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I'd like to see drivers ed put more focus on personal judgements of safety, and less emphasis on following the law. A huge number of car crashes seem to happen

I'd like to see drivers ed put more focus on personal judgements of safety, and less emphasis on following the law. A huge number of car crashes seem to happen because people are doing the speed limit during poor weather/road conditions. The presence of the speed limit makes many people feel entitled to go that speed, entitled to not be burdened with the responsibility of thinking for themselves. Driving at 65 mph through pea soup fog is insane, but I've seen tons of people do it. And presumably when they crash they blame the fog... I know drivers ed courses tell people that the speed limit is the legal maximum, not minimum, but I don't think they do a good job of effectively getting this point across. With proper training, drivers should be able to evaluate the road and weather conditions and estimate a safe speed for themselves using their own judgement, without the aid of speed limits giving them hints. If it were up to me, drivers license tests would have the speedometer blinded to the driver during part of the test, and the driver would be graded on their ability to drive at a safe speed without it.

genewitch 4y ago
California Driver's Ed hammered this in. In california you can get a ticket for going the speed limit if it's foggy, raining, etc. I can't imagine getting pulled over for doing the speed limit anywhere else. I think most of the rest of the country (that i've experienced) has a belief that 90% of people go slower than the speed limit, and the rest are split between people that go the exact posted amount, and people that drive over the speed limit. I've probably put about 800,000 miles on the road in my life, and i gotta say, "exact posted" is fairly rare, but most people are within 1% or so. you really only notice if you're in a factory stock car with stock tires and have GPS telling you your exact speed. Otherwise it feels like everyone is going faster or slower arbitrarily, when it's probably just mechanical. I think i have read more than a thousand times that manufacturers allow for slop in the speedometers, so long as it shows you going faster than your actual ground speed. up to 10% even. it's 2022, 2023 almost. Why isn't the speedometer at least half GPS or otherwise corrected? BTW, the way to determine if your speedometer is correct is with the mile marker signs. you set your cruise control or foot to 60MPH and start timer/look at a watch/clock and you should hit the next mile marker at exactly 60 seconds. From what i've read, most cars will hit that up to 6 seconds later than they should. interesting aside: toyota and ford cars from the late 80s early 90s with digital displays would cap out at like 85MPH but if you switched to KM/H it would allow readings above 85MPH. then again, my first ford was missing the little peg that stopped the analog dial from going past 85, and at one point i was pulled over at 3 AM on I-210 going "R" miles per hour. The Statie told me he was on an interchange, and didn't believe his eyes, because that ford was basically iron oxide and epoxy.

genewitch 4y ago

California Driver's Ed hammered this in. In california you can get a ticket for going the speed limit if it's foggy, raining, etc. I can't imagine getting pulled over for doing the speed limit anywhere else. I think most of the rest of the country (that i've experienced) has a belief that 90% of people go slower than the speed limit, and the rest are split between people that go the exact posted amount, and people that drive over the speed limit. I've probably put about 800,000 miles on the road in my life, and i gotta say, "exact posted" is fairly rare, but most people are within 1% or so. you really only notice if you're in a factory stock car with stock tires and have GPS telling you your exact speed. Otherwise it feels like everyone is going faster or slower arbitrarily, when it's probably just mechanical. I think i have read more than a thousand times that manufacturers allow for slop in the speedometers, so long as it shows you going faster than your actual ground speed. up to 10% even. it's 2022, 2023 almost. Why isn't the speedometer at least half GPS or otherwise corrected? BTW, the way to determine if your speedometer is correct is with the mile marker signs. you set your cruise control or foot to 60MPH and start timer/look at a watch/clock and you should hit the next mile marker at exactly 60 seconds. From what i've read, most cars will hit that up to 6 seconds later than they should. interesting aside: toyota and ford cars from the late 80s early 90s with digital displays would cap out at like 85MPH but if you switched to KM/H it would allow readings above 85MPH. then again, my first ford was missing the little peg that stopped the analog dial from going past 85, and at one point i was pulled over at 3 AM on I-210 going "R" miles per hour. The Statie told me he was on an interchange, and didn't believe his eyes, because that ford was basically iron oxide and epoxy.