Bob Rouleau

Hmm.... do I hear a wave of lawyer jokes coming down the road?

I like Les' idea, Let's beat up on Nick with his namby pamby flappy paddle shifting 430, I'd lead the charge but I'm concerned about the fact I have one too...; My lapse in judgement is offset by the fact that I have a track equipped GT3 with no electronic nannys to interfere in my driving.

Best,

rome

You are clueless. You missed the whole point.

I am going to steer clear of the CGT board from now on...too many shinning lights here for me.

Ryan in SD

Les Quam and Nick,

Thanks! You guys are good and whoever says otherwise are ignorant.

Les Quam

I am clueless as to what a shinning light is and what it could possibly mean? Is that like when you get up in the middle of the night to make a bowel movement and bump your shin into something in the dark and wish you had a shinning light????? I need someone to spoon feed me on this shinning light thing to get back in the loop on this thread I am feeling left out. LOL

Bob,
When did you buy the soccer mom Ferrari? Can you really talk on a handheld cell phone and drink your Starbucks Mocha Latte with your lap dog in your lap and still drive that thing? LOL

JBH

Thanks Jeeva. I've been wound pretty tight this week. I read your post and realized you were correct - I was directly attacking Nick rather than his opinions. I really try to stay away from going after personalities, but in this case I got caught up in the emotion - again my apologies to all (including Nick ) Best to leave this subject alone and see how it plays out.

kilrgt

I may be stating the obvious here, however I will speak my mind. I do feel bad for both families but with that being said the position they are in are from the consequence of an accident.I can not comprehend how a lawsuit can make it in to the US courts period. These was no negligence here that I am aware of, from what I have seen or heard. I am sure Ben chose to take Cory for a lap and I am sure Cory chose to get in that car.I am not a Lawyer , and I don't understand U.S law, but am I a simpleton for stating the obvious? I do think Nick is being a good friend for being there for Ben's Family, and I hope all ends well for all parties involved, but I don't think Ben's family is or should be responsible for what happened.

Bob Rouleau

Les,

I bought the 430 for car-pool. Not only does it have flappy paddle shifters, but there are NO CUP holders. The nerve of them! Since I can put it in automatic mode, I have one hand for the phone and the other for a grande latte! But, no cup holder! I think I better trade it for a Cayenne. Hmm, a CGT has cup holders doesn't it?????

TT Surgeon

Speaking of lawsuits, I heard 'nelly'(sp), a rapper, was sueing manhattan motorsports, a p dealer, over being 'overcharged 40k 'on a porsche(cgt?).

Vancouver83LTD

haha, he can be charged whatever he's willing to say
you americans sue for stupid ****

dcmelik

Ron H makes a good point, but one that may very well be lost on a number of people who have already made up their mind: juries are normal folk who listen to the facts and decide the case. Jurors have bullsh!t meters just like the rest of us and they can see through a bogus argument if need be. But what if it isn't bullsh!t?

Mike Buck also makes a good point-- that the McDonald's case is oversimplified here. Many people do not know that Stella Liebeck endured third degree burns over six percent of her body, required skin grafts, and spent eight days in the hospital. Punitive damages in the case amounted to less than two days of McDonald's coffee sales-- and they were awarded by a jury that heard all of the evidence, unlike the rest of us. A jury that reduced Stella's award because she was partially at fault.

Cars were once thought of as dangerous instruments, like gunpowder, because they were so rare and people had never traveled so quickly as they did when in a horseless carriage. When wooden spoke wheels collapsed under the speed and pressure of the first automobiles, juries intervened to say, "whoa, build these things out of something other than wood." They said that wooden wheels at speed were defective in design.

Instead of accepting what is obviously true today-- that wooden wheels are crap-- car makers tried to make the argument that drivers and passengers assumed the risk. That cars are just dangerous.

Now our wheels are made of things other than wood and we drive at speeds our nineteenth and twentieth cenutry horseless carriage operators never imagined. Innovation is driven by research, but research is sometimes driven by things other than ingenuity.

Sometimes a jury award does inspire good corporate citizenship. I have no idea if the CGT could be safer or could be less volatile, but if it is, I hope something can be learned from this tragedy and it may very well be learned by a jury who inspires change at the highest levels of our favorite company.

David Cmelik
1987 928S4 auto "guards red"
2001 986 5 speed "seal gray metallic"
2000 BMW 323i black on red

wch

"Sometimes a jury award does inspire good corporate citizenship."

To me, good individual citizenship means that, if you are an adult, voluntarily engage in a dangerous activity, sign at least one (probably more) legal waivers to be allowed to engage in it, and are the victim of a completely forseeable, if terrible, consequence, neither you nor your estate should sue anyone.

Wake up: if you're on a race track, and not surrounded by a full cage and other state of the art safety gear, you've exacerbated a very real risk. If you are reading this, you are probably an amateur - just like me - and you're a fool if you think that you can keep up with a very, very sophisticated car at or near the limit.

The unpredictable is completely forseeable to anyone who's spent any time at all around race tracks -come on, people. No jury should hear this case - summary judgment on the waiver, anything else is unjust.

DMin

The cupholders in the CGT are located in the passenger seat, much like in the F430

D.Min

dcmelik

wch,

All good points on individual responsibility. I applaud them. It's a fair point to distinguish individual responsibility from corporate responsibility; they are not mutually exclusive, however. You can and must have both-- and both can be absent in a situation. The question is whether the absence of one or both was/were the proximate cause of this tragedy.

Rightly or wrongly, we *worship* the P-car company for its overengineering (when we are not criticizing it for putting lead weights in the front bumpers or making ineffective rear main seals). But what if a CGT design defect contributed to the accident? Wouldn't CGT owners want to know or is ignorance bliss? If I paid a half-million dollars for a car that was unsafe, I'd want to know. I'd want to know if I paid $10K for a Kia but here, where part of the Porsche mystique and this community's adimiration and respect for the company rests on Porsche's reputation for design excellence, the importance of this question is palpable.

As an aside, it is interesting how frequently someone on Rennlist gets stopped for speeding and all of a sudden, the judiciary is about our "rights" and the injustice of being stopped by doughnut-eating constables with nothing better to do than harass Porsche owners out of spite and envy. Never mind that we were speeding, endangering other motorists, pedestrians, and blind children crossing the street to see their disabled grandparents. Such threads are never about individual responsibility but how to "beat" the ticket.

Contrast that with someone who files a civil action for wrongful death and product liability. Then, across the board, regardless of the facts, it's a "frivolous lawsuit." Let's reserve judgment until there is resolution of the case. If that requires a jury trial, so be it. The best thing for Porsche would be a jury trial that exonerates its CGT design-- much like the verdict last week exonerated Merck in a Vioxx case.

David Cmelik
87 928S4 auto "guards red"
01 986 5 speed "seal gray metallic"
00 BMW 323i black on red

Bob Rouleau

david c, you left one thing out in your defense of stella...she made a stupid mistake. should anyone else have to pay for a mistake made by an adult? whýmust it always be some one elses fault?

dmin, thanks. I found a great cup holder .. D cups in fact.

best

Ron_H

David:

We have spoken in the past. You wrote the Pano article about a 928 Renaissance and my car was in the photo.

I have written spirited responses to many of the recent Rennlist threads dealing specifically with alleged "speeding" offenses and other alleged traffic "offenses". I must take issue with your statements about individual responsibility in the latest CGT thread. One premise that I think escaped validation is that which alleges a person who is accused of exceeding a posted limit is "endangering" other persons and property. At best it is your assertion and is hard pressed to withstand evidence to the contrary, particularly evidence possessed by highway traffic engineers that is routinely ignored when setting speed limits. I can furnish some of this evidence, and it would make you stop and think about your statements. I also ask you to read the following article if you would, please. I certainly respect your opinions, but in this case please be certain they are supported by the evidence. People are dying on our highways because of such faulty premises, and because such premises are the basis for "speed management" instead of "flow management". Here is the article:

The way it is now:

The signs you see on the highways and streets all across the country are authorized by a federal document called the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD). Their size and placement as well as the text used on them and their color, are all governed by this document. To qualify for use of these signs, and to qualify to receive federal highway construction and repair funds, states must meet certain standards. You should be happy that they must meet these standards because they are intended to insure safety on the roads where the standards apply. First, and most important among these standards is the requirement that an engineering and traffic study must be performed prior to setting speed limits, which are then displayed on one type of sign listed in the MUTCD. No engineering and traffic study: no signs. No engineering and traffic study : no radar may be used to enforce the speed limit on the subject road, and if it is used, that practice constitutes a “speed trap” which is illegal.

That seems clear, right? Now why would anyone want the powers that be to conduct an engineering and traffic study before the speed limits were set? Well, let’s examine what constitutes an engineering and traffic study:
First, the study must be conducted by “traffic engineer”. The police, the judges, the prosecutors, the traffic violations bureau clerks, even attorneys are NOT traffic engineers. Second, the study must be conducted scientifically without bias, including measuring the traffic as it is flowing on a particular segment of roadway during various times of day and over a period of days as a representative sample. “Flowing” means just that: it must be observed as “free flowing”, unimpeded by bends and curves, or by jurisdictional cautions visible to the drivers such as speed limit signs, or other warning signs that would interupt the normal flow of traffic, and this includes the sight of police officers, or of road workers or traffic guidance personnel. In other word, as drivers would feel comfortable driving without thinking about all of those other concerns or being observed. Yes the engineers are supposed to be invisible while gathering data. The studies must also include a representative sample of past accidents and their perceived causes on that particular section of roadway, obviously over a period of time to include differing weather conditions for different times of the year. There are other criteria for performing these studies, but the point is they are to be performed under the direction of traffic engineers using sound engineering and scientifically based priciples, not emotional or arbitrary methods.
Finally, the engineers are to determine the freely flowing speed traveled by the 85th percentile of drivers over the subject roadway. The definition of freely flowing is critical because it is based on the above mentioned conditions and perceptions of drivers on that particular roadway over vaious periods of the day. These studies take considerable time to conduct properly and are to be done at least within the last 2 years to be the valid basis for the speed limit you see on the signs. Then, unless unusually limiting circumstances exist unique to this roadway, the limit is to be set 5% above the 85th percentile speed.

The intent is to let traffic flow as it feels comfortable and avoid congestion and frustration. As cars and roadway design improves and drivers become more mature and skilled, as well as educated about vehicle dynamics, speeds tend to increase. And as speeds increase, highway fatalities decrease. Don’t even think about it, because it has been proven time and again and documented in study after study all over the world. The autobahn is a case in point and also studies on the autostradas of Italy have also confirmed this fact.

Well.....that is just a crock, right?? We all know that is not the way it is. And besides, who are we as mere citizens to use our reasoning powers and intelligence to quesion anyone in authority?

But it is the law and the signs you see are not legal unless the above procedures are followed. And we should be glad it is the law, because unless the various jurisdictions follow the law they are powerless to enforce the speed limits that are set and claimed to be violated. Well, that is fine and dandy, but how are the cities supposed to enforce laws that are not routinely broken? And it follows that no citations = no revenue. Hey, that raises some eyebrows, especially since some cities are teetering on the brink of financial disaster. And what would happen to the insurance rates if the accident rate dropped? Uh oh!! Hold on here. Can’t have any of that, and besides, those studies or surveys or whatever those egghead scientists call them are costly to perform every two years. Right? Right. Next thing you know someone will want stricter licensing laws like they have in those furrin countries, right? Right. Can’t have any of that. Why the next thing you know someone might march into court and find out no studies were performed and the road where they were cited was a speed trap and get off because the police lacked jurisdiction. Whew! Definitely can’t have any of that. So.............

The way it is going to be:

The Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices has been re-written to eliminate the requirement for any engineering and traffic studies to determine the safe 85th percentile of free flowing traffic on any roadway anywhere in America, land of the “free” (?) and home of the “brave”. Now the states and cities will be able to use whatever arbitrary speed limit sign and display whatever arbitrary speed on it they wish. No sound or safe engineering practice foundation whatsoever necessary. Just whatever they feel like setting. And no legal defense against it whatsoever. And never mind that it might produce more violations and more accidents. Cities need funds, period. And troopers need to eat, period. And better than donuts, that’s for sure. Enough of this legal mumbo jumbo and traffic court expenses and fair trial nonsense. Smokey says it is so and therefore it is so. After all, who knows more about traffic safety (or any other safety) than Smokey, right? Bettter believe that.

Ya buy that? Ya feel like laying down for that? Well they do in England, and speed cameras are everywhere and coming to a city or town near you soon. And the vendors of those speed cameras process the violations and take a share of the revenue generated. Great game, eh? Ya gonna sit still for that? Well it is almost here. Brace yourselves because it is the truth and is only as far away as the adoption by the various cities and states of the NEW Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices.

Now on the hopeful chance that you still have some American blood left in your veins and wish to challenge that “revision” in the law meant to leave you defenseless against a tyrannical wave of suppression of your common sense, you may either email me, Ron_H at verdant1@pacbell.net, or chad@hwysafety.com and we will direct you to an effort to effectively challenge the legality and adviseability of adopting the latest Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices. If we wait it will be a much higher hill to climb.
A legal challenge to this newest scheme to rob you blindly is being formulated now and frankly we need your help. Or we need you to figure out a way to smuggle files into jails. Face it, you will be “caught” and “punished”. You will be rendered subservient. And traffic safety will have received a blow like we have never known. Just as personal safety has been jeopardized by rising crime rates by banning weapons, traffic safety will be further compromised by this ominous threat. Contact us now and we will tell how to help. Do it for your children.

End of article;

David, I am all for individual responsibility and that is precisely the point behind all of this uproar we wish to make. As Smokey the Bear says: "Only YOU can prevent forest fires". To that I will add: "....NOT the speed limit."

Porsches are the way they are because they MUST be to survive the circumstances under which they are operated. And the operators in their country of origin must prove they are substantially better able to operate them than in this country. Maybe we could begin there to improve personal responsibility. In the words of the author of the Montana Experiment which concluded that increased speed DECREASED accidents and death rates, "people are not insane" and will not put themselves at unreasonable risk.
There will always be the random exception who behaves absurdly dangerously whether in the U.S. or on the German autobahn, or wherever. Arbitrary limits will do nothing whatsoever to prevent them from pulling in front of otherwise safely progressing traffic and creating a hazard. Think about that last statement with respect to this thread.