THE SHEPHERD Posted February 8, 2013 Share Posted February 8, 2013 Given the latest law in France regarding speed detection, if I disable the camera detection element from my SAT NAV does this make it legal, or if not what would be the point of taking it on tour. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kelly58 Posted February 8, 2013 Share Posted February 8, 2013 I thought a sat nav was an extra aid to make finding your way easier thats the reason I use mine when on tour not forgetting a good road atlas though , yes we have disabled the speed camera sites but downloaded the French danger zones from tomtom.It depends which sat nav you have ,but most of the top makes have done a download to remove the French radar sites and replaced them with the danger zones. Perhaps you should state which model you have. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barryd999 Posted February 8, 2013 Share Posted February 8, 2013 I tried to do this on my TomTom last year but they still kept pinging up. I gave up and decided it wasnt worth worrying about. What are the chances of plod firstly stopping you and then trying to work out on your particular sat nav if its turned off or not? Probably nil. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
THE SHEPHERD Posted February 8, 2013 Author Share Posted February 8, 2013 Thanks kelly, I have the TOM TOM GO 730,bit old now I guess. I did notice something about French zones when pressing every button I could find to delete speed detection, but as I have for the last three hours tried to sync my new phone to the sat nav you can see I am not the sharpest knife in the box, I still havent done it LOL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spospe Posted February 8, 2013 Share Posted February 8, 2013 We have a TomTom 730 and the speed camera function has been disabled by TomTom themselves in the current version of the operating system. Make sure that you have version 9.465 loaded (via TomTom Home) and all will be well; you do not need to disable anything at all. Currently TomTom offer 'zones de danger' areas (for the French maps) as part of the map share update service and these have replaced the speed camera alerts and are 100% legal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Derek Uzzell Posted February 9, 2013 Share Posted February 9, 2013 THE SHEPHERD - 2013-02-08 12:44 PMGiven the latest law in France regarding speed detection, if I disable the camera detection element from my SAT NAV does this make it legal, or if not what would be the point of taking it on tour.There has been an enormous amount of discussion about this French law.General advice has been that, if a sat-nav has the capability to warn of the exact location of fixed speed-cameras in France (as historically has been the case), disabling that capability 'legalises' the device. However, the wording of the French law suggests that this is not so and, as long has the sat-nav retains that capability, the device continues to be illegal even if the capability has been disabled.To legalise a sat-nav device that has an 'exact-location' French speed-camera warning capability would require removal of the camera location-data from the device, or updating the device's software/data so that it can only provide approximate "Danger Zone" warnings. On some sat-navs neither of these options may be possible.TomTom's current advice is here:http://uk.support.tomtom.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/5560/~/is-the-tomtom-speed-camera-service-legal%3FIt does need saying that this is a really silly French law. The original intention was to ban all in-vehicle electronic means of detecting speed-cameras (as is the case in Switzerland), but this plan was watered down to the "Danger Zone" concession. French legal advice is that the French police have no authority to check the capability of in-vehicle navigation devices (eg. sat-navs and phones) and, to the best of my knowledge, nobody has been prosecuted for using a 'passive' GPS-driven device that can accurately warn of speed-camera locations. So, even if it's not practicable to convert a sat-nav to "Danger Zones", or to remove the speed-camera data, or even to disable the speed-camera alerts option, the chances or being prosecuted as a result of this law are minimal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hallii Posted February 9, 2013 Share Posted February 9, 2013 Be warned though, last time I was over my Tomtom carried on working as usual, even though I had done the download, and lots of cameras had either been covered up or moved to new locations, my TT dbase did not seem to recognise these new locations. Maybe as time goes on less and less of the locations will be known? H Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
THE SHEPHERD Posted February 9, 2013 Author Share Posted February 9, 2013 Thank you Dereck, as always an informative answer which reduces the concerns I had.TS Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spospe Posted February 9, 2013 Share Posted February 9, 2013 hallii - 2013-02-09 10:26 AM Be warned though, last time I was over my Tomtom carried on working as usual, even though I had done the download, and lots of cameras had either been covered up or moved to new locations, my TT dbase did not seem to recognise these new locations. Maybe as time goes on less and less of the locations will be known? H Hallii Given that you have both a TomTom GO 730 (do you?) and version 9.465 of the operating system software and have dowloaded all the current Map Share updates, I cannot see how you still have the old speed camera locations present. THE SHEPHERD has a TomTom GO 730, which is the same as I have and if he has both version 9.465 and all the updates, then he is 100% safe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Derek Uzzell Posted February 10, 2013 Share Posted February 10, 2013 hallii - 2013-02-09 10:26 AM Be warned though, last time I was over my Tomtom carried on working as usual, even though I had done the download, and lots of cameras had either been covered up or moved to new locations, my TT dbase did not seem to recognise these new locations. Maybe as time goes on less and less of the locations will be known? H My understanding is that, prior to the French law that's being discussed here, there was a friendly relationship between the French highways authorities and map-makers (hard- or soft-copy). So, when speed-cameras were installed, removed or repositioned, this information was passed to the map-makers who could then provide accurate camera-locations on road atlases or sat-navs. This happy relationship is now over and, if map-makers wish to indicate in future exactly where cameras are in France, they will have to obtain this information themselves. How this works with "Danger Zones" I've no idea, but (as you rightly say) one may reasonably expect sat-nav speed-camera-related alerts for France to become increasingly untrustworthy. I have a Garmin sat-nav and, to 'legalise' it, I asked Garmin how I could remove the French speed-camera alerts data from the device rather than just disable the alerts option. After deleting the file that (apparently) contained the French speed-camera alerts data I found that the sat-nav still provided camera alerts in France. My Garmin contact was unable to explain how this could happen, but gave me a free software download that converted the French speed-camera alerts into Danger Zone alerts. These have proven to have a certain amusement value but, as far as speed-cameras are concerned, it's debatable whether they aren't more of a nuisance than a help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Kirby Posted February 10, 2013 Share Posted February 10, 2013 I know I have said this before, but I have found the basic speed limits information on my Garmin (regularly updated via lifetime map updates), to be unreliable, not just in France, but generally. Speed limits are continually being revised, and many towns and villages are adding 70kph restrictions on approach to their 50kph "built up area" limits, to ease the transition down from the main road 90/100kph. Many of these transitional limits are not yet mapped. In other cases, limits around junctions are not mapped, and some others have been abolished/raised. I haven't used the camera alerts, but can only suppose they are prone to the same mapping lag as the speed limits. I have concluded that Garmin's indication of a limit on any stretch of road is at best a guide, and the only safe approach is to rely totally on visuals, and not on the sat-nav. If one is driving at or below the actual, signed, speed limit, the cameras are irrelevant. If one habitually takes liberties with speed limits, then reliance on the mapped data is less liable to keep your licence clean than attentive observation, and a well developed sense of which roads feel as though there should be a limit, even if one has not been spotted. Besides all of which, the French police regularly set up mobile speed traps, which they hide, and no sat nav can identify these. IMO, these mobile traps present a far greater risk to your licence than the fixed variety, and you need keen observation to spot them in advance. Yes, I am fully aware the friendly French will flash you as a warning, but on many roads there will not be someone coming the other way to do this. The scene is a nice long, undulating, straight road, with the odd hamlet and roadside bar or restaurant here and there, invariably around a cross roads with restricted vision, name board on approach, 50kph limit for 500 metres, vehicles parked in front of bar (normal), including an innocuous blue delivery van with its rear doors open. BLUE VAN!! Policeman standing behind the door using radar gun through slot between door and rear of van! Eyeballs, folks, not sat navs!! :-D Be careful out there! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matrix Meanderer Posted February 11, 2013 Share Posted February 11, 2013 Agree with Brian - eyes are better than Sat Navs. Just back from Spain having driven through France. We saw probably four or five very cunningly hidden speed cameras on motorways and on N roads. Some appeared to be remotely controlled as there were no men in blue or in blue vehicles anywhere near them - they were waiting down the road. So Les Flic are making full use of modern technology to catch speeding motorists. Advice is - stick to the speed limits and keep your eyes wide open in all situations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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