Slashdot Mirror
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.
Airplane Photos, Airline News, Planespotting Guides
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
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.
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.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
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.
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."
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