On Topic? Cars, anyway: 55 MPH speed limit...

It's interesting to see how many people in this group and others support
the 55 MPH speed limit.

The question is, where the hell are you on the highway?!?!?!
If 55 MPH is supposed to save fuel, and the speed limit is currently 65
MPH in most places, then why, when I'm doing my usual 68-70 MPH, am I
getting my damn doors blown off?!?!?!

I guess complaining and crying is good, until it effects you...

(Of all the cars I was sharing the highway with, I passed 3 of them.
Everyone else was passing me...over 70-75 MPH)

Hachiroku ãƒ�ãƒ�ãƒ*ク wrote:
> It's interesting to see how many people in this group and others support
> the 55 MPH speed limit.
>
> The question is, where the hell are you on the highway?!?!?!
> If 55 MPH is supposed to save fuel, and the speed limit is currently 65
> MPH in most places, then why, when I'm doing my usual 68-70 MPH, am I
> getting my damn doors blown off?!?!?!
>
> I guess complaining and crying is good, until it effects you...
>
> (Of all the cars I was sharing the highway with, I passed 3 of them.
> Everyone else was passing me...over 70-75 MPH)
>


Well I don't support 55. I put up with it for years and it is nonsense.
Sure, it saves a bit of fuel, but my time is worth a whole lot more than
that.

I'd much rather have the limit at 65 and be comfortable sticking close
to it.


DAve

On 2008-07-24, Leftie > wrote:

> I've always supported 55, as long as you can go 60 and be left
> alone.

So long as the cops don't bother those driving at your chosen speed. How
absurd a standard.

> I do 58-60 in the center lane on my commute (lots of off-ramps in
> the right lane) and idiots keep passing me on *both* sides. Americans
> are stupid.

That may be true generally but in this case you're driving in the wrong
lane. Keep right except to pass. If you can't deal with the merge
impaired go fast enough so you aren't being passed on the right.

Hachiroku ãƒ�ãƒ�ãƒ*ク wrote:
> It's interesting to see how many people in this group and others support
> the 55 MPH speed limit.
>
> The question is, where the hell are you on the highway?!?!?!
> If 55 MPH is supposed to save fuel, and the speed limit is currently 65
> MPH in most places, then why, when I'm doing my usual 68-70 MPH, am I
> getting my damn doors blown off?!?!?!
>
> I guess complaining and crying is good, until it effects you...
>
> (Of all the cars I was sharing the highway with, I passed 3 of them.
> Everyone else was passing me...over 70-75 MPH)
>


I've always supported 55, as long as you can go 60 and be left
alone. I do 58-60 in the center lane on my commute (lots of off-ramps in
the right lane) and idiots keep passing me on *both* sides. Americans
are stupid.

| >> I do 58-60 in the center lane on my commute (lots of off-ramps in
| >> the right lane) and idiots keep passing me on *both* sides. Americans
| >> are stupid.

| This is how we got into the current situation: being told to crowd
| into the right-hand lane to make more room for speeders. On a 3 lane
| highway with off-ramps on the right, the right lane should be for those
| going below the limit, including those exiting or entering from ramps.
| The center lane should be for cruising at the limit or so, and the left
| lane for passing and emergency vehicles. This allows for the optimum
| flow of traffic and for maximum safety. But that's just too sensible for
| this dumbass country...

Uhm.. 58-60 where the limit is 65? YOU are the dumbass. If you don't want to
do the speed limit, get to the right. VERY simple.

Now if you're talking about a limit of 55, then you STILL are a dumbass
thinking that it's perfectly OK to speed.

If 65 is the limit, folks should just not EVER go over 65. What good is a
limit when it doesn't actually mean anything? What would you do if you
bought $20 worth of gas and was charged $25 for it?

Brent P wrote:
> On 2008-07-24, Leftie > wrote:
>
>> I've always supported 55, as long as you can go 60 and be left
>> alone.
>
> So long as the cops don't bother those driving at your chosen speed. How
> absurd a standard.


The standard is perfectly reasonable, and long-standing. It's to
account for both speedometer error and people momentarily drifting above
the limit. I use cruise control and know my speedometer error, so I can
set it for 60 and know I'll be going 58. You're the one being absurd.



>
>> I do 58-60 in the center lane on my commute (lots of off-ramps in
>> the right lane) and idiots keep passing me on *both* sides. Americans
>> are stupid.
>
> That may be true generally but in this case you're driving in the wrong
> lane. Keep right except to pass. If you can't deal with the merge
> impaired go fast enough so you aren't being passed on the right.
>
>
This is how we got into the current situation: being told to crowd
into the right-hand lane to make more room for speeders. On a 3 lane
highway with off-ramps on the right, the right lane should be for those
going below the limit, including those exiting or entering from ramps.
The center lane should be for cruising at the limit or so, and the left
lane for passing and emergency vehicles. This allows for the optimum
flow of traffic and for maximum safety. But that's just too sensible for
this dumbass country...

On 2008-07-24, Leftie > wrote:
> Brent P wrote:
>> On 2008-07-24, Leftie > wrote:
>>
>>> I've always supported 55, as long as you can go 60 and be left
>>> alone.
>>
>> So long as the cops don't bother those driving at your chosen speed. How
>> absurd a standard.

> The standard is perfectly reasonable, and long-standing. It's to
> account for both speedometer error and people momentarily drifting above
> the limit. I use cruise control and know my speedometer error, so I can
> set it for 60 and know I'll be going 58. You're the one being absurd.

Upper bound speed limits are not to be set because of what somebody feels
is 'right'. Neither should having a armed government employee stop you
on the side of road under the threat of violence be determined by his
personal speed tolerances.

Google 85th percentile method to see how speed limits should be set.

>>> I do 58-60 in the center lane on my commute (lots of off-ramps in
>>> the right lane) and idiots keep passing me on *both* sides. Americans
>>> are stupid.

>> That may be true generally but in this case you're driving in the wrong
>> lane. Keep right except to pass. If you can't deal with the merge
>> impaired go fast enough so you aren't being passed on the right.

> This is how we got into the current situation: being told to crowd
> into the right-hand lane to make more room for speeders.

*sigh* A sign with an absurdly low number on it is not a license to
drive poorly.

> On a 3 lane
> highway with off-ramps on the right, the right lane should be for those
> going below the limit, including those exiting or entering from ramps.

WRONG. It's supposed to be the normal cruising lane. It was before the
NMSL idiotcy of 55mph and still is.

> The center lane should be for cruising at the limit or so,

WRONG. It's for passing people in the right lane.

> and the left lane for passing and emergency vehicles.

Somewhat WRONG. It's for passing people in the middle lane.

> This allows for the optimum
> flow of traffic and for maximum safety.

No it does not. Optimum flow and maximum safety is achieved by a strict
keep right except to pass discipline. This is why the autobahn is safer
than the US interstate and much better to drive.

> But that's just too sensible for this dumbass country...

Actually most of those dumbasses are driving just like you, except they
have a different idea of where the speed cut offs for each lane are.
That's why your idea is pure bunk.

Keep right except to pass is pure simplicity. It works like fluid flow
in a pipe. It makes for an engineered system. Your idea is a complex
social interaction that cannot scale. That's why it breaks down so
quickly with increased traffic volumes. Too many people with different
social ideas of what speed each lane should be.

On 2008-07-24, Calab > wrote:

> If 65 is the limit, folks should just not EVER go over 65. What good is a
> limit when it doesn't actually mean anything?

It doesn't mean anything but as a revenue gathering mechanism for
government. It's usally a number pulled out of the ass of someone in
political office and in the case of interstates has nothing to do with
the actual upper bound limit of the road.

Google 85th percentile method and read the MUTCD.

> I've always supported 55, as long as you can go 60 and be left
>alone. I do 58-60 in the center lane on my commute (lots of off-ramps in
>the right lane) and idiots keep passing me on *both* sides. Americans
>are stupid.

Some people can't get the hint (being passed on the right). It would
be nice if cops could give a ticket for a mandatory refresher course
at the DMV.

"Leftie" > wrote in message
...
> Brent P wrote:
> This is how we got into the current situation: being told to crowd into
> the right-hand lane to make more room for speeders. On a 3 lane highway
> with off-ramps on the right, the right lane should be for those going
> below the limit, including those exiting or entering from ramps. The
> center lane should be for cruising at the limit or so, and the left lane
> for passing and emergency vehicles. This allows for the optimum flow of
> traffic and for maximum safety. But that's just too sensible for this
> dumbass country...

Interesting how different countries have different rules about this. In the
UK, the "keep left" and "no undertaking" rules on motorways are drummed into
every new driver and the police will stop people (if they have nothing more
urgent to attend to) to enforce this.

You still get people crawling along at 50-60 in the Lane 2 on a deserted
motorway late at night: it's very annoying to be driving quite correctly in
Lane 1 and have to move over two lanes to pass the slow vehicle and then
move back two lanes to where you were.

Mind you in the UK, it's fairly rare for Lane 1 to be for the exclusive use
of traffic leaving the motorway at a junction - this is only done at a
minority of very busy junctions and is very well signposted in advance so
people going straight on can move over into Lane 2 and don't get shunted off
at the junction.

I'm not sure what other countries' laws are about undertaking (ie overtaking
on the opposite side to the driver's side).

As a matter of interest, in the USA are large articulated trucks (heavy
goods vehicles - HGVs - in UK parlance) legally restricted to a lower limit
than other vehicles? In the UK they are mechanically restricted to 56 mph
(ie 80 km/hr) which can lead to the dreaded "lorry leapfrog" as truck 1
doing 56 comes up behind truck 2 doing 55 (due to tolerances in the settings
of the speed limiters) and decides to overtake it at a differential speed of
1 mph. Consequently all the traffic behind it in Lane 2 is suddenly reduced
to 56 for the several miles that it takes for truck 1 to complete its
manoevre. Lo and behold, a few miles further on they'll come to a hill and
truck 2 (which happens to have a more powerful engine and therefore isn't
slowed as much by the gradient) will overtake truck 1, taking forever and a
day - and so it goes on. In a car, you might temporarily exceed the speed
limit to make sure you got past quickly, but HGVs don't have that option.

On a road with at least 3 lanes, there is at least an extra lane for cars to
get past, but on two-lane roads you are stuck :-(

There's an infamous 2-lane road (the A34) that carries all the HGVs that
have come from mainland Europe north from Southampton Docks to the Midlands
(eg Birmingham) and there are sections which have gentle hills[*] as they
go over a ridge. When I used to come that way to work, it was rare to get
above 55 for the 20 miles that I drive on it, because every time I overtook
a lorry, another sodding one would pull out in front of me. The road really
does need to be upgraded to 3 lanes - or else the law needs to be changed to
ban HGVs from overtaking unless they can complete the manouevre within a few
seconds.
[*] Well, they are gentle to a car which can maintain 70-80 up them but they
force underpowered HGVs down to around 40.