Speeders' 5-10 mph 'free pass' costs lives

[ylexot]

The number of speeding-related deaths is not declining despite major safety improvements in vehicles in recent years, including airbags and anti-lock brakes, the GSHA said. Speeding is a major factor in about one-third of the 42,000 traffic deaths a year in the USA.

The National Motorists Association, which lobbied for repeal of the national maximum speed limit, found the report "disappointing," said John Holevoet, the group's director of development. "All this report does is highlight how out of the mainstream many of our speed limits are. At best, maybe one-quarter of the people are following a speed limit at a given time. Practically everyone speeds. They're going to try and say this is causing highway deaths. (But) we are looking at the lowest fatality rates ever."

I really hate accident statistics. There are so many factors involved in each acident, but you get idiots making sweeping claims like speeding causes accidents (I contend that it's usually not speed, it's the difference in speed that causes problems). They should be able to look at fatality rates vs. how far over the speed limit. I'd guess that 5-10 mph over is usually not a problem.

 

[Bruzilla]

They're down to 1.46 per million miles driven. How much lower do they expect them to go? Also, if the number of miles driven, which they've been using per million for over a decade now, is no longer reflecting the increase in miles driven, then they should change their measure to ten million or 100 million. At per ten million miles driven the rate is .146 deaths, which is a significant reduction.

 

[czygvtwkr]

As many people as I see in Southern Maryland that have been rear ended at stop lights in wet or snowy conditions tell me that speeding is not a cause of those accidents.

Every time it rains someone gets rear ended at chancellors run road and 235 while sitting at a stop light.

 

[ylexot]

As many people as I see in Southern Maryland that have been rear ended at stop lights in wet or snowy conditions tell me that speeding is not a cause of those accidents.

Every time it rains someone gets rear ended at chancellors run road and 235 while sitting at a stop light.

Nope, speeding is not the cause...following too closely is the cause.

 

[czygvtwkr]

Not when the person has been sitting there for 30 seconds and then gets rear ended.....I've seen it.

 

[Bruzilla]

As many people as I see in Southern Maryland that have been rear ended at stop lights in wet or snowy conditions tell me that speeding is not a cause of those accidents.

Every time it rains someone gets rear ended at chancellors run road and 235 while sitting at a stop light.

That's a result of going to fast for conditions, not for exceeding the speed limit. No one's going to get stopped by the police for going too fast for conditions as long as they're under the posted limit.

Also, most of the accidents of this type are not a result of excessive speed but from lack of attention to the traffic situation.

 

[ylexot]

Not when the person has been sitting there for 30 seconds and then gets rear ended.....I've seen it.

But were they speeding? (going over the posted speed limit) By how much? Were they possibly on a cell phone, have bald tires, worn brakes, etc, etc, etc. Like I said, "there are so many factors involved in each accident."

Here's another example of bad accident statistics...if a driver had a beer and gets hit by someone completely sober running a red light, it is considered an "alcohol-related accident" and helps to inflate those statistics. Tell me that makes sense.

 

[SamSpade]

I'd like to see the stats for fatalities versus 5-10 mph over the speed limit...

And also 5-10 UNDER it....
And 10-15 UNDER it.....
And 15-20 UNDER it....
And 10-15 OVER it...

Until it becomes amply clear that there's a linear relationship to justify the stupid premise of the article.

The thing is, it's not that you can prove ANYTHING with statistics.....you can't. But in many cases, you can't prove anything at all BUT you can insinuate all kinds of things to the uncritical eye. The numbers given don't even come close to proving the premise.

You can never PROVE speeding causes accidents, but you can prove something just as good - that there's a significant correlation between the two. This article proves nothing, because it's easily shown that MOST drivers are going about 5-10 over the posted limit - which means the fatality score just falls within the range everyone is driving. Proves nothing.

 

[czygvtwkr]

You only have to drive on 235 to know people are driving above the posted speed limit, including on rainy or snowy days.

The big thing about going faster is the added kinetic energy created by going faster.

Kinetic energy is a second order function of velocity

KE=1/2*mass*velocity*velocity

so increasing velocity by a factor of two increases the kinetic energy of the automobile by a factor of 4

Not to mention no matter how good cars get peoples reflexes, common sense, and intellegence will never follow.

Since you can't enforce things like no day dreaming while driving you have to enforce something measurable like speed.