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There are traffic scenarios where it's too dangerous to stick with the legal speed limits.

CaptainZapp 11y ago
I was about to downvote you, since I think this statemment is, well, moronic. Instead I kindly ask you to elaborate on just one situation, where exceeding the speed limit avoids danger. Edited to add : To be clear: Speeding up upon overtaking doesn't count. If you need to do that you should not have overtaken in the first place, since it was obviously dangerous.
- lmartel 11y ago
  If the posted speed limit is 55 and everyone but you is going 80, then exceeding the speed limit avoids danger. There's your situation. [Of course, you'd never get a ticket in this situation, and I think there are even legal provisions regarding respecting the "flow of traffic" in some US states.]
  - Angostura 11y ago
    Just to be clear, don't try this in the UK. If everyone is going at 80, everyone will get a ticket, thanks to automated speed cameras.
    - saint_fiasco 11y ago
      Hypothetically, it it were true that going at 80 is safer because everyone else is going at 80, wouldn't you have to choose between a risk of paying a fine versus a risk of losing your life? That sounds messed up.
  - Amezarak 11y ago
    > [Of course, you'd never get a ticket in this situation, and I think there are even legal provisions regarding respecting the "flow of traffic" in some US states.] This is exactly how I got my first ticket. I was moving with the flow of traffic, which was going about 15mph over the 55mph speed limit on a busy four lane divided highway. Highway Patrol flew up out of nowhere, angrily berated me for five minutes, and gave me a speeding ticket. Now I just go the speed limit. People cuss me out and flip me off, but that's preferable to paying several hundred dollars. (And for me, it turns out not to really be worth it anyway. Most places I go speeding saves me < 5 minutes, and I get much better gas mileage, up to 48mpg, accelerating slowly and not driving faster than 65mph.) Can you, by the way, cite any state laws explicitly saying it is OK to exceed the posted speed limit if doing so is required to move with the flow of traffic? I have heard this claim a lot but I have never been able to find real proof of it. There are sometimes "flow of traffic" laws applicable if you're driving too far below the posted speed limit, which is assumed (wrongly) to be the maximum "normal and reasonable" speed of normal traffic, and there are laws against driving slowly in the left lanes, and sometimes laws that allow you to speed while passing on a two-lane road, but I have never seen one that was applicable to someone driving at or above the speed limit and would have allowed them to legally speed.
- stefantalpalaru 11y ago
  Safety in traffic depends, among other things, on the relative speed between you and the cars around you. When this relative speed gets out of a certain range, you and/or those around you are forced to make dangerous maneuvers increasing the risk of collision. With this in mind, think about scenarios where the average speed is above the legal limit: highways, rural roads with no known speed cams, etc. Now imagine heavy traffic and only one participant slowing down to the legal limit. Here's one US citizen's experience driving on highways in Italy, where I live, describing what safe driving looks like here: https://www.quora.com/Why-do-people-drive-above-the-speed-limit/answer/Alan-Chao https://www.quora.com/Why-do-people-drive-above-the-speed-li...
  - GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
    Rural roads you have to be careful speeding because people walk on them and tractors drive on them, and sometimes there are horses. If you're driving the limit and there's a bunch of people behind you, either (a) they can deal with it or (b) you can pull over and let them pass.
    - stefantalpalaru 11y ago
      Rural road in northern Italy: https://www.google.it/maps/@45.4014223,8.955495,3a,75y,72.04h,93.16t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s70W0ZwnQ9tVmDYg0cRs9tw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656?hl=en https://www.google.it/maps/@45.4014223,8.955495,3a,75y,72.04...
- aianus 11y ago
  > Speeding up upon overtaking doesn't count. If you need to do that you should not have overtaken in the first place, since it was obviously dangerous. No matter how fast a truck is driving, I don't want to be anywhere near it while driving my motorcycle. Those tires randomly explode (I've seen it happen multiple times) and when a piece hits you, you're dead. I pass them ASAP, no matter how fast I have to go to do it.
- CamperBob2 11y ago
  Here's a pointer to a couple of engineering studies I found interesting, personally: https://www.motorists.org/blog/how-should-speed-limits-be-set/ https://www.motorists.org/blog/how-should-speed-limits-be-se...
1ris 11y ago
This does not deserve to be downvoted. Driving too slow is as dangerous as driving to fast, or more dangerous. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_curve https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_curve
- JimmyM 11y ago
  I think it has likely been downvoted by people from countries that do not speed. I have only ever seen Americans and Canadians talking about the necessity to speed to keep up with the flow of traffic (and they have a higher rate of fatal RTAs per 100,000 than most Western European countries – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r... – Canada is close to Italy, a country that is well known in Western Europe for terrifying traffic, while America is closer to South American countries) While driving too slow is as dangerous as driving too fast, it's not as dangerous as the Solomon curve suggests, according to the article you linked: > Reporting on these results in 1971, academics West and Dunn confirmed the findings of Solomon and Cirillo,[11] but found that crashes involving turning vehicles accounted for 44 percent of all crashes observed in the study and that excluding these crashes from the analysis greatly attenuated the factors that created the U-shape of the Solomon curve. The topic of this conversation also seems to oddly mirror the course of the story from the original article. Minor acts of breaking a just law, justified on an individual basis, lead to a society in which regularly breaking that law is accepted – and indeed enforced – by the state. That is probably why people are downvoting your parent comment. For the record I don't have the ability or the desire to have the ability to downvote.
  - stefantalpalaru 11y ago
    > Italy, a country that is well known in Western Europe for terrifying traffic Is it? The death toll is average to low compared to the rest of Europe: http://ec.europa.eu/transport/road_safety/pdf/gis/mapcare_fatal_2014.pdf http://ec.europa.eu/transport/road_safety/pdf/gis/mapcare_fa... And it's low compared to the rest of the world: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...

I was about to downvote you, since I think this statemment is, well, moronic. Instead I kindly ask you to elaborate on just one situation, where exceeding the speed limit avoids danger. Edited to add : To be clear: Speeding up upon overtaking doesn't count. If you need to do that you should not have overtaken in the first place, since it was obviously dangerous.

lmartel 11y ago
If the posted speed limit is 55 and everyone but you is going 80, then exceeding the speed limit avoids danger. There's your situation. [Of course, you'd never get a ticket in this situation, and I think there are even legal provisions regarding respecting the "flow of traffic" in some US states.]
- Angostura 11y ago
  Just to be clear, don't try this in the UK. If everyone is going at 80, everyone will get a ticket, thanks to automated speed cameras.
  - saint_fiasco 11y ago
    Hypothetically, it it were true that going at 80 is safer because everyone else is going at 80, wouldn't you have to choose between a risk of paying a fine versus a risk of losing your life? That sounds messed up.
- Amezarak 11y ago
  > [Of course, you'd never get a ticket in this situation, and I think there are even legal provisions regarding respecting the "flow of traffic" in some US states.] This is exactly how I got my first ticket. I was moving with the flow of traffic, which was going about 15mph over the 55mph speed limit on a busy four lane divided highway. Highway Patrol flew up out of nowhere, angrily berated me for five minutes, and gave me a speeding ticket. Now I just go the speed limit. People cuss me out and flip me off, but that's preferable to paying several hundred dollars. (And for me, it turns out not to really be worth it anyway. Most places I go speeding saves me < 5 minutes, and I get much better gas mileage, up to 48mpg, accelerating slowly and not driving faster than 65mph.) Can you, by the way, cite any state laws explicitly saying it is OK to exceed the posted speed limit if doing so is required to move with the flow of traffic? I have heard this claim a lot but I have never been able to find real proof of it. There are sometimes "flow of traffic" laws applicable if you're driving too far below the posted speed limit, which is assumed (wrongly) to be the maximum "normal and reasonable" speed of normal traffic, and there are laws against driving slowly in the left lanes, and sometimes laws that allow you to speed while passing on a two-lane road, but I have never seen one that was applicable to someone driving at or above the speed limit and would have allowed them to legally speed.
stefantalpalaru 11y ago
Safety in traffic depends, among other things, on the relative speed between you and the cars around you. When this relative speed gets out of a certain range, you and/or those around you are forced to make dangerous maneuvers increasing the risk of collision. With this in mind, think about scenarios where the average speed is above the legal limit: highways, rural roads with no known speed cams, etc. Now imagine heavy traffic and only one participant slowing down to the legal limit. Here's one US citizen's experience driving on highways in Italy, where I live, describing what safe driving looks like here: https://www.quora.com/Why-do-people-drive-above-the-speed-limit/answer/Alan-Chao https://www.quora.com/Why-do-people-drive-above-the-speed-li...
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
  Rural roads you have to be careful speeding because people walk on them and tractors drive on them, and sometimes there are horses. If you're driving the limit and there's a bunch of people behind you, either (a) they can deal with it or (b) you can pull over and let them pass.
  - stefantalpalaru 11y ago
    Rural road in northern Italy: https://www.google.it/maps/@45.4014223,8.955495,3a,75y,72.04h,93.16t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s70W0ZwnQ9tVmDYg0cRs9tw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656?hl=en https://www.google.it/maps/@45.4014223,8.955495,3a,75y,72.04...
aianus 11y ago
> Speeding up upon overtaking doesn't count. If you need to do that you should not have overtaken in the first place, since it was obviously dangerous. No matter how fast a truck is driving, I don't want to be anywhere near it while driving my motorcycle. Those tires randomly explode (I've seen it happen multiple times) and when a piece hits you, you're dead. I pass them ASAP, no matter how fast I have to go to do it.
CamperBob2 11y ago
Here's a pointer to a couple of engineering studies I found interesting, personally: https://www.motorists.org/blog/how-should-speed-limits-be-set/ https://www.motorists.org/blog/how-should-speed-limits-be-se...

1ris 11y ago

This does not deserve to be downvoted. Driving too slow is as dangerous as driving to fast, or more dangerous. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_curve https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_curve

JimmyM 11y ago
I think it has likely been downvoted by people from countries that do not speed. I have only ever seen Americans and Canadians talking about the necessity to speed to keep up with the flow of traffic (and they have a higher rate of fatal RTAs per 100,000 than most Western European countries – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r... – Canada is close to Italy, a country that is well known in Western Europe for terrifying traffic, while America is closer to South American countries) While driving too slow is as dangerous as driving too fast, it's not as dangerous as the Solomon curve suggests, according to the article you linked: > Reporting on these results in 1971, academics West and Dunn confirmed the findings of Solomon and Cirillo,[11] but found that crashes involving turning vehicles accounted for 44 percent of all crashes observed in the study and that excluding these crashes from the analysis greatly attenuated the factors that created the U-shape of the Solomon curve. The topic of this conversation also seems to oddly mirror the course of the story from the original article. Minor acts of breaking a just law, justified on an individual basis, lead to a society in which regularly breaking that law is accepted – and indeed enforced – by the state. That is probably why people are downvoting your parent comment. For the record I don't have the ability or the desire to have the ability to downvote.
- stefantalpalaru 11y ago
  > Italy, a country that is well known in Western Europe for terrifying traffic Is it? The death toll is average to low compared to the rest of Europe: http://ec.europa.eu/transport/road_safety/pdf/gis/mapcare_fatal_2014.pdf http://ec.europa.eu/transport/road_safety/pdf/gis/mapcare_fa... And it's low compared to the rest of the world: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...