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FWIW Posted by Justin VanAbrahams [Email] (#32) [Profile/Gallery] (more from Justin VanAbrahams) on Mon, 8 Apr 2002 17:11:04 In Reply to: Researchers say higher speeds safer, John A., Sat, 6 Apr 2002 16:54:56 Members do not see ads below this line. - Help Keep This Site Online - Signup |
The CHP (California Highway Patrol) just recently concluded their analysis of the "new" 65mph speed limit in California. Their conclusion was that the higher speed limit has reduced both the number of speed violations and the number of accidents. I think you will be hard-pressed to find any study that shows higher legal speeds equate to more accidents - most studies show quite the opposite and a few show no tangible change. There was *one* study in Montana, if I'm not mistaken, that showed an enormous increase in accidents following the raising of the speed limit, but after a look back in history there were similar oddball years of high accident rates at random intervals when the speed limit did not change. That study was thrown into the "standard deviation" column.
The last study I read indicated that higher road speeds do not equate to higher accident rates but *do* equate more serious accidents at a lower rate. That makes perfect sense. But as others have pointed out, the large majority of highway accidents result from speed differential and I think that's key. Traffic enforcement needs to spend a lot more time policing *unsafe* driving rather than *fast* driving. Your potential to cause an accident does not go down simply because you're driving more slowly. There *is* absolutely such a thing as "driving at an unsafe low speed." I can't speak for anywhere else in the world, but I think substantially higher speed limits *and* more rigorous vehicle inspections would lead to much safer and much less congested roadways... Get people on and off the highways as quickly as possible, that's my theory.
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