Some people may arguge that speed certainly kills, but I argue that time is money. Yes certaintly the faster you go the slower reaction time you have therefore the longer it takes for you to stop. I think you should most likely should worry about a car going 20 miles under the speed limit then a car going 5 miles over it. There are many safety concerns for raising the speed limit but why are they continuing to rise? Texas is one of the largest states and has the most roads with 520 miles of interstate highway. Most of these highways are wide and long. 85mph is dangerous but not so life threatening when your the only car on the road and you have over 10 miles in visibility. I think Texas is just trying to make it easier on motorists to get to there destination faster.
As for raising the speed limit in crowded citys, I think it could help reduce traffic. According to an artical in the austin american statesmen, Austin currently has the third worst traffic in the United States. If Texas contine to raise its speed limits, then people could get to there destination faster and there would be fewer motorist on the road. This will slow down congestion time so it would take longer for traffic to build up.
Among helping move along traffic, it could possibly decrease the number of tickets given out each year. Comming from a person who is currently paying off a speeding ticket, there is no way that some highways should be 60mph when there is no traffic on the road. I think Texas should continue to raise its speed limits appropriately. It could help reduce time, traffic, and fines which I'm sure could all save us money.
There were a couple of good points that were brought up when Mr. Mitchell wrote about the recent speed limit changes, although overall I disagree. Maybe I am turning into my mother in my old age but I think that the negative would outweigh the positive because of the nature in which people drive. I agree that traffic is ridiculous and it does take a terribly long time to get somewhere if you are driving during peak hours but this is something we all have to get used to if we continue to reside here.
ReplyDeleteI have covered the fact that I am turning into an old lady and for this reason the speed limit increase makes me a little nervous. While driving at times that the roads are not very congested people drive with little regard to anyone else, like they own the road. With this being said I don't think anyone really pays attention to the speed limit as long as they aren't going that much over, for example if the speed limit is 70 generally people will probably push it to 75-80, so with the increase it just means we will have drivers thinking that it is acceptable to push the limit.
I do understand the point that when you are driving on a road that has nobody else on it and you have miles of visibility it should be acceptable to drive as fast as you want but again I disagree. There are a lot of experienced drivers on the road but there are a large amount of very new drivers as well. When your vehicle is moving at a very excessive rate your reaction time is terrible so if a deer or even an armadillo were to jump or crawl out in front of you and you are caring of all natures creatures, you will probably swerve, crash, and possibly die.
We live in Austin, traffic is very crazy and I agree with that but if we choose to live here we understand that traffic is going to have to be something we deal with. If everyone could be trusted to do the speed limit and be cautious while driving I would be just fine with the increases, I am just not ready to have some irresponsible asshole crash into me because they have somewhere to be in a hurry, which is typically an appointment for a hair cut or something stupid.