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There are speed limits, now. When the 55MPH federal limit was repealed, the limits on interstates went to "Reasonable & prudent". A guy driving a brand new sports car was ticketed for doing around 80, and he fought the ticket on the grounds that the speed was reasonable & prudent for the conditions. The state supreme court ruled that the R & P limit was unconstitutional due to its vagueness, so until the state lawmakers could set new limits, there were none on the interstates.

Interestingly enough, during the time of no speed limits, there was not a single fatal accident on any of the roads that had no limit. Seat belt usage was far higher than the national average. Once speed limits were set again, the fatal accident rate rose 111% from when the limit was R & P.

Now, the interstate limit is typically 75, and most 2 lane roads are 65-70. Speed limits tend to be loosely enforced, due to the low amount of officers patrolling.

Links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_limit#Montana
http://www.hwysafety.com/hwy_montana_2001.htm
http://www.motorists.com/pressreleases/montana.htm l

History would disagree with you. Montana had a 4 year period in the late '90s with no numerical speed limit. The results of which, was a record breaking decrease in the number of fatal accidents. Read about it yourself: http://www.motorists.com/pressreleases/montana.htm l

I hope you lose your insurance. You are a prime example of the self-centered "me first" mentality that pervades society. You think you're entitled to everything and don't care about other people's well-being.

I hope a thousand sea-gulls crap on your car.

You are a prime example of the self-centered ignorant know-it-all that think's he's entitled to dictate how other people live without regard to their actual safety and well-being.

1) The safest motorists are those traveling faster than the average rate of traffic.
2) Only 1.5-2.2% of accidents are caused by speeding.

I hope you lose your insurance. You are a prime example of the self-centered "me first" mentality that pervades society. You think you're entitled to everything and don't care about other people's well-being.

I hope a thousand sea-gulls crap on your car.

You are a prime example of the self-centered ignorant know-it-all that think's he's entitled to dictate how other people live without regard to their actual safety and well-being.

1) The safest motorists are those traveling faster than the average rate of traffic.
2) Only 1.5-2.2% of accidents are caused by speeding.

So is it that cell phones are too dangerous, or that .08 is too low a blood alcohol level to justify criminal charges?

From the National Motorist Association:

"People at .1 or .08 are not automatically "drunks" and they are not the people who should be targeted for DWI enforcement. The average DWI violator is arrested with a BAC of .15 to .17 percent. Even in countries with extremely low legal BAC limits (e.g. Sweden at .02), the average DWI arrest involves a BAC of at least .15 percent."

"Myth: Lowering the BAC to .08 % will reduce alcohol-related accidents.

TRUTH: ... because alcohol at low BAC concentrations is typically NOT the CAUSE of the accident, what we have is a commensurate increase in non-alcohol-related accidents. In other words, there are the same number of accidents, with a transfer of the alcohol-related to the non-alcohol related categories."

There are lies, damn lies, and _______.

Montana, late 90's. It was the safest period ever on the roads there.

Ability for travellers to self-police. If some guy is driving 60mph+ over the speed limit, likely you could have people report this driver.. Enough complaints and an officer will know where to respond.

Speed alone is, by far, the least common cause of accidents. However, inattention, making abrupt lane changes, not signaling, fatigue, intoxication, mechanical failure (usually due to poor maintenance habits), poor visibility are all far more likely causes. The speed the vehicle was traveling when this root cause occurred is secondary. Unfortunately, speed limits are much easier to enforce, so that's what lawmakers focus on.

http://www.roadsense.com.au/factsandfigures.html
http://www.motorists.com/issues/speed/Making_Sense .html
http://www.safespeed.org.uk/speed-doesnt-kill.pdf (PDF)

I talked with one of the people who process these tickets at one point

In DC (at least as of a few years ago), the people that processed the tickets work for a company (ie not the government itself) that gets a cut of every ticket. There is a strong incentive for no slack to be cut as a result.

And in fact, Lockheed Martin (a major manufacturer, who again, gets a cut of every ticket) alledgedly forbids cities from improving intersections.. Or some more about dubious light tactics.

It's nice to see a traffic signal enhancement that will actually make driving more efficient and direct rather than the opposite.

In my neighborhood, there is a light that has a hundred yards back from the light that causes it to go yellow. There's no connection with your speed, of course. They just don't want anyone to NOT have to stop. For those who want to know, it's at Newhall and Monroe just outside Santa Clara. I'm sure it's not unique. I'd be overjoyed if someone sabotaged it someday.

I would take Pruneridge as an alternate route, but there is a nasty radar trap at the I-880 undercrossing. The revenuers make a mint off it.

All of this could be avoided if they would conduct honest traffic surveys and not set speed limits lower than the 85th percentile, as proper traffic engineering practice dictates. But though speed limits were originally designed as a means to control unreasonable law enforcement (before speed limits, the cop could decide anything over 15 mph was not "reasonable or prudent"), they clearly have strayed from that purpose.

I use this method and find it a hell of a lot safer than the standard way. Maybe it varies from car to car but with this setup I can see a car passing me the entire time. It's either in a mirror or the corner of my eye.

Here are some links to the setup

here and here

Might want to pay the National Motorists Association a visit.

In 1996 [dot.gov], speeding was a contributing factor in 30 percent of all fatal crashes, and 12,998 lives were lost in speeding-related crashes.

You see, most studies define a "speed-related" collision as a collision that occurred when one of the participants was exceeding the speed limit. They make no judgement call on whether speeding was a cause. The interesting part is that, even given this bias, the rate is always less than 50%.

The actual cause of most accidents (see the NMA website) is speed differential. The driver going twenty miles under the prevailing speed of traffic is as much of a hazard as the one going twenty over. (In my opinion, the slower car is more of a danger, as he requires everyone to try to get around him, while the faster driver can just slow down if he can't go at that speed anymore; if he is a "lane weaver", then he is a hazard, but that is because of the unsafe lane changes, not because of the speed!).

Check out rec.autos.driving for some spirited discussion of this topic...

Here's some examples of what I'm talking about:
http://199.97.97.16/contWriter/yhdweek/2001/03/19/ medic/2607-0105-pat_nytimes.html
http://www.motorists.com/issues/cellphones/policy. html

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