Vehicle Reversing Alarms - c/d?

I appreciate that you don't want to be killed but I just wonder if there are not other (perhaps more effective ways) at preventing that? After a while don't you just get blase about the beeping noise as well?

And it is comparable because what I'm saying is that there is enough noise in the world without it being added to and the logical next stop is every car fitted with a beeper. In fact, beepers on cards seem to make more sense then beepers on trucks in this instance. Just a brief look on the news sees loads of kids run over by backing up vehicles.

In the wider world, this is not the case.

I believe if you took a look at actual statistics, you would find an equal or larger number of children have been injured and/or killed by vehicles moving forward. Also, at what age is a child capable of 1) interpreting he is in danger when he hears a beeping, 2) judging what position is safe to move to, and 3) accomplishing both 1 & 2 quickly enough to get to a position of safety?

As a different solution to the problem of the wider world, the company my husband works for (the US post office) directs its employees to not back up when on company business.

And, in the US at least, OSHA allows for a "signal person" to stand on the ground and monitor the rear of heavy equipment, signalling the operator when it is safe to reverse and also to warn approaching pedestrians of danger, as an alternative to the beep.

When I posted this I had been out in the front of my house listening to this beeping coming from three directions for about an hour and it was totally doing my head in!
I didn't mean to say that my annoyance should lead to your (or anyones) demise!

What I'm saying is that it doesn't make much sense for vehicles out in the wider world of standard neighborhoods and pedestrian traffic to have reverse alarms. Young children are not "protected" by them, neither, as you noted, are the deaf. The onus is on the driver of the vehicle to make damn sure he/she doesn't back over anyone.

Really?

Luckily for me I don't actually live that near to a permanant site. I can hear the recycling plant but it's not too bad because 1) they've started to use these directional beepers 2) they've built baffles around the site and 3) a lot depends on wind direction. At the moment I'm being bothered by two building sites although obviously they are (relatively) short term.

I feel most sorry for the people who live next to the recycling plant. This is mostly social housing i.e. these are people who cannot afford to move. It is no surprise either, of course, that the plant has been postioned next to one of the poorest parts of the city. If these things were in "nice" residential areas they'd be hell to pay. Accept of course they would never be built there, ever.

This, I am sad to say, is the closest I have ever gotten to removing a driver from their car and beating the shit out of them.

Oh no, now I am Spokesperson for Reversing Drivers.

lorries/construction vehicles reversing slowly down the entire length of a deserted residential street at 6am like a Giant Fucking Alarm Clock On Wheels

i have this wonderful mental image of thousands of abandoned US post office vans in cul-de-sacs/alleyways/dead-end streets. "oh fuck, not allowed to reverse. anyone know where the nearest bus stop is? do we even have bus stops in america?" etc.

The reversing alarm is no more annoying to me than any other EXTREMELY LOUD urban noise, and more useful than some. I don't like the ones that talk though - it feels like a slippery slope.

Proud to be a SWD.

!

this reminds me of when i passed my L-test (second attempt, curses) and said to my mum: "can i take the car out on my own, then?"

"hm, okay," said mum. "as long as you promise only to turn left."

(the car, incidentally, was a 1.0-litre nissan micra. vroom, eh?)