifting/aquaplaning too. A lorry spun out all the way from lane 1 to lane 4. Some Mercedes also started drifting but didn’t know how to counter-steer. All these happened on wet roads.
   Moral: Learning fancy (advanced) driving/riding techniques can be useful. This is something I brought up on my first visit, but I realised that they can’t do much about it, and they don’t really believe it helps too. I suggested pegging insurance rebates to proper advanced training, and getting the driving centres to provide such training and certification, etc. But it’s mostly out of their hands. They’re just the Road Safety folks afterall. I also realise some advanced techniques are seen to be too “flashy” and disliked (e.g. shifting body weight for braking and corners), after speaking to some officers.

Off the highway, there were some sequence pictures too, from other cameras. I thought it was quite a privilege to see some of these stuff, e.g. the red-light-cam photo sequences.

SSG Neo(left) and Deputy Superintendent Simon Ng patiently answering our questions and giving advice. "You all ah, better ride safely, understand? Don't whole day buang here buang there understand? Lidat make me very busy understand? Cannot sit in my opik blow aircon. Must whole day go outside and investigate here investigate there. Turtle lah you all."

Then came the gory bit, with lots of accident-case pictures. I think this had the most impact on everyone. I hated it, actually. I don’t need or want to see so much. I know the consequences of crashing are disastrous. I think safety gear is important. But I think accident prevention is centred around skills (both road-reading and technical skills). However, I think this section was good for most people. I mean, it highlights the NEED to prevent accidents. Which is really a good place to begin.

But where’s the HOW of it? There’s lots of advice being bandied around, lots of opinions. Two-second rules. Car-lengths to follow for wet and dry days. Looking far. Being alert. Not drinking/driving, not falling asleep. Some of it is common sense. Some of it is dispensed simplistically. Some of it is very detailed and useful, e.g. the Streetsmart thread on SBF.

I think, however, that the good advice isn’t reaching the right people. Nobody’s sorting out the good advice from the bad. Nobody’s contextualising it for the local situation. Nobody’s making it accessible to the people who need it, through good explanations, elaborations, in more languages, in practical training situations (and not just on paper), in good powerful diagrams, in structured lessons, etc. It’s not being given enough emphasis in training and refreshers.

Training is focused so much on technical skills. So much of it is rote learning too; same route all the time, same old places to speed up, slow down, check blindspots. It won’t be a bad thing if we could introduce creative and critical thinking into our driving schools too. Refreshers aren’t even popular, perhaps because as it is they don’t offer very much. We could do a lot if we just used some diagrams/materials off the internet and magazines. I say we should revamp this syllabus too.

Overall, it was an excellent presentation though, because I could sense the effort to “reach” us. The officer doing it tried very hard to talk to us and communicate to us, to get us to see things from certain perspectives. I appreciated that a lot. It came across like they wanted to work with us as equals, and not as “the authority”.

After the informative talk, TP still blan-jah us to makan siah.
We get to chit-chat and ask the TP officers in person.

Then as expected lah. Sure got people complaint to TP:
"Wah lau eh, you all TP so on for what? Everywhere also got speed camera.
Lin bei 24 points also not enough!"

After the presentation we got the standard tour, to gawk at the glitzy hardware (VFRs, WRXs and some speedcams), and to get filled in on some history, at the Heritage Centre. The tour made me think of how closely linked the TP were to motorcycles, they’ve always had motorcycle patrols since ages ago, and just look at their crest. Says it all, really.

The TP's Subaru WRX on display. It is the base 225bhp version.
Alamak, they forget to leave the car key behind.

Up close with The Evil Eye.

ROV explain how the laser speed camera works.
You just point, turn on, sit back and see how the speedster automatically get caught. Ha!
You can run. But you can't hide. Ha!

The view of the TP officer behind his toy.

Funan Centre got sell or not?

Do you know that there is a museum inside the Ubi TP HQ?

We are given a guided tour around the TP Heritage Centre.
















See before this type of TP bike before or not?

Last time, the TP wear "wings".
You know why?
Of course, not to fly lah.
Because the TP act as traffic light and the wings help to direct the traffic flow.
Orrrrr!

Remember this thing?
I was designated car driver and I rode this back in my primary school days.
Yes, the road safety park is still funtioning at East Coast.
Incredibly, even when I was kid doing the road safety park thing, I was given a "summon".

It was a sign of things to come when I become adult.
I was supposed to be a car driver. But I overshot my destination.
So I parked my "car", disembarked and walked over to my destination to get signed-off.
I was "summoned" for acting as a pedestrian when I was supposed to be a car-driver.

I very much want to ply loose one of those silver items on display and bring home as souvenir and act to my collection of Hard Rock badges.
But I scared mah tak liak.

That’s all I have to say about the event. But here’s some afterthoughts:

First off, I’m really glad to see that being “consultative” is not just a buzzword the government services/departments pay lip service to. I think Simon (CO, Road Safety) has done excellent work here. He’s also doing fantastically in another aspect: encouraging and promoting civil society (that’s us guys on SBF, among others).

Why do I say this? Simon and his motley crew of twelve (yes, only!!) have been going around engaging with motorist groups, including bike clubs such as the Harley Owners’ Group, Storm Riders, etc, car clubs, tertiary institutes of education (ITEs and Polytechnics), army camps, restaurants which hire delivery riders, etc etc, to build links and spread the word about road safety with civilians who have an interest in such things (this is what they call “civil society” at school).

That’s really tough work for such a small department, which has also been managing to scrounge up $6 million in sponsorship each year to fund those funky road-safety adverts you see all around (the government doesn’t pay for those, or anything else related to road safety education). And they’re the ones in charge of producing the ads too. A hand for our hardworking officers!

And now, they’re starting even to engage with groups like us (SBF) on the internet. Very modern, very forward looking, to do so, don’t you think? (and you should, since you’re probably reading this very article on the internet!)

It IS a big deal, because such behaviour isn’t (well, wasn’t) typical of the government departments in the past. Things were, and still are, really bureaucratic, for e.g. the TP riders are still not wearing full-face helmets, somehow. It’s kindof like at our schools, where they’ve wonderfully revamped the philosophy, syllabuses, teaching methodology, etc, but still make our students sit for boring O and A levels (which is why many teachers, in spite of all the exciting new stuff they learn at NIE, still spend so much lesson time preparing for dreary exams). We need to change our examination system, but we’re dragging our feet about it. Argh.

Anyway, back to the topic, I think Simon is doing what he can very well. He can’t make our patrol riders wear full-face helmets, but he’s trying to talk to “civil society”; he’s trying to understand us, to find out what/how we think, in short consulting us, and he’s also trying to forge links for cooperation, to communicate with us, to get us to “do work” in spreading the word about road safety, i.e. he’s encouraging and promoting us, the civil society, the grassroots, to be involved.

Road safety, like so many other issues, like our environment, courtesy, women’s rights, education, etc are part of our civic life. It’s become so cliché to say that Singaporeans are apathetic, indifferent, and bochup. We also like to say it’s because our government has been too authoritarian, too top-down, too paternal.

But that’s not really the case here today, at TP HQ, Ubi, is it? Times are changing. “You have a voice, and you can do something,” I think that’s what Simon is trying to tell us.

Let’s work together to make a difference.

For me hor, the most important thing that come out from the TP talk besides the makan session, is this photo!
Next time when TP stop me on the road that time, I will take out this picture and show the TP.
"You know who I am or not?
I am good brother with your CO Simon understand?"
Absolutely priceless.

Please visit www.SingaporeBikeForums.com 's Street Smart thread.

There are many many very informative and useful survival tips for us motorcyclists.
It may save your live!

Visit:
http://www.singaporebikes.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=67876&st=960&#entry3345164