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At least the 11’ 8" bridge has a reason for the hard limit and the new protective I-beam. This badly designed restrictor doesn’t seem to have a corresponding need such as a 7’ wide bridge or tunnel, otherwise, why are their restrictors in both directions? Seems more like they are part of a road diet for the neighborhood or tangential enforcement of a weight limit.
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With their weapon and manipulator arms covered by their Halloween costumes, the Daleks had to resort to more physical forms of attack.
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The white van with blue and yellow at 35 seconds is a police van.
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Also, Boris Johnson. Pretty sure he’s a Dalek plot. Somehow.
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This is part of the reason many roads in the US now have added bumps and strips that make noise so that people will keep their cars inside the lines. In my area, there are streets with cars parked on both sides, a line down the middle, and cars traveling in both directions. Some drivers still cross the median, because they think their car - unlike every other car going down the road - isn’t going to clear the vehicles on both sides. Don’t get me started on the folks who steer left (moving into the path oncoming traffic) to make a right turn… 
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So if people or property are injured as a result of that deployment, that’s not an engineering fault? I think you’ve just summed up my argument nicely.
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By definition, the person looking down the angry end of a weapon isn’t a user.
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The people who have accidentally shot themselves, though, are.
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If someone throws their laptop against a wall as hard as they can, and then cannot recover it, is that a usability engineering fault? Because that’s pretty much what’s happening here.
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It’s more like if you try to copy file onto your laptop from a thumb drive and your computer is designed to explode if there is not enough hard drive space instead of just displaying a popup window saying there isn’t enough room. There is no valid justification for the catastrophic failure mode in the restrictor’s case or in my exploding computer example.
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This is more like, if there was a peripheral connector that would easily foul itself if you tried to plug it in too roughly. If the connector design is good, it will have affordances and accommodations that guide the plug into the socket. But if the connector design requires more care and finesse than a user is used to applying, otherwise boom, then the failure is a collaborative effort between the user’s actions and the design choices. There are relatively few “user errors” that come about without bad design acting as an accomplice.
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No, it’s really not like these in any way whatsoever. For a start, you’re not going to kill any pedestrians when you fill up your hard drive or plug in your connector. The trade off here is protecting pedestrians lives, versus dangerous drivers with big repair bills. Did you stop to consider that the repair bills are a feature, not a bug?
1 Like
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It doesn't matter what's on the other side of the bollard.
If the bollard design regularly destroys people’s cars, it’s a failure. More so because there are designs that would achieve the same goals without destroying them. User error should always be recoverable.
Now, if the bollards were not supposed to allow any cars to pass, and the only cars that were trying to pass were literally in the process of possibly killing pedestrians I’d be on your side – for instance separating a pedestrian-only plaza from a busy road. But that is not the case here.
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So, you’re arguing that deploying these bollards is not even an engineering activity? Great. This town should hire some engineers then.
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Nothing about a road diet requires catastrophic destruction of compliant vehicles, which is what this restrictor is doing. And it could be causing whiplash to drivers and passengers. They are a hazard unto themselves.
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Scarfolk Councillor - “I have an idea…”
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Get yourself out of the driving seat for a bit. Why are you assuming that street furniture should be designed for the convenience of drivers? It’s cars driving into them too fast that are a hazard unto themselves. Some people only learn the hard way.
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I’m thinking of people in general rather than just “pedestrians” or “drivers”. And your “Just think of the pedestrians!” special pleading doesn’t justify the destructive failure mode of the restrictors, let alone for destroying compliant vehicles that are the correct size and going a reasonable speed.
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