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Let's decrease the speed limit to 55mph (and other bad ideas)
ege02
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Let's not derail the other thread anymore.
So the idea is to lower the speed limit to 55mph nationwide. The rationale is that cars pollute less since they consume their fuel more efficiently at that speed than at higher speeds. It would come with other boons too, such as:
*Discouraging people from living far away from where they work, further reducing oil consumption
*Saving money by paying less at the pump, and visiting the pump less often
*Reducing urban sprawl in the long run
*Reducing rate of accidents
*Providing an incentive for individuals to use public transportation, and for governments to invest in it
Of course, like any pro-environment measure, the proponents were too rabidly short-sighted to recognize the negatives associated with this.
First of all, it would incur massive social costs across the entire medium- and long-distance commuter population. Thanatos provided a link in the other thread saying the average commute time in the US is a mere 24 minutes, but this is misleading due to the fact that not every commuter uses the highway and thus will be affected by this decrease in maximum speed (but they will still be negatively impacted, as I explain below). Furthermore, it conveniently ignores the fact that people don't use highways only when going to and from work. In any case, most people would not sacrifice 30 minutes of their time just so that they can save 50 bucks a month or whatever at the pump. Time is a much more valuable commodity than a small amount of money.
Secondly, it would remove a good amount of the incentive for using highways, which is to drive fast. This would increase traffic at surface roads, causing massive traffic congestions. This would in turn require increasing the capacity of these surface roads, which is very costly and disruptive.
Thirdly, while it seems like discouraging people from living far from their workplace sounds like a neat idea, it would be devastating for urban areas.
- It would increase rent in urban areas while decreasing rent in rural areas. As a result, well-paying jobs that are typically located in urban areas would be less accessible to people who can't afford rent, increasing the income gap.
- It would hurt businesses, who now not only have access to a smaller pool of job applicants, but also have a less happy and less productive workforce because the workers are spending more time on the road and less time on leisure.
- It would increase population density in urban areas, causing a huge strain on service industries, especially gov't services.
Fourthly, you can expect the price of goods that are transported by trucks to increase, as trucks are now taking longer to travel (which also decreases their range in the case of perishable goods, such as food).
Finally, I don't think it would be much of an incentive to invest in public transportation. This is a popular topic in public policy economics: the only way people will use public transportation is if the costs of using it (additional time lost due to frequent stops and crawling speed, inconvenience and discomfort, lack of privacy due to sharing the vehicle with 30 strangers) are less than the costs of driving (car expenses). It will take much more than a speed limit decrease to convince people that public transport is preferable, and to convince governments and private companies to invest in public transport.
Finally finally, Thanatos sucks.
Except for the part where it is good for neither the individual nor the society. Every benefit you mentioned is effectively neutralized or outweighed by numerous detriments.
The bottom line is that this is a stupid idea. There are other programs that would be far more effective and would not require people to make such huge sacrifices. Let's support those instead.
So the idea is to lower the speed limit to 55mph nationwide. The rationale is that cars pollute less since they consume their fuel more efficiently at that speed than at higher speeds. It would come with other boons too, such as:
*Discouraging people from living far away from where they work, further reducing oil consumption
*Saving money by paying less at the pump, and visiting the pump less often
*Reducing urban sprawl in the long run
*Reducing rate of accidents
*Providing an incentive for individuals to use public transportation, and for governments to invest in it
Of course, like any pro-environment measure, the proponents were too rabidly short-sighted to recognize the negatives associated with this.
First of all, it would incur massive social costs across the entire medium- and long-distance commuter population. Thanatos provided a link in the other thread saying the average commute time in the US is a mere 24 minutes, but this is misleading due to the fact that not every commuter uses the highway and thus will be affected by this decrease in maximum speed (but they will still be negatively impacted, as I explain below). Furthermore, it conveniently ignores the fact that people don't use highways only when going to and from work. In any case, most people would not sacrifice 30 minutes of their time just so that they can save 50 bucks a month or whatever at the pump. Time is a much more valuable commodity than a small amount of money.
Secondly, it would remove a good amount of the incentive for using highways, which is to drive fast. This would increase traffic at surface roads, causing massive traffic congestions. This would in turn require increasing the capacity of these surface roads, which is very costly and disruptive.
Thirdly, while it seems like discouraging people from living far from their workplace sounds like a neat idea, it would be devastating for urban areas.
- It would increase rent in urban areas while decreasing rent in rural areas. As a result, well-paying jobs that are typically located in urban areas would be less accessible to people who can't afford rent, increasing the income gap.
- It would hurt businesses, who now not only have access to a smaller pool of job applicants, but also have a less happy and less productive workforce because the workers are spending more time on the road and less time on leisure.
- It would increase population density in urban areas, causing a huge strain on service industries, especially gov't services.
Fourthly, you can expect the price of goods that are transported by trucks to increase, as trucks are now taking longer to travel (which also decreases their range in the case of perishable goods, such as food).
Finally, I don't think it would be much of an incentive to invest in public transportation. This is a popular topic in public policy economics: the only way people will use public transportation is if the costs of using it (additional time lost due to frequent stops and crawling speed, inconvenience and discomfort, lack of privacy due to sharing the vehicle with 30 strangers) are less than the costs of driving (car expenses). It will take much more than a speed limit decrease to convince people that public transport is preferable, and to convince governments and private companies to invest in public transport.
Finally finally, Thanatos sucks.
Yes, and I'd personally rather not pay taxes if it meant that I personally would have more money. This is what we call a "collective action problem." This isn't about cost effectiveness; it's one of those cases where what's good for society as a whole isn't good for a given individual in that society. This is why we have a government, and laws.Gas would have to be about $20 a gallon for it to be more cost effective for me to move. I don't know about the country as a whole, but I'd rather personally pay more for gas if it meant that I personally would have more time.No, I'm assuming that you'll put up with the extra time in order to, y'know, reduce our gasoline consumption and pollution by a very substantial amount, or you'll move closer to the city in order to reduce your travel time.
It's great how everyone bitches about gas prices, our reliance on foreign oil, greenhouse gases, but doesn't actually want to do anything which might slightly inconvenience them in order to fix any of it.
Except for the part where it is good for neither the individual nor the society. Every benefit you mentioned is effectively neutralized or outweighed by numerous detriments.
The bottom line is that this is a stupid idea. There are other programs that would be far more effective and would not require people to make such huge sacrifices. Let's support those instead.
ege02 on
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Posts
But those answers are hard and this one is easy.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Young/Inexperienced/Risky/Very Old/SUV drivers can drive no faster than 50mph and must stay in the right lane.
Safe/low MPG drivers should be able to go to 65mph and must stay in the left lane.
It may not be the best solution, but it's not exactly a huge change either.
At best changing the interstate speed limit treats a symptom rather than a cause. Changing the speed limit is likely a bad idea, but I don't think its effect is as large as you're painting it to be Ege.
And nothing in Thantos original quote points to him supporting the speed limit decrease, his statement, "It's great how everyone bitches about gas prices, our reliance on foreign oil, greenhouse gases, but doesn't actually want to do anything which might slightly inconvenience them in order to fix any of it." is very true.
Eh, I like it. As I absolutely hate risky/young/inexperienced/suv drivers. Very often people are many or all of those.
Seriously though, I'm all for a lower enforced speed limit. Most cars have an optimal speed in the neighborhood of 55mph, after which the fuel economy decreases dramatically. Add 10mph and you lose about 10%. 10mph and you lose about another 10%, after which the decrease is much more than a linear relation. With a speed limit of 65mph, you're already above the optimal speed for most vehicles. Then we have to take into account that most people don't observe the speed limit and drive in excess of 5-10mph.
I don't see how it would create a significantly less demand for highways. Yeah, you'd have to drive a little bit slower, but you can still do so without red lights and pedestrians. (Isn't driving without interruption the point of highways, not driving as fast as you feel like so you can save your precious 2 minutes?)
The fourth point really doesn't make much sense. It would be beneficial that most land routes for shipping drive at optimal speeds to cut the costs of gas. I understand "time is money", but how many big rigs do you see going 90mph to save time? Probably not very many.
Thanks. I think high speeds should be a privilege and should be rewarded, like lower car insurance rates, to those that are safe drivers that don't use up a lot of gas. It'd be a great way to change people's driving habits. Best way to track drivers is by their license plate via color coding.
I'm all for stricter punishment of reckless driving if necessary. Trying to put the blame on people who follow the law? pfft.
http://www.ibiblio.org/rdu/sl-irrel.html
"Lowering speed limits by 5, 10, 15, or 20 mi/h (8, 16, 24, or 26 km/h) at the study sites had a minor effect on vehicle speeds. Posting lower speed limits does not decrease motorist's speeds."
It doesn't matter that lowering the speed limit is going to create minor beneficial effect X, Y and Z, in the end people are going to ignore it unless it is enforced to the point where it causes more harm than good.
If they did that, they'd get tailgated and road-raged by everyone behind them who's going at least ten miles over the speed limit.
Because rather than take responsibility for anything that goes wrong from yourself driving fast, you blame the people who are driving slower.
As far as safety goes: when you're speeding, you have less time to react and need more of a distance to brake. At the same time, driving way under the speed limit is also bad. I'm not advocating simply driving slower (to ridiculously slow), I'm advocating a lower limit. Driving in the triple digits, though? That's just retarded, and you're delusional if you somehow think you're driving safely.
Even entertaining your egotism about your driving skills, the problem remains that the number of things you have no way of controlling on the highway (road debris, unexpected behavior of other drivers, etc) becomes much more dangerous to you when you are traveling that fast. And at that speed, if you do get into an accident, you're most likely taking a few people with you.
A lot of major US cities have shitty traffic. Thankfully my commute is west of DC and soon will be just 5 minutes from my house 8-) Problem is a lot of fuckers in this city love to text & drive.
Let me guess, you also ride up on peoples' tails and hastily swerve in and out of lanes?
No, that doesn't make you a reckless driver, that just makes you a douchebag.
Nothing sucks more than getting in the left lane to pass someone traveling about 5 mph slower than you, only to have some pompous dick ride up on your ass like you are such an inconvience to them.
Sometimes I want to put reinforced steel bars on my bumper and just slam the brakes on tailgaters.
I wish this every day. Fuck the 100+ MPH speeders. Crash and die soon please.
The answer is to get a bunch of people off the road. Quite frankly, there are too many people out there who have their driver's licenses that should, as they are completely irresponsible or incapable of driving safely and effectively. I say get these people off the road to start, then see where we're at. This would hopefully put more of a demand of developing public transportation, because now it's actually needed rather than an option, and politicians will start push transportation project through more quickly to keep their constituents happy.
I'm pretty sure the most dangerous thing on the road when you're going 100+ mph is you.
No, it's really not.
If someone is on your tail and you're going at a sensible speed, put your hazard lights on. Continue to block them. They'll get it.
Or you could do what a friend of mine does and angle your windscreen washer so that it goes over your roof and into the windscreen of anyone passing too close. Bonus points for convertibles.
This is so awesome. I know what I'm doing tomorrow.
I do the hazard lights thing on an almost daily basis to tailgating motorcyclists and it never fails to drive them insane. Tailgating in a car is stupid enough, but a motorcycle?
Ricers? I ride, but I don't have the balls to act like that. Then again, I always get that twinge of schadenfreude when one of the ricers wipes out on our mountain roads.
Thank you.
We're all on the road together. Let's try to help each other get where we're going, even if that means speeding a little bit to open up a space for someone to merge or pass a little faster to let somebody late make their meeting on time. I know you might be indulging a tailgating dick in the process, but hell, at least he isn't near you anymore.
That said, I personally think speed limits should be raised to what the traffic engineers actually designed the roads for. I've never understood why, when approaching Houston, the lanes widening and multiplying in number justifies a reduction in speed limit.
In Southern California, the average speed in the left lane (excluding the carpool lane) of any of the major freeways is typically about 75-80 mph. The posted speed limit on pretty much every freeway in the area is 65 mph. Being pulled over for speeding on a freeway is exceedingly rare and police will generally be passing people who do 80 rather than pulling them over.
On I-5, in the middle of the state between Southern California and Northern California, the average car speed is probably in excess of 80 mph, where the posted limit is 70. Again, you're probably more likely to be passed by a police officer while doing as much as 90 mph than to get a ticket at those speeds.
In Northern California, the average speed in the left lane is closer to 65 or 70 mph. The posted limit is 65, just the same as in Southern California.
In Seattle, the average speed in the left lane can be as low as 60 mph. The posted limit is 60, most places I drive.
It's hard to say exactly what causes the difference in driving behavior between Northern and Southern California. I haven't personally observed any higher rates of enforcement in Northern California. I have, on the other hand, noticed that the freeways in Northern California are generally in much worse shape than those in Southern California. It may be that people simply will drive as fast as they feel is safe, regardless of what the posted limit is, and police, recognizing this fact, will only pull over people who drive well in excess of the actual average speed, as opposed to the posted limit. This whole argument may be a farce - reducing the posted speed limit may have only a very marginal effect on both behavior and enforcement.