Which is more dangerous or troublesome to you?
Say the speed limit is 40.
Which is worse – someone going 25 or someone going 55? And why?
Which is more dangerous or troublesome to you?
Say the speed limit is 40.
Which is worse – someone going 25 or someone going 55? And why?
Both, because they are both telling me they don’t give two shits about the other cars around them.
Faster, because they’re not taking into account whether or not they’ll have enough time to react to whatever’s around that next turn.
That’s the point I make about too slow. If someone is driving too slow and you are driving the speed limit and you turn a corner and they are on the other side going too slow, you (who is not even going too fast) will be in danger having to slam on the break.
55 is not way above. That’s actually pretty normal in my opinion.
God damn I hate speed limits. They deserve a pitting; lucky for you Dopers, I’m not going to be the one pitting them (at least for now).
Oh, I meant both if the slow vehicle can move at normal speed and chooses not to. Bicycles, tractors and so on are exempt.
What if it is raining?
In that case, since there may be bicycles, tractors & so forth around any turn, that sounds more like the speed limit is set too high for safety for that stretch of road, which is a different situation. The whole point of a speed limit is that it says “This fast, and no faster, a reasonable drive in a reasonably-maintained vehicle should be able to handle a reasonably surprising situation.” Such as somebody who’s just pulled out onto the road and is only going 25, because he hasn’t had a chance to accelerate yet (or somebody who’s going 25 because he chooses to).
This is also why rural highways list minimum speed limits: to keep people from trundling along in their tractor at 20 mph when the speed limit’s 60.
If that were true, farmers would need a tractor for each individual field, since they’d never be able to drive on the highways. Here in corn country, only freeways have minimum speed limits. Tractors are free to trundle along highways at 20 mph as necessary.
I don’t think people going slower is very dangerous… BTW if they traveled half the speed they can stop in about 1/4 of the distance and if they travel twice the speed it takes about four times the distance to stop (I think - and the impact is four times greater).
Going too slow is as bad as going too fast, as the danger lies in the speed difference with surrounding traffic.
For your poll I answered that both are equally aggravating/dangerous, since your example was the speed limit +/- 15mph.
However, in general I would say that speeding can be more dangerous than going slowly, since it’s possible to go extremely fast whereas you wouldn’t find someone going equally slow. For example, I would imagine that on freeways it’s not extremely rare to see someone go 40mph over the limit, whereas it’s much less common to see someone go 40mph under the limit. Also, an accident involving a car that is speeding is more likely to cause a lot of damage and injury, given the momentum involved.
Also, I would say that if the weather and road conditions are bad, then it’s more dangerous to speed than to go slowly. Even if someone isn’t technically going over the speed limit but they’re still driving too fast for the conditions, then they’re a huge hazard. And given that reaction times are already slower when speeding, adding a longer stopping distance due to wet/icy conditions just compounds the risk.
Depends whether you’re talking highway or local. On a highway with a speed limit of 55mph, the average car travels above that–say 65mph. Someone traveling at 40mph on said highway is more likely to present a hazard than someone driving 70mph, because they’re disregarding the flow of traffic. This increases their speed differential relative to everybody around them, and in turn causes accidents.
But take a local road with a speed limit of 35mph during rush, with lots of stoplights and people slowing/stopping/turning every quarter-mile. The average speed may only be 25mph. In that situation, it’s more dangerous to travel at 50mph than 20mph, because your speed differential is so high.
It’s also worth mentioning that many speed limits are unnecessarily low, due to inertia and municipal coffer-padding. Are *any *too high? If so, they certainly wouldn’t be for long.
It depends on the road. My city has a stretch of five-lane road in an area with few homes and only light industrial development set well back from the road. The speed limit is 35 MPH, but the normal speed is 50 or higher. (The speed camera that was put there was by far the most profitable for the city and its corporate partner. It was also the straw that broke the camel’s back as far as public opinion was concerned.)
On the other hand, there are a few winding rural roads that have speed limits of 55 MPH. You’d be foolish to attempt 55 the whole way, or even 40 or 30.
Both are equally aggravating and/or dangerous.
My answer qualifier: that’s my answer for here in the USA, where people do not have good lane discipline (i.e. - fast on the left, slow/normal on the right). Further, as worded the question, to me, assumes the road can handle the higher speeds.
BTW, I love driving in Germany. Very good lane discipline there.
Depends on the circumstances. I can think of 70mph roads where 150 is safer than 30 in most traffic, simply because no one expects a 30mph car, they don’t expect a 150mph car either but the difference is that they have to take avoiding action for the 30mph one while its the onus on the 150mph car to take the avoiding action. Certainly I feel a hell of a lot safer at 150 than I do at 30.
Anyway, speed limit isn’t a target. It is by definition either too fast or too slow.
One interesting thing is in the good ole days speed limits used to be set at roughly 85th percentile. It was the 97th percentile that were statistically the safest drivers, make of that what you will.
I am happy that I don’t live anywhere near you. It is exceedingly rare to see someone driving 110mph around here. I don’t believe that even state troopers go that fast, and they think all roads are dragstrips. 20mph over is rare, but not extremely so.
On the other hand, buses are required to drive 15mph below the limit and I often encounter them more than once a day. It’s hazardous for everyone else, but at least they’re large and the hazard is easy to recognize from a distance.
40mph below the limit would have the police on you within ten minutes. Unlike speeders, everyone will call in a slowpoke and it will be very easy for the troopers to run you down. That may be why you see few of them in your neck of the woods.
lets put it t his way…Take a running start and run into a brick wall. Would you rather be going fast or slow? Enough said! :smack:
Pokey McSlowpoke is worse, because he makes everyone else around him a more dangerous, aggressive driver as they pull various crazy maneuvers and cut each other off to try to get around him. Speedy McLeadfoot zips by and is gone a second later. I get far more pissed at slow drivers than fast drivers.
Except the OP asked which is “more dangerous or troublesome”, not “more annoying”.