IS350jet

With all due respect, this is one of the stupidest things I have ever heard!!

EZZ

For the most part I agree. I was commenting that speed itself isn't the killer. Other factors like crappy drivers in the US play a more contributing role. Germany is a perfect example of speed done right. Also, arbitrarily reducing speeds just wastes everyone's time when faster speeds would probably be more efficient on many interstates.

IS350jet

Your argument doesn't hold water. That's like saying jumping out of an airplane without a parachute isn't deadly, hitting the ground is what kills.

EZZ

We will just agree to disagree. I think cars can go faster safely if you improve the driving skill of the population and enforce lane discipline. Both are achievable over time.

Wilson2000

Unfortunately, over time, I've seen a lessening of enforcement of the laws of the road, and concurrently, a lessening of driver attentiveness. As long as Americans hold tightly to their rugged individualism and their right to do whatever they can get away with, we can't increase speed limits on our highways.

I had a German friend who told me German laws don't allow drivers to eat in their cars, and if they do, they are more than likely to get ticketed.

Before it was posted, I was thinking of the video mmarshall shared of the MB flipping over on the autobahn. It is a good example of how speed kills, but your chance of surviving is much greater in a well built automobile. The Lambo/autobahn video is an example of how nobody survives a crash a 200mph in a production car on any highway! Could anyone lobbying for autobahns in America watch the Lambo video and still think it is a good idea? I love adrenaline as much as the next guy, but I'm not willing to trade my life for a few moments of it.

Stroock639

driver attentiveness is going down because cars improve while speed limits stay the same, going 55 in any modern car is so boring of course your mind will start to wander and get distracted... and people start to feel like they can do whatever because the laws don't make sense / are so outdated you quickly realize nothing will happen from breaking them

i NEVER see left lane laws enforced and constantly traveling in the left lane is one of the most dangerous things you can do, and when a speeding ticket is given it's usually from some cop hiding in the darkness which makes it clear the ticket is all about money and not safety

the road test here is also far too easy and abbreviated, and doesn't include even a single second on the highway... i remember everyone being freaked out about the dreaded parallel park which just shows how incorrectly prioritized the current system is

when done properly and responsibly the extra risk of driving fast is so minute it's almost nonexistent... why not just have us all drive at 20? that'll be very safe... people get this notion that you'll like spontaneously burst into flames once a certain speed is reached, without speedometers most people wouldn't even be able to tell the difference between a 'safe' and 'dangerous' speed

oldcajun

Exactly! No matter how good a driver you are and how good your car is, at these speeds there is no margin for Grandma Ruth and her Prius in the left lane or cousin Ralph pulling out to pass a truck in his minivan at just the wrong moment. I usually drive pretty fast, but at 80 mph I'm not that much faster than traffic and can easily adapt. At 120 mph that is not possible.

Blaze876

iTrader: (1)

I have to agree with EZZ. First off just my anecdotal experience, I can personally say I have had many more closer calls of almost getting in an accident when I am obeying the speed limit. I have 5 car enthusiast friends, we all usually drive above the speed limit. We have all been in 1 or more accidents (none out fault). All have happened when we were at a stand still or obeying the speed limit. It has become a joke where we say we better speed so we don't get in a next accident. I have been in 2 accidents...both at a red light, at a stand still got rear ended by distracted drivers. I am sure someone speeding would have seen me lol. However, I know this does not prove anything.

IMO, like EZZ was saying, yes the stats show that speeding is the main cause of crashes in USA. The question you need to ask yourself is what are the circumstances that resulted in the crash. If the main cause of clogged arteries is eating fry chicken, your fix is to not have the oh so good and crunchy fry chicken. EZZ and I are proposing to find the cause why fry chicken clog your arteries. We found it is the oil that it is fried in. So we decide to use an air fryer. Still get our delicious fry chicken without the clogged arteries. The following is what I believe are the main causes which EZZ touched on:
1. improper lane use. "Speeding" cars has to be swerving in and out various lanes from the slowest to the fastest, passing on the right because people in America don't know what the left lane purpose is.
2. Distracted drivers that switches lanes without checking their mirrors. If they do, many times they don't have reasonable judgement. For example, a car going 40 mph switching into the left lane with an oncoming car going 90mph. Yes, the car going 90 mph is 100 feet behind but that distance is eaten up quickly which many people can't seem to grasp.
3. More people in America don't use their indicator versus those that do imo. Don't need to explain this any further.

There is no way you can convince me that a driver going 130 mph in a single lane straight highway, never switching is more dangerous than a distracted driver, drunk driver, etc.

There are times I drive at or slightly below the speed limit and it feels borderline terrifying versus when I am 20-30 mph over the speed limit. Cars flying past me on the right, cutting me off dangerously close...why? because idiots are doing the same speed or slower than me in the 3 left lanes next to me. I see it everyday where many drivers first job to do as they merge is to switch to the passing lane as fast as possible and go 5 mph below the speed limit.

I can bet the chances of a speeding driver crashing on his own without a next driver involvement is low.

Blaze876

iTrader: (1)

America needs to have more stringent driver tests and cops need to enforce laws better. This will weed out the bad drivers and left lane campers ticketed until they learn / go broke from tickets / lose their license.

Wilson2000

Aren't most freeway speed limits 65 mph these days in metro areas and 75 in rural areas? I don't see many 55 mph speed limits anymore. Also, like me, most people routinely drive 10-15 mph over the speed limit. While doing so, I've only received two speeding tickets in almost 50 years of driving! Most cops won't pull you over unless you are blatant and/or careless while speeding. I would vote for raising the max speed limit to 80-85, as long as I could also vote for greater enforcement!

While agreeing with some of your points, I don't agree with this, and to ask why we don't all drive 20 mph is silly. Physics, and statistics are why we need reasonable speed limits. A recent National Safety Council report showed, "Speeding was a factor in 26% of all traffic fatalities in 2018, killing 9,378, or an average of over 25 people per day." If a loved-one was one of these fatatlities, one may be more accepting of reasonable speed limits.

mmarshall

Exactly. That is the point I have tried to make, several times. The laws of physics (kinetic-energy) don't go out to lunch just because some people decide they want to have a heavy right foot. High speed is potentially dangerous, whether one person or a thousand is doing it.

Stroock639

just saying 'speed was a factor' doesn't actually prove anything, going 'too fast for conditions' is a more likely what happened... and restricting the speed limit does nothing to address the real issues here with drivers

also i'm not proposing complete lawlessness here lol... but if i want to go to a deserted highway at night in one of my autobahn tested cars and speed around a bit, there's no reason i should be risking imprisonment for a few seconds worth of fun while putting not a single other person at risk

obviously it makes sense to restrict speed in more urban sections of interstates (like the autobahns do), but there's so many sections of deserted flat smooth wide open highway in this country which are essentially no different than many unrestricted autobahn sections, no lives are being saved by having speed restrictions there

people will generally just drive as fast as they feel comfortable, and those that want to 'speed' will basically just do so anyway, physics makes it quite clear that speeding up the rest of the people to reduce the speed differentials would result in less severe impacts

it's not right that brilliant teams of engineers work hard to create these devices and a few incompetent people ruin it... one of my favorite drives was heading back from montreal with my friend on I-87, we got from the canadian border to albany in 90 minutes flat, and as you're steaming along with the cruise control set at 100 the whole time you start to wonder why is this so illegal? it was a very relaxing experience in the pinnacle of 90s japanese luxury

bagwell

Germans are better drivers - Americans suck.

mmarshall

It's true that driver-training is more comprehensive in Europe....no one is arguing that. But that still doesn't change the laws of physics. The faster you go, the more potential kinetic energy is stored in the vehicle....and the greater the damage will be if you do hit something. That is simply beyond debate.....end of story.

Stroock639

nobody's debating that, but that doesn't matter if you're less likely to have an accident in the first place

if you just keep saying more speed equals more kinetic energy, we should all just drive 20