In recent years, I have started driving in “commuter” traffic, and it boils my blood.
I am as anti-surveillance as they come, but I would be willing to give up my “freedom” to stick traffic cameras up at lights and just on the roads, and have a zero-tolerance policy for speeding, running lights, stopping over the line, tailgating, lane changing without using a signal, and general reckless driving.
Complaining about the “revenue” stream of ticketing is silly. It’s saying that you shouldn’t be held accountable for breaking code if the motivation for holding you accountable isn’t pure, or something.
You are confusing a few different concepts there. Running red lights is always dangerous if there is any traffic around. Reckless driving is bad too just by definition.
However, speed limits are arbitrary in many places and a slow driver is more dangerous than one that goes over the limit but still follows general traffic speed. Remember when the national speed limit was 55 to save gas? That was stupidly low on most interstate highways and the current speed limits are also too low in many places today. You have states cranking up their speed limits slowly on some major highways. Montana did away with speed limits for a while on some highways. Texas has adjusted them as well. I can promise you that a driver going the speed limit on the interstate roads that I commute on every day is way more dangerous than someone going ten miles over the limit. It constricts traffic flow and makes people do abrupt lane changes. They only stop driver on I-495 outside Boston if going 80 mph minimum and I usually go 90+ mph and occasionally hit of 100 mph and I am usually not the fastest car on the road.
I could follow the 65 mph speed limit but it is much more dangerous than going faster at least to other vehicles. I know if I lose a wheel and fly off the road slower is better but the overall total risk is better by staying with general traffic.
I know Guin.You would probably be thrilled if I got executed for it. :Kiss :Kiss. Don’t judge until driven in shoes however. You really can’t safely drive the speed limit on the roads I do every day. My major mistake was carrying those habits into New Hampshire where different rules apply. I should have known better. I am still going to fight it though because everyone deserves a hearing. Worse case, I have to pay $155 and drive up there again to court. I could have just paid it to begin with and it will not affect my insurance in any case because I have no prior tickets but that wouldn’t be any fun.
I have no real problem with people speeding. I don’t tend to “speed”, but I don’t really pay attention to the speed limit. I did speed when I was younger.
People that go sugnificantly faster than others and constantly are changing lanes while speeding irk me. Also - people that claim they do so for “safety” reasons :).
When I was younger I would speed all the time. I got pulled over ~12 times and only got a speeding ticket once. The secret (which I figured out by accident, but then started doing on purpose) - don’t give them your registration.
The reason it works:
In Maryland at least - they have to write a separate ticket for each offense. Police deal with dicks all day long. Don’t be a dick. When you get pulled over - be polite and keep your hand on the wheel, pull far over, turn on the interior light if dark - etc. The cop will almost always write you a ticket for not having your registration - but let you go off the speeding. No points on your license - and far cheaper. You still get “punished”, but you were nice to him - he is nice to you - and still doing a job.
I did, when I was younger, even fight the “failure to display registration” tickets. Basically did what you suggested - got a later court date - and basically hoped the cop didn’t show up. This worked about half the time.
By doing the registration trick - you do risk getting a ticket for both. This only happened to me once in over ten times [and the cop didn’t show up - so I was found not guilty]. It had been over ten years since I had been pulled over until a few months ago - I got pulled over twice in a few weeks.
One time I got a warning - the other time a ticket for “failure to display registration on demand”. Think it was $50 vs a couple/few hundred.
Despite Australia’s reputation for being A Nation Peopled Entirely By Criminals, it might surprise you to know that the default, at least in the state of Victoria, is to pretty much drive the speed limit. There’s still the occasional driver doing 10-20k over, but most of the time, if you sit on 60kph (or 100 on the freeways), you’ll be moving with the general flow of traffic. All in all, I’m pretty satisfied with the situation (despite my natural tendencies to leadfootedness)
Possible reasons…
Lots of speed cameras (and red light cameras). Lots of traffic police. The police can, and occasionally do, ticket people for being 1k over the limit. I don’t know if the fine size is particularly draconian compared to other countries - couple of hundred dollars, maybe.
And, possibly the most significant factor, reducing the road toll is practically a national obsession. TAC ads featuring various aspects of traffic safety are on constant rotation (well, they were the last time I watched commercial TV). One recent campaign featured the relative stopping distances at 60 versus 65 (complete with appropriately gory imagery of the unfortunate pedestrian getting bowled over in the second instance). It does seem to be working. Road deaths here are about half those in the US if you count by population or car numbers, and about 2/3 if you count by kilometres.
I certainly wouldn’t complain if they upped all the speed limits around here by about 30% or so. The German model, for instance, seems to work fine for Germany. But I can see where having an “official” speed limit and a “real” speed-that-everyone-goes would possibly drive one just a little batshit
You surprise me. Traffic in Qld habitually moves at 60km/hr or so in 50km/hr zones and about 110km/hr in 100km/hr zones. I drive in Victoria every couple of years and haven’t noticed any difference.
Well, my “beat” is generally inner north of Melbourne, with occasional forays out to Gippsland. I wouldn’t say you don’t meet people going over the speed limit - sometimes they’d be me But when I am staying within the speed limit, I certainly don’t notice crowds of impatient drivers blasting by me, and when I’m going 5k over, I do pass folks fairly regularly.
Certainly when I see US folks reporting that the general stream of traffic is going 10 to 20 miles an hour over the limit, I’d call that way different to my general experience. Translating, say, Shagnasty’s figures:
Speed limit 65mph (104)
General traffic 80mph (128)
His own usual speed 90-100 (144 to 160)
You simply wouldn’t have a license any more if you did that here.
When the cameras in my town were up for a vote, the mayor actually campaigned saying that normal speeders wouldn’t be caught because the threshold was 10 MPH over the (35 MPH) limit. He was later found to be lying about that number (it was more like 5 over), but I think it demonstrates the expectation that you be allowed to speed a little.
(The cameras and the mayor were kicked out. For a few days, the vote totals for the opposing candidate and the no-cameras choice were deliciously identical.)
If those humans wouldn’t speed, there would be no revenue…… Stop fucking bitching when you are getting caught breaking the speed limit – It’s your own fault.
Speed limits safe lives.
Everyone thinks, that they are a “safe” driver and great behind the wheels – Fact is, 99.999999% of accidents are caused by human error, due to DUI, Speeding, Texting, Tiredness and other negligence drivers do besides driving.
If people are stupid enough getting caught speeding, it’s because they were speeding – it would be very stupid of the cops to let people get away with it.
It helps if you just embrace the fact that it’s a tax. Then you’re free to drive as fast as you want.
I’ve been driving for 17 years I guess, I lost count of how many speeding tickets I’ve gotten but it’s averaged about 1 per year. I kept track until 12 or 13. I speed a lot. Like, all the time, pretty much as fast as I feel like going. When I get pulled over, it’s not punishment for committing a crime, it’s the tax man collecting his due. So I pay about $150 a year in order to drive as fast as I want all the time.
Points drop off after 3 years, and in my state you can have 12 of them, so the math works out there. Plus I do a lot of interstate travel, so reporting is spotty. But even still, people have a fear of getting speeding tickets that doesn’t line up with the actual consequences, which are basically nothing.
Do you have insurance? The rate increases from racking up more than a couple of them in a 3-year period end up costing way more than the slap on the wrist that the actual fines are.
I’d be curious how much my rate would go down if all my tickets cleared off my record. I pay a little less than $130 a month for 3 cars, collision coverage on two of them. They’re not particularly expensive cars and I’ve never had an accident or filed an insurance claim. I guess if I could be paying way less I haven’t thought about it, because I’ve had tickets on my record for my entire adult life.
No, I’m not confusing them; I happily cruise along at approx 10MPH over the speed limit in most situations, as I know I will not be pulled over or ticketed, and if there are two lanes of traffic, there will always be cars passing me going even faster.
My point (which I didn’t make that clearly) is that I would happily give up my ability to drive above the speed limit, if we instated universally and rigorously enforced traffic rules.
There is a general state of lawlessness on the roads, and overly-aggressive and/or clueless drivers fail to cause accidents only because of the attentiveness of everybody else. Every morning it’s a disgusting show of jerks forcing others to react and yield to the right of ways the jerks create for themselves.
If there’s one place where people are as asshole-ish as the internet, it’s on the roads.
And, of course, the reason people push and shove their way around with their cars, is because they can; enforcement is lax and some laws are never enforced.
So, end the confusion, I say. If the speed limit is 35, then put up a camera, or hire a few part-time traffic enforcers, and ticket every person going 38. Or change the limit. If it’s illegal to be stopped in an intersection when the light changes, or to rush through behind another vehicle even after the light has turned to red, then let’s get cracking!
If “the city” really wanted a revenue stream they could make millions a day (at least at first) by just enforcing current laws. It would be win-win for everybody, though it would piss off people who are used to having their way on the roads, for sure.
. . .
A Simple and Effective Answer for the TRB Workshop
By James Walker, President, JCW Consulting
This was a paper that was submitted to the Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting in 2000.
This problem has a simple and effective answer, one which has been well known for nearly sixty years.
The default posted speed limit, in the absence of very unusual circumstances that the driver cannot perceive, must be set at the 85th to 90th percentile level of free-flowing traffic under good conditions. The list of engineering references supporting this proven methodology is very long. Here are a few highlights:
[ul]
[li]The Synthesis of Speed Zoning Practices, FHWA/RD-85/096 of 1985 says to use the 90th percentile, rounded up, for posted limits that will work out over 50 mph and the 85th for those posted under 50 mph.[/li][li] The National Safety Council Report on speed, 1941, says to set limits between 80th and 90th percentile.[/li][li] The Martin Parker report, FHWA-RD-92-084, published in 1997, shows no safety benefits and often disbenefits for limits posted below the 85th percentile. (Original 1992 text is even clearer than 1997 text.)[/li][li] The Institute of Transportation Engineers Speed Zone Guidelines says to post limits at the 85th percentile or the top of the 10 mph pace speed. It carefully details the loss of driver respect for underposted limits.[/li][li] The MUTCD from the FHWA details 85th percentile speed zoning procedures.[/li][li] The FHWA Speed Management Workshop of 1996 summed up the subject in 18 powerpoint slides.[/li][/ul]
Most highway speed limits in the USA are posted between the 30th and 50th percentile of free-flowing traffic speeds under good conditions. This means that posted limits arbitrarily define 50% to 70% of all drivers as violators.
Here’s a UK site with charts and graphs showing that the safest speed for all traffic is at the 85th percentile. The “speed kills” motto is as false as the one that says “one in three driving accidents is due to drunk driving”.
Traffic flows well when everyone is going roughly the same speed. So, sure, if everyone is going the speed limit, then traffic flows fine. The problem is, most traffic goes at least a little faster than the speed limit so, in fact, driving the speed limit often causes MORE hazard and more backups. Consider, for instance, if I’m driving on I-95 on a portion where the speed limit is 55, but most of the traffic is going 75 or faster. That’s effectively the same as everyone going the speed limit and someone going 35. It’s just not safe to go that much slower than the rest of the traffic. And the thing is, even in the areas around here where I-95 is 55, it’s still at least 3 lanes in each direction and very nearly perfectly straight, so it’s difficult to say that 75 is unsafe IF traffic is free-flowing enough to allow that sort of speed.
This is just part of the nature of driving that directly applying traffic laws without thought has. For instance, I also prefer to leave a good 3s of space between me and the car in front of me. However, if traffic is anything above moderate, leaving that much space means I constantly get cut off. Thus, against what the laws might otherwise say, it ends up being safer to follow a little closer and not getting cut off. Again, just like with the speed limit, traffic would flow smoother if EVERYONE left good stopping distance and then we’d have a lot less stop and go since those distances would absorb a lot of the random slow-downs, but since everyone doesn’t, we ought to adjust our driving to be safe in the real world.
As for tickets as revenue, it does bother me because it is essentially a speed tax that is applied randomly. Some people will get hit more, some less, but on average it will hit everyone about the same, which means it’s also going to result in being regressive. Yes, calling it safety lets them get away with it, but it’s really no different than all the other euphemistic language that politicians use to get unpopular policies in place.
Now, of course, you can completely avoid it by always driving the speed limit, but then you’re in the situation of often going 10-20 mph less than the rest of traffic, at which point you’re a road hazard. For the same reason I won’t go 10-20 mph faster than everyone else because it endangers me and them, I won’t go 10-20 mph slower.
That all said, I’m okay with speed enforcement, it just needs to be done in context. Setting a speed trap and pulling people at random actually makes the road less safe, unless that one person is going significantly faster than everyone else. Instead, it should just be enforced on people whose speed is dangerous. So, for instance, if all the traffic is going 75 on a straight road, no one should get pulled over, but if someone goes 85, pull them over. Or, on the same road, if everyone is going 65 at another time, then where 75 might have been safe before, it’s not going to be more dangerous. And, yet again, if there’s heavy traffic or bad driving conditions, speeds much lower may even be unsafe.
Now, sure, this level of enforcement puts a greater burden on police to prove based on relative speed and driving conditions rather than a simple radar/laser check, but I also think it would go a LOT farther in actually enforcing safe speed and also removing incentive for people to go slower and becoming a road hazard to avoid a ticket. And, hell, they can still get revenue out of it too by having more serious penalties for legitimately unsafe driving rather than just exceeding an arbitrary value where the penalty is often not high enough to be worth taking a day off of work to fight.
My big complaint isn’t so much traffic enforcement, but rather the “shooting fish in a barrel”/speed trap approach to traffic enforcement. Those are totally intended to generate revenue, because they’re usually set up in such a fashion that they’re hard to detect and somewhere where it’s easy to speed because the conditions are conducive (straight, flat, limited access, etc…) and usually in good weather as well.
For example, the last ticket I got was for driving 40 in a 35 on a road that is literally flat and straight as an arrow for about 3 miles, with a total of 2 cross-streets (with stop signs) and one other road that intersected. I could see one end of the road from the other.
(Coit Rd. in Frisco, TX between 121 and University in 2002, FYI)
Combine that with there being very little traffic on the road at 10:30 am on a Thursday, and the day was sunny, clear and about 70F.
The cops were set up in a church parking lot on foot, and would radar people and flag them down and give out tickets.
This was a speed trap to generate revenue, pure and simple. Had they been serious about enforcing traffic, they’d have been over on Preston road near the mall- there’s about 5x the traffic volume, and more crazy drivers as well.
But when I am staying within the speed limit, I certainly don’t notice crowds of impatient drivers blasting by me, and when I’m going 5k over, I do pass folks fairly regularly.