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Gubernatorial Candidate Wants to Sell Speeding Passes for $25
If Nevada gubernatorial candidate Eugene "Gino" DiSimone gets his way, $25 will buy you the right to drive up to 90mph for a day. DiSimone estimates his "free limit plan" will raise $1 billion a year for Nevada. From the article: "First, vehicles would have to pass a safety inspection. Then vehicle information would be loaded into a database, and motorists would purchase a transponder. After setting up an account, anyone in a hurry could dial in, and for $25 charged to a credit card, be free to speed for 24 hours."
A comedian (forget who) once said that the SL in a state should be proportional to how boring that state is. In Nebraska, for example, the speed limit should be roughly 200 MPH.
Only way I'd be okay with this is if they give the driver some sort of competency exam. Cars don't normally fall apart and cause accidents...it is usually driver error.
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apart from the state sharing in liability for accidents while speeding with permission...
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
That's not necessarily the case. Have you ever driven on Nevada roads? You can go 90, take a brief nap, and still be perfectly safe. I'm exaggerating, but only slightly. Germany has some roads without any speed limit whatsoever, and they're safer than comparable roads elsewhere in Europe.
This will never work. Who would pay 25 to speed for one day. When they can speed all week and if they are caught once pay a attorney 75 dollars. Do the math people.
There are going to be arguments both ways on this. I'd like to see the statistics if/when this goes into effect. It's definitely an interesting concept. My only qualm is those that are "in a hurry" may have other things on their mind and might not be the best drivers at any speed. Then again, if every state had this system, or even if there was a national level system and you had a trip to go cross country. Could be an interesting idea. Although, then there is the problem of "Ya, I know the highway was crowded, but I _paid_ to speed, so I weaved in and out of traffic to keep up at 90mph." So I guess we'd really need a couple "speeding only" lanes. Still, I'd like to see the statistics after this has been in effect for a while.
Germany's Autobahn is a very modern system, built with incredibly strict tolerances. Also, the rules for driving on the Autobahn are very strict, and German drivers have a very strenuous testing process before they can get a license. Comparing the two doesn't make much sense.
I saw them working on a segment of the Autobahn some years back. They were laser-leveling poured concrete.
CUE INCREASE IN ACCIDENTS - I have no doubt this will make them money, but it will also make them look much worse on traffic accident statistics vs. other states.
Interestingly, this isn't a given. Well, not in the dramatic sense you imply. Yes, increased speed means that in the event of a collision there's more energy involved to be disbursed and absorbed, leading to more severe injuries and frequent deaths in the event of a collision. On the other hand, it's not a given that a higher speed limit will result, for a number of reasons.
Traffic tends to flow at rates generally in excess of speed limits. Speed limits are generally set (in the U.S.) 8 to 12 MPH below the speed 85% of traffic typically flows. This is done deliberately as one of the biggest purposes behind speed limits is to set a calibration number that most traffic will aim for. The goal is to have most vehicles going the same general speed. That is to say, it's important to reduce variance in vehicle speed. You set your limit expecting almost all traffic to flow within a few MPH of that limit.
See, the problem is that if a road is well-engineered and conditions are clear, many drivers will push well beyond the speed limit if it's posted "too low". Folks (like me) who are afraid to get pulled over (I drive a tempting and obvious target) stay down very close to the speed limit. The result is that the variance in vehicle speed increases, which is inherently likely to cause more accidents.
You want to reduce the number of accidents, then consider the severity of those accidents. Not the other way around. By setting limits wisely, even erring on the high side sometimes, you may actually make things safer. That's why you see so many different numbers on the roads.
Final note: all of what I just wrote is why this plan is horrible. I'd [i]love[/i] to open up my car and go play. But allowing a small percentage of the traffic to flow potentially 50% faster than the rest is likely to result in more accidents. The will coincidentally involve worse injuries.
"Oh no... he found the
I think it's just an admission by governments that speed limits aren't actually there for safety so much as to raise funds. If the road is safe enough to drive on at 90mph for $25, it's safe enough to drive on at 90mph for free. The government isn't AT&T, it doesn't get to impose bullshit laws unless the public good outweighs individual liberty.
Those German highways without speed limits are dangerous and demand the driver's full attention because there's almost always a car nearby that is going much faster or much slower than you are (except when traffic is really dense, of course, in which case this degenerates into a massive stop-and-go where you're constantly changing from standstill to speeds up to 100km/h and back in a constant, rather tight cycle). It's quite stressful to drive on these roads for a couple of hours.
Still, my guess is that the high demands on the drivers keep all of them so much more focused that the end result is a bearable rate of accidents. Actually, I find that I'm much more inclined to doze off on the wheel when I'm abroad on a highway with speed limit where everyone is going in a straight line at the same speed (did I mention that there's barely a highway segment in Germany that's really straight; I've heard that this is actually on purpose, but I'm not certain).
http://www.moonlight3d.eu/
As Nevada is one of the US states I've never visited it makes me wonder if their roads are anything compared to European or even German Autobahns...
Until then I'll limit the times I hit 265 km/h (155 mi/h for the old fashioned) to the occasions I get in Germany.
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I'm German, and I find 160 km/h (100 mph) a very decent cruising speed. Sometimes I go up to 200 km/h for short periods of time (5 to 10 minutes) where it's legal.
I've been driving around Pittsburgh for the past few days, and I learned driving in Iowa. All three are very distinct driving experiences, and while I think Iowa Highways couldn't support these speeds, their Freeways would; but in Pittsburgh, even 55 mph is often an unsafe speed because the roads are so chaotic, uneven, there's so much construction and hardly anyone ever uses their turn signals to show intent rather than stating the obvious.
90 MPH is pretty much the standard anyway. Seems to work rather fine with cars flying along at 90+ and trucks chugging up the passes at 30 MPH.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Or more likely that he's a nut job that doesn't know what he's talking about. Roads are constructed to engineering specs. Even if you're on a long stretch of straight road, there's still engineering that goes on to determine the maximum safe speed. Things like lane size and spacing are taken into account. As are the size and spacing of the shoulder and the considerations as to how far away buildings need to be. Not to mention the fact that any road that has a curve is engineered to handle traffic going up to a maximum speed. The angle of the bank and the radius of the curve are chose on the assumption that people will be traveling at no more than a certain speed.
While libertarians tend to get all outraged about things like this, there's no evidence that it's as safe to go 90mph on those roads as it is 70mph or whatever the current limit is. Even for roads like the Autobahn, when you do have a wreck, it tends to be pretty spectacular and much worse than the ones we typically get in the US. Beyond that mixing traffic speeds is a real danger. There's a reason why you're urged to keep up with traffic flow even if the traffic flow is going somewhat over the speed limit. It represents a risk to other vehicles to have people that aren't keeping up.
People drive 90mph already on those roads anyway. Highway 5 in California has stretches that routinely flow-of-traffic at my car's electronically limited top speed.
The old "55 everywhere" limit was put in place 40 years ago when that hit the fuel efficiency curve of cars at the time. That is no longer true. Now we have a voting block of really old people who don't feel comfortable driving at the normal flow of traffic, and as such keep voting down speed increases. Sigh.
The ______ Agenda
Well, at least they still have the sense of speed. This means the magnitude of the vector is still there.
It'd be really sweet if the families of anyone killed by a legally speeding driver got the $25.
But I wholeheartedly disagree with the government giving 'special' rights in exchange for money.
There's no place like
And roads are over-engineered. A road with a speed limit of 65 is not designed to fail or to become undriveable at 70.
Your argument also breaks down when you realize that interstates originally had speed limits at or above 70mph - limits which were then lowered to 55 and have only relatively recently been creeping back up.
The plain fact is that vehicles and roads can both safely support higher speed limits. The "speed kills" BS is there because it's more politically expedient to blame driving problems on an arbitrary number than it is to put the blame where it belongs - in the hands of the crappy driver that caused the wreck.
"I disagree with you" does not equal "flamebait."
Those German highways without speed limits are dangerous and demand the driver's full attention because there's almost always a car nearby that is going much faster or much slower than you are (except when traffic is really dense, of course, in which case this degenerates into a massive stop-and-go where you're constantly changing from standstill to speeds up to 100km/h and back in a constant, rather tight cycle). It's quite stressful to drive on these roads for a couple of hours.
I've driven those roads. They were no more stressful than any given highway in the US. If anything, they were less stressful because slower traffic stayed in the right lanes. The big problems I have during my daily commute in the US is when several lanes try to stay at (or below) the speed limit and there's a backup of others heading in to work used to going 10 - 15mph above the limit trying to find a way around them.
To add to my German roads experience - I drove a lot of small country roads as well. Two lane roads that are about as wide as one and a half US lanes. No speed limits. Occasional blind hills and turns. Farm equipment occasionally on the road. The only accidents I knew of involved either a drunk driver or black ice. As the police say, "speed was a factor." But then, any speed would have been a factor in those cases.
With that in mind, I knew that when a speed limit was posted, there was a damn good reason for it (and it wasn't to "save the children" or fund the local law enforcement). I paid attention to blind spots in the road. I knew to watch for black ice and moderate my speeds in colder months. I watched for tractors. And I got the heck out of the left lane as soon as I was done passing while on a stretch of Autobaun (one time I looked in my rear view mirror when I saw a flash of headlights, didn't see anytihng, looked back down and saw tail-lights in the distance - dude was really moving). I never had an accident and never had a close call in 3 years of driving there. In all, I'm pretty convinced speed isn't the demon the US likes to make it out to be - beyond the fact that any speed is unsafe in the right circumstances.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_oil_crisis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_oil_crisis#Conservation_and_reduction_in_demand
To help reduce consumption, in 1974 a national maximum speed limit of 55 mph (about 88 km/h) was imposed through the Emergency Highway Energy Conservation Act. Development of the United States Strategic Petroleum Reserve began in 1975, and in 1977, the cabinet-level Department of Energy was created, followed by the National Energy Act of 1978.
http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/drivehabits.shtml
http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/images/speedVsMpg3.gif
While each vehicle reaches its optimal fuel economy at a different speed (or range of speeds), gas mileage usually decreases rapidly at speeds above 60 mph.
You can assume that each 5 mph you drive over 60 mph is like paying an additional $0.24 per gallon for gas.
But I wholeheartedly disagree with the government giving 'special' rights in exchange for money.
Street parking? Licenses to drive, hunt, fish, concealed carry, etc?
I'd say they're carrying on the fine tradition of doing just that.
Think of all the other things they could apply this to:
Just think, all of the budget concerns could be over!!! Genius!!
The real Sig captains the Northwestern. This one captains
Street parking can be a limited resource and is usually only metered where it is. Charging for it increases the percentage of the population that can use the resource, thereby making it better for society at large. (People that park downtown everyday can usually beat the government rate, which works for them as well.) Hunting and fishing are again limited resources. Typically governments let people hunt and fish overpopulated species as much as they want. It's when they get to the low-population species that seasons and licenses start being talked about.
Licenses to drive try to ensure that everyone has a minimum skill set before getting behind the wheel and potentially killing others. That program takes a lot of manpower and resources. The licenses by comparison are really not that much.
Concealed carry has been abused so many times that people see it as a harm to society, even though it may be an overall good. But it's easy to parade the memory of a shooting victim around and get people to blame the weapon.
But the pay-to-speed law is different than any of these, in that it is not protected a limited resource AND it is not perceived as a good for society. It's downright blood money as speeding DOES increase fatal accidents in Nevada and there are statistics to back that up.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Fully agreed. I'm German too, and I have driven several thousand miles on American roads. I fully agree that 100mph to 110mph (180km/h) is a convenient speed on a German Autobahn, with a decent car. In fact I find driving on the Autobahn relaxing, especially at night, with a good talk radio programme.
Many interstates in the US are of comparable or in fact better standard than the Autobahn. Especially in warmer parts of the States, the climate makes potholes rare, and the wide green strips between the opposing directions are a good safety feature that most Autbahns lack. In many parts of the States, the traffic density is also very low compared to the incredible bustle on Autobahns (Germany is right in the middle of the EU, and it seems everyone needs to get from Poland to France, from Austria to Denmark, and the other way round, every other day).
But the big difference between the States and Germany is the culture of driving. Germans (and everyone else driving on the Autobahn) have learned to live with unrestricted roads, and they started learning, as a society, back when cars had a top speed of 60mph. There are laws requiring everyone to drive in the rightmost lane currently available (the "Rechtsfahrgebot"), and in contrast to the States or Britain where these laws also exist in principle, virtually everyone actually obeys them. Indicating is a reflex rather than a concious gesture: people even indicate at 2am on deserted roads in the middle of a forest, with noone but the moon to watch. And they have acquired an intuition for how fast a car is approaching in the rear view mirror, which is crucial on roads where the relative speed between cars on the right and middle lane can easily exceed 50mph. Americans would have to learn these things for everyone to be able to drive on those roads. In the meantime, there'd be a lot of accidents.
Statistics on the other hand will show that the number of fatalities varies to the square of the speed of the vehicle involved in a collision.
Highway statistics show no consistent relationship between speed and fatality. That's probably because once you reach a speed that kills you, it doesn't matter how much faster you go. Higher speeds do seem to increase driver alertness, but of course you also have more stopping distance.
What we do know is that Germany has much higher highway speeds, yet much lower highway accident rates (1/3 of US) and lower absolute number of fatalities (1/40 of US at 1/4 the population).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_limit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autobahn
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policyinformation/pubs/pl08021/fig7_5.cfm
So, stop pulling statistics out of your ass.
I agree with you.
I'd like to add that faster speeds mean less reaction time. The road might be physically capable of handling 100 anything per hour, but the bottom line, is that we might not have fast enough reflexes to deal with various obstacles.
testing out my trending skills
Can I buy a pass to temporarily raise the legal blood alcohol limit? Can I buy a pass that changes the definition of premeditative homicide? Or oooh, what about genocide? Cuz I got some plans. It would probably be expensive, but man what a night that would be! Nevada's sitting on a goldmine here.
Now is also a good time to mention how 80-90% of drivers consider themselves to be above average.
One that hath name thou can not otter
Speaking of pulling thing out of asses, maybe you should have pulled your head out before you make statements like 'Germany has less accidents on the Autobahn blah blah blah...'. They most certainly do. Do you know why? Because 1) it is very cost/time prohibitive for a German citizen to get a drivers license (~$1600US, 6+ hours of first aid training, books, etc) and 2) Germany has one of the best (if not the best) public transportation systems on Earth.
There is a much smaller percentage of licensed drivers in Germany than in the US (which is near 99%). And the drivers that are on the Autobahn have much more training and are far more skilled. Sure, they have less accidents, but not even remotely for the reasons you think.
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