How do you treat speed limits?

'Normal' speed behaviors vs posted limits differ considerably by locality. As one member here once posted about the West Coast's I-5, not completely joking, speeds that will get you shot at for going too slow on the southern segments, will get you thrown in jail for reckless driving on the northern segments. So pay attention to what the locals are doing.

I grew up in a rural western area of narrow winding roads and less police tolerance of speeding. Most travelers were, and still are, 'saved' by sparse staffing resources. Yet when visiting back there or similar regions, I still witness a fair number of others getting pulled over while doing speeds significantly lower than numerous urban folks expect as almost a 'birthright'.

Note also that urban folks in heavy traffic have very substantial 'herd protection', because an officer simply can't stop and ticket thousands of drivers per hour. They have no choice but to push up their tolerance threshold. But in sparse rural areas with only a few dozen vehicles per hour using the road, this 'herd protection' is absent. They can bust drivers at lower excess speeds without getting overloaded.

Note also that Texas, literally once a different country, is still almost a different country ...

 

I travel a lot for work, always renting cars and often driving in traffic patterns I've never seen before. I try to remain conscious of how everyone around me is driving. Also I have to think about the rental car: is it wearing a plate from the state I'm actually driving in? Sometimes that matters.

Mostly I just try to blend in and not get too hung up on the actual numbers. Speed enforcement seems to be a much lower priority than it once was.

 

I'll throw my opinion in here also. If you're doing 5 mph under the speed limit, you're potentially a danger to everyone else.
There has to be organized chaos on the road. That's why there's left lanes and right lanes with slower traffic keeping right. If you're on a one lane (each way) road and you're having traffic build up behind you, take the hint and speed up or move out of the way.

I'm a far cry from being a speed demon, but it's reality. Regardless of where you're at, drive at a speed comparable to the majority of drivers around you. Speed does not kill nearly as much as differences in speed.

If you drive too slow, all you're doing is building up traffic behind you and many people don't handle it well. They start doing stupid things, and stupid things with crowded traffic = bad things happening.

Driving too fast..well anything can happen, right? Like running into a car going too slow or deciding to weave in and out of cars because you feel you need to be somewhere, etc, etc, etc.

IMHO, cars going too slow are as dangerous or maybe even more dangerous than cars going too fast. It makes it dangerous for everyone behind them.

Doing 30-35 in a 40 in my area may get you run off the road, as you're going to end up with a bunch of pissed off drivers behind you. Go with the flow.

 

Same here. It seem like most drivers in the Tampa area have replaced the throttle pedal with a toggle switch. Up is WOT, and down is max brakes. And then there are the old folks who drive 10-15 under the limit on two-lane roads that go 10 miles with no place to pass. I get awesome gas mileage when trapped behind them!!

If I had my 'druthers, I'd do the speed limit. But that's rarely safe here. I try to be just a little slower than average, but don't want to be the slowest. If there are multiple lanes, I'll often tuck in behind another driver going about the speed I want to go and very soon I won't be able to pass even if I want to because of all the Big Money Wasters blasting past in the left lane.

 

St. Carlin said it best:

"Have you ever noticed that anybody driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac?"

 

Just a thought: what speed would you go if you were pretty much the only car on the road? Middle of the night shift working, for example. And then, it's the middle of the afternoon, roads are crowded: what's changed?

 

True Story.
A few years back now, with my Prius believe it or not, I got 2 speeding tickets within a month. Maybe it was 3. Anyway, I absolutely could not afford to get another.
Therefore for the following 2 years, until they dropped off my record, I went exactly the speed limit or less, everywhere.

I'm convinced a great majority of people go WAY over the speed limit. Everyone passed me, all the time. Most unhappy. I'm sure I was contributing to the "slow" Prius driver stereotype.

How in a public forum would I promote NOT following the law?
But the reality where I live, is I think the vast majority of people, most of the time, are driving anywhere from 5-10 or miles over the speed limit all the time.

Also, true story, just last memorial day, the police set up a speed trap photo van on a stretch in my area that is posted 45 miles per hour, BUT again NOBODY goes 45, almost all the time the speed I would say people are going 55 mph or more.

I was merging onto that piece, luckily just past the speed trap van, but I watched as it flashed photos like a strobe light. It almost couldn't keep up. I'd be interested to know how much revenue was made off the fines collected. It must of been substantial.

 

Going with the flow is the best way to deal with speeding situation. If you are worried about getting a ticket, make sure you are in the middle of the pack, not at the front, and not at the tail end. My commute is on rural back roads with some sections being 1 lane each way state highway with speed limit from 25 mph to 50 mph. On this commute, I have tried once or twice setting my DRCC to exactly the posted speed limit, adjusting the speed as the post changed. I got really good mileage like 85 mpg, but I was holding up many, many angry drivers behind me. Won't try it again if cars behind are tailgating me.

I also did similar thing on >2 lanes interstate highway with DRCC set at 5 miles less than the speed limit and kept driving on the right side slow lane all the way ~300 miles. I got excellent mpg, but I was holding traffic some times. However, it was much better than 1 lane road situation.

 

Off-topic but related: around here nobody plays by the rules at:

1. Stop signs.
2. Turning right with a red light.

In both instances, you're supposed to come to a full stop, with the car completely behind the broad white line (or behind the sign, in absence of white line), and check for traffic and pedestrians, before proceeding.

 

85 mph toll road? we live in different worlds

 

Ah,
Speed limits.
The saga continues.....
When I was deployed overseas (I was a POG, or REMF for you older folks) the most dangerous thing I did was to drive.
This is because in sparsely populated nations with chalk-line straight, 4 lane roads and a VERY patriarchal population....you learn very quickly that speeding doesn't contribute to accidents nearly as much as speed differential.

Here, as there, the pro-tip is to blend in with your surrounding traffic.
Since we used to drive 'white gear" (civilian rentals with the de-rigueur tinted windows) this was as easy to do as it was important, since most people are fairly uncomfortable when a carload of heavily armed ferigners are bombing around on their roads.

Americans tend to be abysmal drivers when compared with their contemporaries overseas, but for the most part our roads are fairly good and fairly well patrolled, and Darwin, traffic courts, lawyers, and insurance premiums usually take care of the statistical outliers.
The stereotypical smug Prius drivers going 5-under in the fast lane have largely been supplanted by Tesla drivers these days (THANK GOD!!!) but if you're behind the wheel of a Prius all of the important stuff from 10 years ago is still applicable today:

1. Sometimes, tailgaters, aren't!!
Priuses do not have trunks. This means that despite what the side-view mirror says, objects in your mirror are really NOT closer than they appear to be, but actually might really be about 4 feet further back that you might think that they are.

b. It's not YOUR job to regulate traffic speed, enforce laws, or be the great parent that you think most teenage drivers don't have.

iii. SLOWER TRAFFIC KEEP RIGHT.
It's not a suggestion. It's the law.
Most roads have just as many signs that remind drivers of this universally flouted law as they do reminding folks of the speed limit.

Four. Good drivers are COURTEOUS drivers....and No.
I am absolutely NOT always a good driver!!!

I'm on my second work car Prius, call sign Goofy-II, a 2010 G3.
About 5 years after I got my first company Prius, they put a data-logger in it that sent people in my company nasty-grams every time I went above the speed limit, engaged in "excessive idling", was out of my assigned route, or engaged in harsh braking or "hard acceleration."
Of all of these, I got my hand slapped once for "hard or unnecessary acceleration.".............in a PRIUS.

So what this means for you, the reader, is that for a period of YEARS I HAD to drive AT the posted Speed limit, but curiously I never got honked at, flipped off, or had the number on the "how am I driving" sign called on my behalf.
This is because I adopted the practice of getting the self-important, impatient JERK off my rear bumper by driving in the right lane (behind a truck when I can) pulling off of two lane roads when I can, and generally trying to do what I did those years ago when I was in the sandbox........

Be unnoticed.

 

Off the highway, I tend to go the speed limit, because I don't want to get a speeding ticket. Even if people go 5mph over, that doesn't make it right, and I am not comfortable with that being my witness to others on the read. It doesn't matter if I have a Prius or if I ever get a Tesla.

^ And in doing so, I've been tailgated (up to a dozen times per week), had lights flashed at me, honked at a few times, and I don't even care to look behind me to see how many magic fingers I've been given. Once I was tailgated for 7 miles by a police officer. Another time, I was tailgated on the highway for 40 miles. I legit. nearly called 911 a few times because of these kinds of dangerous interactions.

So, to all impatient drivers up my bumper, read my 1st paragraph, and respect my choice to go the speed limit and not risk a ticket, and just back off... your aggression makes me uncomfortable and I am not going faster for you just because you get inconvenienced.

On the highway, I stay in the slow lane to save fuel economy.

 

80 km's an hour is our usual limit; We try to avoid the freeway, take secondary highways around here.

I've noticed too, on some of the BC highways with higher limits, say around 110~120 km range (limits raised by the previous "liberal" highway ministry): a lot of cars keep it to 100 max.

 

The world would be a mighty boring place if we were all the same. Any of us can drive any way we'd like. We just need to accept the results, and maybe, just now and then, remember it doesn't always have to be about me, me, me.

Another thing to think about....A few decades ago when schools still did drivers education classes, we had a state trooper come into class. We had one classmate who liked to always start trouble, so the first question he asked was why police think they're better than everyone else, why speed limits don't apply, etc.

The trooper started a very interesting discussion that has stuck with me to this day.

Trooper: What do your parents do when they come up on a police car on the highway?
Kid: Well, they stay behind him, not wanting to pass him and risk a ticket.
Trooper: What about the 100 cars behind them?
Kid: They do the same thing.
Trooper: "Exactly". And then he discussed the dangers of that situation.

Trooper: Let's discuss why troopers are out there driving the roads.
Several kids come up with job responsibilities.
Trooper: What about looking at cars? Do you know one of my responsibilities is looking at other cars on the road? What if I'm looking for a robber in a blue chevy? Or someone in a green dodge that just hit another car and took off? Or someone who just robbed your house or stole your car? What happens if I'm driving down the highway at the exact speed limit?
Kid: You end up with a bunch of cars behind you....
Trooper: Exactly..I would end up looking at the same car next to me or right behind me the entire day. I would never be able to see a bunch of different cars, different license plates or different people. I wouldn't be able to do many parts of my job. On highways, we try to do 10-15 mph faster than the flow of traffic in order to observe many different cars each hour.

Since that class, every time I hear someone complain about why police speed past everyone on the highway, I laugh to myself, because it just seems so obvious....

 

yeah, i had a trooper in ny york speeding by me, along with everyone else, until he saw that i wasn't wearing a seat belt.
then he slowed and pulled in behind me and went the exact same speed

 

Do note that this depends on the particular local culture. Not all places have the same degree of combat driving culture. Here, in the rural Interstate zones with 70 mpg car / 60 mph truck zones, cars can readily stay 10 under their limit without being a hazard.

Though we do have a few 'free-fire' zones such as urban I-5 between Seattle and Tacoma-JBLM, where many drivers are making the most of the available 'herd protection' ...

Do note that some of this 'speed difference' advice derives from an ancient (before seatbelts) 'study' that included only a narrow slice of traffic crashes, excluding the bulk of today's traffic deaths. It addressed only multi-vehicle crashes involving traffic moving in the same direction on multi-lane roads. It excluded (1) head-on collisions with opposing traffic, (2) single-vehicle crashes into stationary objects or terrain, and (3) cross-traffic collisions. All these cases involve greater speed differences and greater mortality than hits between traffic moving the same direction, but too many drivers don't adequately factor these scenarios into their speed choice decisions.

 

Yup! I see that carnage here almost every day.

 

I have seen others here in Priuschat write about concerns with drivers as well. There seems to be a trend nationwide with aggressive drivers. Car comercials with people doing burn outs and donuts seem to influence this willy-nilly, dilly-dilly to rules attitude. I have seen this behavior from drivers in all ages and sexes. During my quarterly family trip to San Diego, I often go up to 7 over the speed limit. Others will fly by me without a care in the world. My whole reason for driving safely is because I am done with tickets. Done with parking tickets, done with failure to yield tickets, done with not driving safely tickets, done with speeding tickets, done with traffic school and the stupid court house system they are tied to. Done with visits to the DMV (dumb, mindless and Vocally inept) to fix issues that should have been done by the stupid court house system. My last ticket was in 2006. Hopefully it will be my last one till I stop driving.
Overall, my driving over the years has at least been respectful of others, my tickets I deserved because I wasn't paying attention. Cost too much to not pay attention!

 

In California you can get a ticket for doing 85 on the freeway. In Northern California it will be for excessive speed. In Southern California it will be for obstructing traffic...

Just got back from a trip to Southern California. Up north, the Highway Patrol mostly uses SUVs. I noticed a lot of Dodge Chargers down south. That and a few white incognito family sedans, except for the Highway Patrol logos on the doors.

Passed an 18 wheeler with his hazard flashers going. He was doing about 70. Guess he felt the need to warn others about his slow vehicle. Actual speed limit for trucks on the freeway is 55. Then there's the grapevine where you have 2 lanes of trucks doing 35 or less, plus 2 lanes of unlimited.