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Traffic fatalities would fall nearly to 0 if we made all speed limits 25mph. Obviously, as it has been for decades, child safety is the cloak that tyranny is dr

by wand3r 3y ago

Traffic fatalities would fall nearly to 0 if we made all speed limits 25mph. Obviously, as it has been for decades, child safety is the cloak that tyranny is dressed in. Not to mention CP is a common thing to pin on inconvenient people in society. The EU has been doing a lot of rent seeking off Google & big tech. They hit them with fines all the time. If I actually believed they gave a fuck about people or privacy it wouldn't be as offensive to me, but they don't. They want big tech doing what they want, they want "protection money" or at least a slice of the pie, and they want more government control of citizenry. I always admired Europe as an American, but its clearly in the same (or worse) state of decay as the US.

kiba 3y ago
Lowering speed limit to 25 mph isn't a magic wand. People will speed what they feel safe to speed. If we want to reduce pedestrian fatalities, there are a raft of social policies and urban planning decisions we can make that reduces fatalities to a potentially very low level if we decided that's a priority. We don't need to rigorously enforce the speed limit to make that happen.
- omginternets 3y ago
  [flagged]
- kodt 3y ago
  Make it illegal to own a car that does not have a governor which limits it to 25 mph. There are ways around that. Then the only people speeding are those with illegally modified cars. Then you just have to suggest the only reason someone would want to drive faster than 25 is to specifically run over children.
  - all2 3y ago
    This sounds vaguely familiar. I've seen almost this exact chain of reasoning somewhere and I can't quite put my finger on it.
  - rad_gruchalski 3y ago
    > Make it illegal to own a car that does not have a governor which limits it to 25 mph. „Intelligent” speed assistant becomes mandatory for any new model homologated in the EU from next year. But as we are are onto banning random things that piss us off: can we ban bicycles moving faster than 25mph and also being an idiot? Or even better, make it illegal to procreate with an idtiot. Like mosquitoes, idiots will surely die out if they cannot procreate. Now someone has to come up with a legalese for an idiot.
- javajosh 3y ago
  One day I'd like to create a taxonomy of hacker news responses. This is a good example of the one where someone gets pedantic about the details of an analogy employed for rhetorical purposes, objects to those details, and in so doing completely misses the point.
  - Asooka 3y ago
    That's not exclusive to hacker news in the least, I've seen it happen at about the same rate throughout communities regardless of how technology-centric they are. It seems that the inability (or unwillingness) to put away the reality of the analogy and only take it as a bridge towards the point the person is trying to make, is universal.
Tomis02 3y ago
> Traffic fatalities would fall nearly to 0 if we made all speed limits 25mph. You're saying it as if it's a bad thing. Nah, it would be great (with some exceptions that can be addressed). It would encourage ubiquitous and efficient public transport.
- lrem 3y ago
  Consider moving to Switzerland then. Not only they're discussing an universal 30km/h (18mph) limit in urban areas, but some cities are also tweaking traffic lights to maximise stopped time on top of that.
  - steve1977 3y ago
    And we have ubiquitous and efficient public transport.
    - SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
      Switzerland has 1/2 the population of New Jersey. Are the accomplishments in public transportation because the Swiss have solved some fundamental issues that no one else possibility could, a truly amazing feat that the world should look to? Or do certain things work better under certain conditions, and it's pretty much the exact same thing everyone does that doesn't scale?
      - ben_w 3y ago
        > Are the accomplishments in public transportation because the Swiss have solved some fundamental issues that no one else possibility could, a truly amazing feat that the world should look to? Loads of other countries also have great public transportation, especially when the current state of the USA is what’s being compared against. Possibly including the USA itself before cars got going. > Or do certain things work better under certain conditions, and it's pretty much the exact same thing everything that probably doesn't scale? The thing which public transport needs to be good at scaling is passengers per hour per land area. In this regard, approximately all public transport — bus, light rail, heavy rail, tram, ferry, underground — scales better than cars. This is why the Swiss built them, as all those steep hillsides and valleys already have houses in them, and tunnels (regardless of if they’re road or rail) are expensive. Seriously, why does this trope of saying “oh America can’t possibly, it’s such a big country” even exist, when the USA also has a road network despite being big and those roads are themselves generally much wider than Europe’s roads? It’s not like public transport is some special magic category that’s different from all the civil infrastructure the USA already makes, the only difference seems to be that “public” is a dirty word.
vik0 3y ago
Off topic but i just want to share that yesterday I was traveling, and in a residential area (a village) that nobody has stepped a foot in in 30 years, I was caught "speeding". I was going 75 in a 40kph zone. I don't get why it's 40kms. The traffic sign wasn't even visible, although that's not an excuse that would or should work. It's not like anyone lives there. Anywho, I paid 150 euros and now I have to go to court, where they will 99.9% take my drivers license away for 3 months. Fucking bullshit. I study law in uni. I don't get why these archaic villages that nobody has stepped a foot in for a long time are still considered residential areas, limiting how fast you can legally go. I thought the whole point of the law was to serve society and it's interests, and not to fill the state budget by being caught "speeding" in an area where the speed limit shouldn't realistically be that low, but alas it doesn't seem so Like, I live in a village too, but it's got a population of over 1k as opposed to 0.
roywiggins 3y ago
> Traffic fatalities would fall nearly to 0 if we made all speed limits 25mph. Wales is giving it a go: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-62134399 https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-62134399
- rootusrootus 3y ago
  Looks like they're just limiting speed in built-up areas. That's pretty common around the world, including in the US.
yieldcrv 3y ago
> I always admired Europe as an American, but its clearly in the same (or worse) state of decay as the US. Don’t passively let these systems develop, you can lobby them too. World construction isn’t just a gradient of people’s mores, it is catalyzed by a couple individuals just like the ones pushing this CSAM scanning From my experience, everyone feels like they’re doing the most good thing when they are pulling the controls of the state, even though they are all subverting the popular vote with access and money, or vice versa.

by wand3r 3y ago

kiba 3y ago

Lowering speed limit to 25 mph isn't a magic wand. People will speed what they feel safe to speed. If we want to reduce pedestrian fatalities, there are a raft of social policies and urban planning decisions we can make that reduces fatalities to a potentially very low level if we decided that's a priority. We don't need to rigorously enforce the speed limit to make that happen.

omginternets 3y ago
[flagged]
kodt 3y ago
Make it illegal to own a car that does not have a governor which limits it to 25 mph. There are ways around that. Then the only people speeding are those with illegally modified cars. Then you just have to suggest the only reason someone would want to drive faster than 25 is to specifically run over children.
- all2 3y ago
  This sounds vaguely familiar. I've seen almost this exact chain of reasoning somewhere and I can't quite put my finger on it.
- rad_gruchalski 3y ago
  > Make it illegal to own a car that does not have a governor which limits it to 25 mph. „Intelligent” speed assistant becomes mandatory for any new model homologated in the EU from next year. But as we are are onto banning random things that piss us off: can we ban bicycles moving faster than 25mph and also being an idiot? Or even better, make it illegal to procreate with an idtiot. Like mosquitoes, idiots will surely die out if they cannot procreate. Now someone has to come up with a legalese for an idiot.
javajosh 3y ago
One day I'd like to create a taxonomy of hacker news responses. This is a good example of the one where someone gets pedantic about the details of an analogy employed for rhetorical purposes, objects to those details, and in so doing completely misses the point.
- Asooka 3y ago
  That's not exclusive to hacker news in the least, I've seen it happen at about the same rate throughout communities regardless of how technology-centric they are. It seems that the inability (or unwillingness) to put away the reality of the analogy and only take it as a bridge towards the point the person is trying to make, is universal.

Tomis02 3y ago

> Traffic fatalities would fall nearly to 0 if we made all speed limits 25mph. You're saying it as if it's a bad thing. Nah, it would be great (with some exceptions that can be addressed). It would encourage ubiquitous and efficient public transport.

lrem 3y ago
Consider moving to Switzerland then. Not only they're discussing an universal 30km/h (18mph) limit in urban areas, but some cities are also tweaking traffic lights to maximise stopped time on top of that.
- steve1977 3y ago
  And we have ubiquitous and efficient public transport.
  - SV_BubbleTime 3y ago
    Switzerland has 1/2 the population of New Jersey. Are the accomplishments in public transportation because the Swiss have solved some fundamental issues that no one else possibility could, a truly amazing feat that the world should look to? Or do certain things work better under certain conditions, and it's pretty much the exact same thing everyone does that doesn't scale?
    - ben_w 3y ago
      > Are the accomplishments in public transportation because the Swiss have solved some fundamental issues that no one else possibility could, a truly amazing feat that the world should look to? Loads of other countries also have great public transportation, especially when the current state of the USA is what’s being compared against. Possibly including the USA itself before cars got going. > Or do certain things work better under certain conditions, and it's pretty much the exact same thing everything that probably doesn't scale? The thing which public transport needs to be good at scaling is passengers per hour per land area. In this regard, approximately all public transport — bus, light rail, heavy rail, tram, ferry, underground — scales better than cars. This is why the Swiss built them, as all those steep hillsides and valleys already have houses in them, and tunnels (regardless of if they’re road or rail) are expensive. Seriously, why does this trope of saying “oh America can’t possibly, it’s such a big country” even exist, when the USA also has a road network despite being big and those roads are themselves generally much wider than Europe’s roads? It’s not like public transport is some special magic category that’s different from all the civil infrastructure the USA already makes, the only difference seems to be that “public” is a dirty word.

vik0 3y ago

Off topic but i just want to share that yesterday I was traveling, and in a residential area (a village) that nobody has stepped a foot in in 30 years, I was caught "speeding". I was going 75 in a 40kph zone. I don't get why it's 40kms. The traffic sign wasn't even visible, although that's not an excuse that would or should work. It's not like anyone lives there. Anywho, I paid 150 euros and now I have to go to court, where they will 99.9% take my drivers license away for 3 months. Fucking bullshit. I study law in uni. I don't get why these archaic villages that nobody has stepped a foot in for a long time are still considered residential areas, limiting how fast you can legally go. I thought the whole point of the law was to serve society and it's interests, and not to fill the state budget by being caught "speeding" in an area where the speed limit shouldn't realistically be that low, but alas it doesn't seem so Like, I live in a village too, but it's got a population of over 1k as opposed to 0.

roywiggins 3y ago

> Traffic fatalities would fall nearly to 0 if we made all speed limits 25mph. Wales is giving it a go: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-62134399 https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-62134399

rootusrootus 3y ago
Looks like they're just limiting speed in built-up areas. That's pretty common around the world, including in the US.

yieldcrv 3y ago

> I always admired Europe as an American, but its clearly in the same (or worse) state of decay as the US. Don’t passively let these systems develop, you can lobby them too. World construction isn’t just a gradient of people’s mores, it is catalyzed by a couple individuals just like the ones pushing this CSAM scanning From my experience, everyone feels like they’re doing the most good thing when they are pulling the controls of the state, even though they are all subverting the popular vote with access and money, or vice versa.