Differential speed is what kills.
Study after study has shown that those at greatest risk of injury or death are the SLOWEST 10% of drivers not the fastest 10%
Yes, well, surprise, surprise there are less able drivers on the road. Why don't we make everyone take a driving test that would qualify them as a Formula One Driver?
Once the roads are practically empty, I'm sure the number of accidents will fall dramatically.
And some people believe that having children or getting old (or both) entitles them to tell other people what to do because there might be an outside chance that their baby might get run over by a Camero.
I know that people on sladhsot love to ridicule the "just think of the children" mentality, but in this case you are talking absolute bollocks in bringing it up.
In residential areas where there are children, old people, pedestrians, cyclists and so on, you should indeed have a low speed limit because high speed cars are not the only people using that space. It is an evil socialist thing, your freedom to be a cunt does not trump anyone else's right to cross the street reasonably safely.
Fast highways are an entirely different matter. Speed limits are there because the average driver needs to be protected. Most people are not fucking racing drivers, do not use roads as racetracks, and should not be expected to have to deal with dickheads overtaking them at 150 mph in a 70 limit..
It's simple. I do not care if you have a Lamborghini that can do 200 mph, I just want to get to work or to the supermarket. You can go and play somewhere private.
If you have a system like the German Autobahns, that's different, as people there know the rules. You're not going to get grannies in Nissan Micras using them to pop down to the local shops.
As a fellow car and bike rider, I've noticed this too. I have come to the conclusion that it is because motorbikes generally have their headlight on, and I think this subconsciously impresses and/or wakes up slightly inattentive car drivers. Or possibly they don't know the difference and think it may be a police bike? I know biikers who deliberately choose white bikes and wear a fluorescent jacket, so that at any sort of speed they certainly look pretty much like police riders.
I have heard it directly from cops mouths.... if they want to pull someone over, the standard wisdom is, all they have to do is watch them for a few minutes and they will find a reason. What does that say about the standards that are set?
i think it says more about the crappy standard of driving where you live. But, because this is slashdot, obviously The Cops/Government are just making up arbitrary laws to ensnare honest law-abiding citizens prior to sending them to Stalinist Re-education Camps.
OK, why don't you just point out to everyone the page in the local statute book which enshirines in law your right to be an absolute arsehole, then we'll all listen to you?
If there's a car in front of you, you DO NOT HAVE RIGHT OF WAY OVER IT. It doesn't matter how slow it is, how ugly the driver is, or anything else. They're on a public road the same as you.
PS is it illegal to drive under the influence of drugs where you live? If so, I hope someone sends the cops an anonymous tip off, because a fucknut like you shouldn't be allowed to drive, and I can only charitably assume you have a steroid abuse problem.
If you can't safely keep up with traffic you need to switch to a road where you can. If your work truck can't reach the speed limit, take a different route. IMO, there should be an implied minimum speed of 5 under the posted limit with very few exceptions. I'd be willing to bet that you'd see fewer accidents if that were the case.
What about if it's foggy, raining, windy, dark or there's heavy traffic or whatever? The displayed speed limit is not always the safe maximum speed in all conditions, whatever some (extremely poor) drivers seem to think.
This. A million times this. I am SO sick and tired of people citing risk as a reason NOT to do something. I control my own body and my own mind and I and ONLY I should be the one to decide what I do and when I do it. If I want to drive 150 mph on a fucking toll highway in my car, why shouldn't I? I am a way better driver than anyone else on the road, and even with 'excessive' speed I can avoid accidents just by using COMMON SENSE (which no one else seems to have any more).
Dude, a large bird appears to have sat on your car while it had diarrhoea.
Of course in Germany and many European countries the 'privilege' part of driving is real. You can easily not qualify to be able to drive, in the states its so easy it's not a 'privilege' anymore. That and if you don't have a car in Europe it's at least plausible to get around outside metro centers.
These latter two facts are connected. Precisely because the US doesn't have decent mass transit in most parts of the country, driving requirements have to be fairly relaxed. Otherwise, a large portion of the population would be shut-ins, unable to find work, do their own shopping, or pretty much do anything else that is part of normal adulthood. Since the physical layout of the US makes mass transit impractical in many areas, the only way to break this gridlock will be with self-driving cars. At that point you can institute very stringent requirements for actually doing the driving yourself, and everyone else can just tell their car's computer where to drive them.
Tough. Fucking. Shit.
If you're incapable of driving safely, you shouldn't be on public roads.
By your argument, you'd have to let blind people drive.
That is the way it is done in Germany today. Whether it is a 2 lane road (1 each way) or a 6 lane road, the faster car seems to have the right-of-way. They have it right: the ones fully utilizing (going faster) a medium of transport should get the right-of-way.
if you think the primary function of a car is to go fast, become a fucking racing driver. Meanwhile, in the real world, we mostly use roads because we have to get from A to B, and I would say the optimum utilization of these included not clogging them up with unnecessary speed-related accidents.
Ehhh sorry, I have lived for nearly 20 years here and I would like to ask where these courtious, follow the rules and don't try to do anything stupid drivers are. You see I have a car that can, and have driven 250 KPH. Let me tell you there are more idiots out there than you let on. I can't tell you how often I have to slow down from 230 to 120 because a driver feels he has the right to a pass a truck doing 80. Yes folks trucks are allowed a maximum of 80.
You can drive safely at high speeds if people realize that you are driving at highspeeds and I will argue that even Americans clue into it.
Fuck you you dangerous, irresponsible, pathetically bad driver. You are on a public road, not a racetrack, and cannot assume that everyone is driving as fast as you.
People like you should stick to track days on racing circuits. Seriously.
You seem to be convinced that the proliferation of signs and rules on roadways makes them safer. Why is that?
I find that signs warning of (for example) upcoming bends, steep hills, hidden junctions, roundabouts, upcoming service stations or whatever make it a lot esier to drive smoothly and safely.
We don't all drive like we're in the F1 championships when we're taking our kids on holiday.
I agree that it increases the potential for Darwinism,>
I think if you look at the whole situation, it is complete Darwinism. This is a toll road, no one is making you use it, and there are other ways (although perhaps not as desirable) to get from Austin to San Antonio. There are also well published statistics about how fatalities increase as a result of going at a higher speed (which should be pretty obvious if you give it more than a few minutes of thought). This all adds up to the drivers on that road (all of them) basically accepting the increased risk in exchange for going faster. If you want to preserve yourself (and the others in your car) you will take a different route. Natural selection, plain and simple.
The number of people with adolescent Death Race 2000 attitudes here is fucking pathetic.
A road, toll or otherwise, is a public utility designed to help you get from A to B, not an excuse to show how small your dick is by driving over-powered, over-priced personality substitutes.
If most people treat the speed limits with such casual disdain, why do you think they will follow any other traffic laws?
They've already decided they know best. It's like the retards who don't think stop signs apply to them. Well, evil and socialist though it might be, you are only using the roads because society built them, so you can fucking obey the traffic laws. You do not have the right to cause accidents that affect other people.
Like anything else, the stupid and unskilled will kill themselves off, leaving behind a stronger more fit population capable of handling such conditions..
That's the most idiotic thing to be said on the topic. The stupid and the unskilled will end up killing other people who were doing just fine.
On slashdot, if you're a self-certified great driver, you should be exempt from all rules of the road, and can never, ever cause an accident by your own actions.
It's always someone else's fault.
This is known as early adolescent magical thinking in the real world.
How does Darwinism have a good kind?
I do not believe Darwin intended any moral decisions when he proposed natural selection. If this kills those who decide to use the road then there is a selection pressure against using this road.
Nothing good or bad about it.
Of course, it's barely possible that Darwinism is a terribly poor analogy to use to describe simple ignorance and selfishness.
We should always strive to limit the freedom of the good and responsible people to protect the stupid, the evil and the ignorant.
It has worked well so far. Look at the number of hairdryer in the shower deaths we have prevented. Also. People who can not legally own a gun are unable to commit gun crimes.
Life is good and fair.
Fuck off you stupid arsehole. People driving way over the legal speed limit are not good and responsible people If they just killed themselves, I wouldn't give a toss, but it's other more sensible drivers who are just as likely to end up dead or injured.
Driving is, in fact, one of the classic examples of "your freedom to swing your fist ends at my nose".
Thing is, this isn't a politician, scientists, or institution saying this, it is the insurance companies. They tend to do a pretty good job of cutting through the BS since their profits are directly connected to actually things right.
On the other hand the insurance companies would benefit if we all went 20 MPH everywhere and never had a major accident. Actually getting to a destination in a reasonable amount of time is of no benefit to them. So maybe they aren't the most objective.
It would make absolutely no difference to insurance companies in the long run. Their premiums reflect actuarial analysis of reality. If more people have more severe accidents, the premiums will go up to cover the payouts.
Life is a fatal disease, and there's no way to prevent driver fatalities
I am seeing this line of argument used increasingly on slashdot. It's a variation on "the poor are always with us" (i.e. there's nothing you can do about it), which is to say a libertarian/extreme right wing excuse for letting everyone else go to hell, in the expectation that the speaker will always come off OK because they're richer/cleverer than the plebs.
. Frankly I find the chaos of Mexico's highways more appealing than the excessively proactive, taxation-masquerading-as-safety scheme we have on American highways today.
One more point to note... if you're going to get in a single-car accident at 65 MPH and hit a pylon or something, you're dead. If you do it at 85 or 90 MPH, you're just REALLY dead. Same difference.
There are lots of possibilities in between not having an accident at all and having a fatal accident by hitting an effectively immoveable object at speed.
If (for instance) you suddenly get a puncture, you'll have a much better chance of getting the vehicle under control and coming to a controlled stop if you're doing 50- 60 instead of 90-100.
I am ignoring the usual crowd of "but I am a highly skilled racing driver who has survived racetrack crashes at 200 mph" types who usually pop up on slashdot round about now. For normal drivers, things happen too fast at 100 mph.
Personally, I think the era of high speed roads should only come into existence when fully automatic electric/nuclear robot cars have replaced human-driven ones on public roads.
Your first paragraph makes an arguably exaggerated point, while ignoring the fact that if everyone drove around at 180 mph then (a) we'd burn through oil qucker and create even more pollution than we're doing now and (b) having a tyre blow out or whatever becomes much more likely to be a fatal accident at that speed.
Your second paragraph is the usual slashdot Paranoid Randroid bollocks. So you get modded as insightful.
Slashdot Mirror
Differential speed is what kills. Study after study has shown that those at greatest risk of injury or death are the SLOWEST 10% of drivers not the fastest 10%
Yes, well, surprise, surprise there are less able drivers on the road. Why don't we make everyone take a driving test that would qualify them as a Formula One Driver? Once the roads are practically empty, I'm sure the number of accidents will fall dramatically.
And some people believe that having children or getting old (or both) entitles them to tell other people what to do because there might be an outside chance that their baby might get run over by a Camero.
I know that people on sladhsot love to ridicule the "just think of the children" mentality, but in this case you are talking absolute bollocks in bringing it up.
In residential areas where there are children, old people, pedestrians, cyclists and so on, you should indeed have a low speed limit because high speed cars are not the only people using that space. It is an evil socialist thing, your freedom to be a cunt does not trump anyone else's right to cross the street reasonably safely.
Fast highways are an entirely different matter. Speed limits are there because the average driver needs to be protected. Most people are not fucking racing drivers, do not use roads as racetracks, and should not be expected to have to deal with dickheads overtaking them at 150 mph in a 70 limit..
It's simple. I do not care if you have a Lamborghini that can do 200 mph, I just want to get to work or to the supermarket. You can go and play somewhere private.
If you have a system like the German Autobahns, that's different, as people there know the rules. You're not going to get grannies in Nissan Micras using them to pop down to the local shops.
As a fellow car and bike rider, I've noticed this too. I have come to the conclusion that it is because motorbikes generally have their headlight on, and I think this subconsciously impresses and/or wakes up slightly inattentive car drivers. Or possibly they don't know the difference and think it may be a police bike? I know biikers who deliberately choose white bikes and wear a fluorescent jacket, so that at any sort of speed they certainly look pretty much like police riders.
You are ignoring the number and severity of injuries that result from increasing speeds
I have heard it directly from cops mouths.... if they want to pull someone over, the standard wisdom is, all they have to do is watch them for a few minutes and they will find a reason. What does that say about the standards that are set?
i think it says more about the crappy standard of driving where you live. But, because this is slashdot, obviously The Cops/Government are just making up arbitrary laws to ensnare honest law-abiding citizens prior to sending them to Stalinist Re-education Camps.
OK, why don't you just point out to everyone the page in the local statute book which enshirines in law your right to be an absolute arsehole, then we'll all listen to you?
If there's a car in front of you, you DO NOT HAVE RIGHT OF WAY OVER IT. It doesn't matter how slow it is, how ugly the driver is, or anything else. They're on a public road the same as you.
PS is it illegal to drive under the influence of drugs where you live? If so, I hope someone sends the cops an anonymous tip off, because a fucknut like you shouldn't be allowed to drive, and I can only charitably assume you have a steroid abuse problem.
If you can't safely keep up with traffic you need to switch to a road where you can. If your work truck can't reach the speed limit, take a different route. IMO, there should be an implied minimum speed of 5 under the posted limit with very few exceptions. I'd be willing to bet that you'd see fewer accidents if that were the case.
What about if it's foggy, raining, windy, dark or there's heavy traffic or whatever? The displayed speed limit is not always the safe maximum speed in all conditions, whatever some (extremely poor) drivers seem to think.
Do you seriously have so little free time that you worry about forty minutes a week (eight minutes a day) here or there?
I mean, I spend more than forty minutes a DAY on slashdot...
Of course, pollution would skyrocket.
Why?
Motorbikes have emission controls too, you know.
This. A million times this. I am SO sick and tired of people citing risk as a reason NOT to do something. I control my own body and my own mind and I and ONLY I should be the one to decide what I do and when I do it. If I want to drive 150 mph on a fucking toll highway in my car, why shouldn't I? I am a way better driver than anyone else on the road, and even with 'excessive' speed I can avoid accidents just by using COMMON SENSE (which no one else seems to have any more).
Dude, a large bird appears to have sat on your car while it had diarrhoea.
Of course in Germany and many European countries the 'privilege' part of driving is real. You can easily not qualify to be able to drive, in the states its so easy it's not a 'privilege' anymore. That and if you don't have a car in Europe it's at least plausible to get around outside metro centers.
These latter two facts are connected. Precisely because the US doesn't have decent mass transit in most parts of the country, driving requirements have to be fairly relaxed. Otherwise, a large portion of the population would be shut-ins, unable to find work, do their own shopping, or pretty much do anything else that is part of normal adulthood. Since the physical layout of the US makes mass transit impractical in many areas, the only way to break this gridlock will be with self-driving cars. At that point you can institute very stringent requirements for actually doing the driving yourself, and everyone else can just tell their car's computer where to drive them.
Tough. Fucking. Shit.
If you're incapable of driving safely, you shouldn't be on public roads.
By your argument, you'd have to let blind people drive.
That is the way it is done in Germany today. Whether it is a 2 lane road (1 each way) or a 6 lane road, the faster car seems to have the right-of-way. They have it right: the ones fully utilizing (going faster) a medium of transport should get the right-of-way.
if you think the primary function of a car is to go fast, become a fucking racing driver. Meanwhile, in the real world, we mostly use roads because we have to get from A to B, and I would say the optimum utilization of these included not clogging them up with unnecessary speed-related accidents.
Ehhh sorry, I have lived for nearly 20 years here and I would like to ask where these courtious, follow the rules and don't try to do anything stupid drivers are. You see I have a car that can, and have driven 250 KPH. Let me tell you there are more idiots out there than you let on. I can't tell you how often I have to slow down from 230 to 120 because a driver feels he has the right to a pass a truck doing 80. Yes folks trucks are allowed a maximum of 80.
You can drive safely at high speeds if people realize that you are driving at highspeeds and I will argue that even Americans clue into it.
Fuck you you dangerous, irresponsible, pathetically bad driver. You are on a public road, not a racetrack, and cannot assume that everyone is driving as fast as you. People like you should stick to track days on racing circuits. Seriously.
You seem to be convinced that the proliferation of signs and rules on roadways makes them safer. Why is that?
I find that signs warning of (for example) upcoming bends, steep hills, hidden junctions, roundabouts, upcoming service stations or whatever make it a lot esier to drive smoothly and safely.
We don't all drive like we're in the F1 championships when we're taking our kids on holiday.
I agree that it increases the potential for Darwinism,>
I think if you look at the whole situation, it is complete Darwinism. This is a toll road, no one is making you use it, and there are other ways (although perhaps not as desirable) to get from Austin to San Antonio. There are also well published statistics about how fatalities increase as a result of going at a higher speed (which should be pretty obvious if you give it more than a few minutes of thought). This all adds up to the drivers on that road (all of them) basically accepting the increased risk in exchange for going faster. If you want to preserve yourself (and the others in your car) you will take a different route. Natural selection, plain and simple.
The number of people with adolescent Death Race 2000 attitudes here is fucking pathetic.
A road, toll or otherwise, is a public utility designed to help you get from A to B, not an excuse to show how small your dick is by driving over-powered, over-priced personality substitutes.
If most people treat the speed limits with such casual disdain, why do you think they will follow any other traffic laws?
They've already decided they know best. It's like the retards who don't think stop signs apply to them. Well, evil and socialist though it might be, you are only using the roads because society built them, so you can fucking obey the traffic laws. You do not have the right to cause accidents that affect other people.
I love the smell of libertarianism in the morning. It smells like...insanity.
Like anything else, the stupid and unskilled will kill themselves off, leaving behind a stronger more fit population capable of handling such conditions. .
That's the most idiotic thing to be said on the topic. The stupid and the unskilled will end up killing other people who were doing just fine.
On slashdot, if you're a self-certified great driver, you should be exempt from all rules of the road, and can never, ever cause an accident by your own actions.
It's always someone else's fault.
This is known as early adolescent magical thinking in the real world.
How does Darwinism have a good kind? I do not believe Darwin intended any moral decisions when he proposed natural selection. If this kills those who decide to use the road then there is a selection pressure against using this road.
Nothing good or bad about it.
Of course, it's barely possible that Darwinism is a terribly poor analogy to use to describe simple ignorance and selfishness.
We should always strive to limit the freedom of the good and responsible people to protect the stupid, the evil and the ignorant. It has worked well so far. Look at the number of hairdryer in the shower deaths we have prevented. Also. People who can not legally own a gun are unable to commit gun crimes. Life is good and fair.
Fuck off you stupid arsehole. People driving way over the legal speed limit are not good and responsible people If they just killed themselves, I wouldn't give a toss, but it's other more sensible drivers who are just as likely to end up dead or injured.
Driving is, in fact, one of the classic examples of "your freedom to swing your fist ends at my nose".
Thing is, this isn't a politician, scientists, or institution saying this, it is the insurance companies. They tend to do a pretty good job of cutting through the BS since their profits are directly connected to actually things right.
On the other hand the insurance companies would benefit if we all went 20 MPH everywhere and never had a major accident. Actually getting to a destination in a reasonable amount of time is of no benefit to them. So maybe they aren't the most objective.
It would make absolutely no difference to insurance companies in the long run. Their premiums reflect actuarial analysis of reality. If more people have more severe accidents, the premiums will go up to cover the payouts.
Life is a fatal disease, and there's no way to prevent driver fatalities
I am seeing this line of argument used increasingly on slashdot. It's a variation on "the poor are always with us" (i.e. there's nothing you can do about it), which is to say a libertarian/extreme right wing excuse for letting everyone else go to hell, in the expectation that the speaker will always come off OK because they're richer/cleverer than the plebs.
. Frankly I find the chaos of Mexico's highways more appealing than the excessively proactive, taxation-masquerading-as-safety scheme we have on American highways today.
Go and live in Mexico then, you stupid twat.
One more point to note ... if you're going to get in a single-car accident at 65 MPH and hit a pylon or something, you're dead. If you do it at 85 or 90 MPH, you're just REALLY dead. Same difference.
There are lots of possibilities in between not having an accident at all and having a fatal accident by hitting an effectively immoveable object at speed.
If (for instance) you suddenly get a puncture, you'll have a much better chance of getting the vehicle under control and coming to a controlled stop if you're doing 50- 60 instead of 90-100.
I am ignoring the usual crowd of "but I am a highly skilled racing driver who has survived racetrack crashes at 200 mph" types who usually pop up on slashdot round about now. For normal drivers, things happen too fast at 100 mph.
Personally, I think the era of high speed roads should only come into existence when fully automatic electric/nuclear robot cars have replaced human-driven ones on public roads.
Your first paragraph makes an arguably exaggerated point, while ignoring the fact that if everyone drove around at 180 mph then (a) we'd burn through oil qucker and create even more pollution than we're doing now and (b) having a tyre blow out or whatever becomes much more likely to be a fatal accident at that speed.
Your second paragraph is the usual slashdot Paranoid Randroid bollocks. So you get modded as insightful.
Yeah, obviously no doctor or engineer has ever made a single mistake in their professional lives.