I have lived in places where the speed limit is very obviously around 10 mph too low for the road’s engineering and surrounding environment, consistently. Consequently, there is truly no one during busy times doing the speed limit.
This gives police the ability to pull over anyone, at their discretion, with direct legal cause (not even the “immune from consequences in practice” kind). Even driving the speed limit creates a hazard and merits intervention according to the law.
The place I’m describing was very racist, driving while black was absolutely unofficially illegal, and this lets cops pick and choose in all the worst ways.
Be deeply suspicious of any law that is routinely broken by everyone for years with no change - it is to allow arbitrary, bigoted enforcement.
Most drivers with experience can tell by how a road is constructed (materials, bank angles on curves, etc.) roughly how fast they can safely go, and there’s a subconscious mental tug to get up to that speed. Whether you personally are impacted by that or not, it’s a well-known phenomena.
When everyone on the road, most far less thoughtful than yourself, are experiencing that mental tug, traffic moves naturally faster than the posted speed. And then that gives probable cause for our racist police to pick and choose who to fuck up.
It’s a real thing, road design has an inherent “natural speed” where most drivers feel comfortable, not too quick, not too slow. In the Netherlands if you get a speeding ticket there is a chance that you can successfully argue in court that the road design invited you to drive faster and get the fine annuled. When that happens the government will ask the company responsible for that bit of road to add traffic calming measures like bumps, or obstacles you have to go around that slow you down. Highways are an exception though.
As an addon, those private companies responsible for the roads have to abide by certain design philosophies made by the government, and they are legally responsible for the safety of the roads, if someone dies and it’s found to be due to the road design, or its state of maintenance for example, they can be charged massive sums of money.
It’s more so psychology. There’s a few videos floating around YouTube by creators like Not Just Bikes that explain the concept, but in short most people are going to drive a speed that is comfortable for them, and that is dependent on the size and design of the road, which means the best way to make people obey the speed limit is to use narrower roads and the best way to make people break it is to design wider straighter roads.
This is what they mean by the speed “speed limit being too low for the street”. The speed limit may be an amount but the speed suggested by the street design itself pushes people to go faster
Fair. Even though I feel like at least 4 out of 5 cars have cruise control (a lot even with distance control) and a speed limiter, so it would be easy to suppress one’s psychology. At least that is what I do.
In the scenario I described above, congrats, you now stick out like a sore thumb as traffic flows around you, and you need to hope or pray that everyone coming up behind you is alert. Police can pull you for causing a hazard, and plus you just radiate “I have something to hide” energy. Simply driving slower isn’t some magic solution when no one else joins you.
I have lived in places where the speed limit is very obviously around 10 mph too low for the road’s engineering and surrounding environment, consistently. Consequently, there is truly no one during busy times doing the speed limit.
This gives police the ability to pull over anyone, at their discretion, with direct legal cause (not even the “immune from consequences in practice” kind). Even driving the speed limit creates a hazard and merits intervention according to the law.
The place I’m describing was very racist, driving while black was absolutely unofficially illegal, and this lets cops pick and choose in all the worst ways.
Be deeply suspicious of any law that is routinely broken by everyone for years with no change - it is to allow arbitrary, bigoted enforcement.
How does that work? Like, even on the broadest highway I could drive 5 mph without my car or the highway taking damage from it?!
Most drivers with experience can tell by how a road is constructed (materials, bank angles on curves, etc.) roughly how fast they can safely go, and there’s a subconscious mental tug to get up to that speed. Whether you personally are impacted by that or not, it’s a well-known phenomena.
When everyone on the road, most far less thoughtful than yourself, are experiencing that mental tug, traffic moves naturally faster than the posted speed. And then that gives probable cause for our racist police to pick and choose who to fuck up.
It’s a real thing, road design has an inherent “natural speed” where most drivers feel comfortable, not too quick, not too slow. In the Netherlands if you get a speeding ticket there is a chance that you can successfully argue in court that the road design invited you to drive faster and get the fine annuled. When that happens the government will ask the company responsible for that bit of road to add traffic calming measures like bumps, or obstacles you have to go around that slow you down. Highways are an exception though.
As an addon, those private companies responsible for the roads have to abide by certain design philosophies made by the government, and they are legally responsible for the safety of the roads, if someone dies and it’s found to be due to the road design, or its state of maintenance for example, they can be charged massive sums of money.
It’s more so psychology. There’s a few videos floating around YouTube by creators like Not Just Bikes that explain the concept, but in short most people are going to drive a speed that is comfortable for them, and that is dependent on the size and design of the road, which means the best way to make people obey the speed limit is to use narrower roads and the best way to make people break it is to design wider straighter roads.
This is what they mean by the speed “speed limit being too low for the street”. The speed limit may be an amount but the speed suggested by the street design itself pushes people to go faster
Fair. Even though I feel like at least 4 out of 5 cars have cruise control (a lot even with distance control) and a speed limiter, so it would be easy to suppress one’s psychology. At least that is what I do.
In the scenario I described above, congrats, you now stick out like a sore thumb as traffic flows around you, and you need to hope or pray that everyone coming up behind you is alert. Police can pull you for causing a hazard, and plus you just radiate “I have something to hide” energy. Simply driving slower isn’t some magic solution when no one else joins you.