4 ms·

Everyone doing 60 doesn't see each other because we're all doing the same speed, the ones going faster are the dangerous drivers.

by ChoGGi 2y ago

ryao 1y ago
When everyone is driving beyond the speed limit, the ones actually obeying the speed limit are the dangerous drivers. It is unfortunate that speed limits in the US have not corresponded to how people actually drive since 1973.
- tfourb 1y ago
  How does this make sense? If I'm driving the speed limit and someone else is crashing into me from behind while speeding, they are the dangerous driver. No matter how many other people also ignore the speed limit. Also, increasing the speed limit does nothing to make traffic safer. That doesn't make any sense at all, as increased speed is correlated very well with increased accident rates and severity of traffic-related injuries: https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/eu-road-safety-policy/priorities/safe-road-use/safe-speed/archive/speeding/speed-central-issue-road-safety/speed-and-injury-risk-different-speed-levels_en https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/eu-road-safety-po...
  - ryao 1y ago
    It should be obvious that driving substantially slower than everyone else would make you a danger to others. Try driving at the speed limit on a high way in southern NY, especially in the left lane. You will have many near accidents and the reality is that you would be the dangerous driver for not keeping pace with everyone else. Increasing the speed limit to the 85th percentile so that you do not have the few people who actually obey it posing a hazard to others does make things safer. Getting cars off the road sooner by reducing travel time, decreases the number of cars on the road. This increases the distance between cars and accidents only when the distance betweeen a vehicle and something else reaches 0. Forcing people to drive slower therefore causes collisions by bringing cars closer to one another. The severity is a separate matter from whether there is a collision. As for severity, people drive much faster in Germany where there is no high way speed limit for much of the autobahn yet their autobahn network has half the fatalities that U.S. highways have. The safety data from 2012 shows this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobahn#Safety https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobahn#Safety As for your link, it talks about pedestrian safety. As per the data there, pedestrians are unsafe on highways no matter what the speed limits are. There are also no pedestrians on highways. There is no point to setting highway speed limits based on studies showing the danger to non-existent pedestrians. Did you post the first link that seemed to agree with your position as part of some fallacious appeal to authority because logic failed to agree with your preconceived notions that you were never equipped to defend? I suspect that is exactly what you just did.
    - tfourb 1y ago
      >Increasing the speed limit to the 85th percentile so that you do not have the few people who actually obey it posing a hazard to others does make things safer. [citation needed] Seriously. That is a pretty bold claim that you should be able support with actual studies, if true. You have several things working against your hypothesis: - While it may be true that driving at the legal speed limit might slightly increase the risk of accidents when many other drivers drive faster than the speed limit, a general increase of the speed limit might severly increase risk for everyone. - Many people do not drive above the speed limit, because they have a "higher normal", but because they feel entitled to "drive faster". I.e. they claim that they are "better drivers", they have a superior need to arrive faster, etc. Those people will just adapt their behavior to the new, higher speed limit and again drive above that, making the entire exercise pointless and dangerous. - A potential and less risky alternative would be improved enforcement of the current speed limit. There are probably plenty of other arguments that actual experts in this field would bring up. >Getting cars off the road sooner by reducing travel time, decreases the number of cars on the road. This increases the distance between cars and accidents only when the distance betweeen a vehicle and something else reaches 0. That makes no sense at all. It has been proven in both theoretical and practical tests that driving "all out" does not decrease travel time drastically in almost all circumstances. But it substantially increase the risk of accidents. So any minuscule decrease in car density will be far outweighed by increased accident risk per kilometer driven. >Forcing people to drive slower therefore causes collisions by bringing cars closer to one another. It's actually the other way around: Forcing people to drive slower drastically reduced the risk of collisions because people are slower and have more time to react. It also reduces the incidence of traffic jams (because sharp braking prevalent with speeding drivers is a main contributor to traffic jams), which are in turn a major factor in collisions. >As for severity, people drive much faster in Germany where there is no high way speed limit for much of the autobahn yet their autobahn network has half the fatalities that U.S. highways have. You'll have to control for other factors, of course. Cars in the US are much larger and heavier than in Germany, for example. In statistics, you want to compare apples to apples, so you control for vehicle weight when trying to make observations about the impact of speed on accident severity. >As for your link, it talks about pedestrian safety. True. But the same holds true for vehicle collisions. It's really basic physics. All other things being equal, faster cars have more energy. More energy = more severe accident outcomes. >Did you post the first link that seemed to agree with your position as part of some fallacious appeal to authority because logic failed to agree with your preconceived notions that you were never equipped to defend? No. There are plenty of other sources that support my views, i.e. https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/eu-road-safety-policy/priorities/safe-road-use/safe-speed/archive/speeding/speed-central-issue-road-safety/speed-and-accident-risk_en https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/eu-road-safety-po... https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0001457519318408 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00014... ("Impact speed was found to have a highly significant positive relationship to risk of serious injury for all impact types examined.") Where are your sources?
lupusreal 1y ago
It's a rare stretch of American interstate highway where the majority are sticking to the speed limit. On different roads the ratio of speeders to "speed limit doers" varies, but interstates have fairly consistent driving conditions and the safe speed for those conditions is consistently higher than the posted limit. Usually traffic on American interstates is staying at the speed limit if: there is a fair amount of congestion, everybody is stuck behind somebody doing the limit, or there is rain/fog/snow/etc.
- tfourb 1y ago
  >and the safe speed for those conditions is consistently higher than the posted limit. A cursory look at traffic safety statistics would seem to dispute this statement. The US consistently ranks quite high in traffic fatalities, which seems to indicate that you couldn't safely drive faster than the current speed limit in most circumstances. Of course you'd have to control for a lot of other factors for a definite conclusion, but conversely, I'd like to see an actual source for your theory. Enforcing a speed limit is actually not that hard if you want to. You can of course put stationary or mobile speed cameras in place. But even better may be systems I've seen in some places in southern Europe: Cameras at the beginning and end of a stretch of highway that compare time stamps of your passing and calculate the average speed of your car in that stretch. If you've passed the stretch quicker than should be possible according to the speed limit you'll be fined. It's quite low tech, cameras are prevalent on the highway systems of many countries, anyway, and it solves the problem of people adhering only to the speed limit if they know they are being observed by law enforcement.
- vel0city 1y ago
  There are a number of interstates (and interstate like US highways) near me that have posted speed limits of 70MPH but any normal day you'll find traffic going 55mph or even less.

Everyone doing 60 doesn't see each other because we're all doing the same speed, the ones going faster are the dangerous drivers.

by ChoGGi 2y ago

Everyone doing 60 doesn't see each other because we're all doing the same speed, the ones going faster are the dangerous drivers.

ryao 1y ago

When everyone is driving beyond the speed limit, the ones actually obeying the speed limit are the dangerous drivers. It is unfortunate that speed limits in the US have not corresponded to how people actually drive since 1973.

tfourb 1y ago
How does this make sense? If I'm driving the speed limit and someone else is crashing into me from behind while speeding, they are the dangerous driver. No matter how many other people also ignore the speed limit. Also, increasing the speed limit does nothing to make traffic safer. That doesn't make any sense at all, as increased speed is correlated very well with increased accident rates and severity of traffic-related injuries: https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/eu-road-safety-policy/priorities/safe-road-use/safe-speed/archive/speeding/speed-central-issue-road-safety/speed-and-injury-risk-different-speed-levels_en https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/eu-road-safety-po...
- ryao 1y ago
  It should be obvious that driving substantially slower than everyone else would make you a danger to others. Try driving at the speed limit on a high way in southern NY, especially in the left lane. You will have many near accidents and the reality is that you would be the dangerous driver for not keeping pace with everyone else. Increasing the speed limit to the 85th percentile so that you do not have the few people who actually obey it posing a hazard to others does make things safer. Getting cars off the road sooner by reducing travel time, decreases the number of cars on the road. This increases the distance between cars and accidents only when the distance betweeen a vehicle and something else reaches 0. Forcing people to drive slower therefore causes collisions by bringing cars closer to one another. The severity is a separate matter from whether there is a collision. As for severity, people drive much faster in Germany where there is no high way speed limit for much of the autobahn yet their autobahn network has half the fatalities that U.S. highways have. The safety data from 2012 shows this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobahn#Safety https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobahn#Safety As for your link, it talks about pedestrian safety. As per the data there, pedestrians are unsafe on highways no matter what the speed limits are. There are also no pedestrians on highways. There is no point to setting highway speed limits based on studies showing the danger to non-existent pedestrians. Did you post the first link that seemed to agree with your position as part of some fallacious appeal to authority because logic failed to agree with your preconceived notions that you were never equipped to defend? I suspect that is exactly what you just did.
  - tfourb 1y ago
    >Increasing the speed limit to the 85th percentile so that you do not have the few people who actually obey it posing a hazard to others does make things safer. [citation needed] Seriously. That is a pretty bold claim that you should be able support with actual studies, if true. You have several things working against your hypothesis: - While it may be true that driving at the legal speed limit might slightly increase the risk of accidents when many other drivers drive faster than the speed limit, a general increase of the speed limit might severly increase risk for everyone. - Many people do not drive above the speed limit, because they have a "higher normal", but because they feel entitled to "drive faster". I.e. they claim that they are "better drivers", they have a superior need to arrive faster, etc. Those people will just adapt their behavior to the new, higher speed limit and again drive above that, making the entire exercise pointless and dangerous. - A potential and less risky alternative would be improved enforcement of the current speed limit. There are probably plenty of other arguments that actual experts in this field would bring up. >Getting cars off the road sooner by reducing travel time, decreases the number of cars on the road. This increases the distance between cars and accidents only when the distance betweeen a vehicle and something else reaches 0. That makes no sense at all. It has been proven in both theoretical and practical tests that driving "all out" does not decrease travel time drastically in almost all circumstances. But it substantially increase the risk of accidents. So any minuscule decrease in car density will be far outweighed by increased accident risk per kilometer driven. >Forcing people to drive slower therefore causes collisions by bringing cars closer to one another. It's actually the other way around: Forcing people to drive slower drastically reduced the risk of collisions because people are slower and have more time to react. It also reduces the incidence of traffic jams (because sharp braking prevalent with speeding drivers is a main contributor to traffic jams), which are in turn a major factor in collisions. >As for severity, people drive much faster in Germany where there is no high way speed limit for much of the autobahn yet their autobahn network has half the fatalities that U.S. highways have. You'll have to control for other factors, of course. Cars in the US are much larger and heavier than in Germany, for example. In statistics, you want to compare apples to apples, so you control for vehicle weight when trying to make observations about the impact of speed on accident severity. >As for your link, it talks about pedestrian safety. True. But the same holds true for vehicle collisions. It's really basic physics. All other things being equal, faster cars have more energy. More energy = more severe accident outcomes. >Did you post the first link that seemed to agree with your position as part of some fallacious appeal to authority because logic failed to agree with your preconceived notions that you were never equipped to defend? No. There are plenty of other sources that support my views, i.e. https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/eu-road-safety-policy/priorities/safe-road-use/safe-speed/archive/speeding/speed-central-issue-road-safety/speed-and-accident-risk_en https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/eu-road-safety-po... https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0001457519318408 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00014... ("Impact speed was found to have a highly significant positive relationship to risk of serious injury for all impact types examined.") Where are your sources?

lupusreal 1y ago

It's a rare stretch of American interstate highway where the majority are sticking to the speed limit. On different roads the ratio of speeders to "speed limit doers" varies, but interstates have fairly consistent driving conditions and the safe speed for those conditions is consistently higher than the posted limit. Usually traffic on American interstates is staying at the speed limit if: there is a fair amount of congestion, everybody is stuck behind somebody doing the limit, or there is rain/fog/snow/etc.

tfourb 1y ago
>and the safe speed for those conditions is consistently higher than the posted limit. A cursory look at traffic safety statistics would seem to dispute this statement. The US consistently ranks quite high in traffic fatalities, which seems to indicate that you couldn't safely drive faster than the current speed limit in most circumstances. Of course you'd have to control for a lot of other factors for a definite conclusion, but conversely, I'd like to see an actual source for your theory. Enforcing a speed limit is actually not that hard if you want to. You can of course put stationary or mobile speed cameras in place. But even better may be systems I've seen in some places in southern Europe: Cameras at the beginning and end of a stretch of highway that compare time stamps of your passing and calculate the average speed of your car in that stretch. If you've passed the stretch quicker than should be possible according to the speed limit you'll be fined. It's quite low tech, cameras are prevalent on the highway systems of many countries, anyway, and it solves the problem of people adhering only to the speed limit if they know they are being observed by law enforcement.
vel0city 1y ago
There are a number of interstates (and interstate like US highways) near me that have posted speed limits of 70MPH but any normal day you'll find traffic going 55mph or even less.