The difference is, one situation is dangerous because we are told it is and the other because we know it is.
My car can easily and safely cruise at 100MPH on that road i mentioned above. It has good brakes, good wide tyres and in good condition. On a wet road i'd have to slow down because i know it is more dangerous, sometimes even to below the "speed limit" in very heavy rain or fog.
No, there is no difference. I
know that both of those would be dangerous situations.
Just because you believe your car is 'safe' to cruise at 50 mph, doesn't mean that it is. I guess I'll have to repeat my recursive argument then. Yourself, and anyone else, is going to have less control behind the wheel at 100 mph, than 70 mph. This is simple physics. Just because my argument can be repeated to apply to our own speed limits, does not mean that it should.
The whole concept of speed limits is to keep people has safe as possible, whilst still allowing them to do what they want to do. It would be safer for everyone to drive at 50 mph on an open motorway. Would the public accept it? Not easily. Would it result in an increase in speeding offences? I think likely so.
Wouldn't it be better to be told and thought to drive safely for the conditions rather than to obey an arbitrary speed limit.
No, because statistics show that people have significant differences over what is a safe speed to drive at accounting for the environmental conditions at any given time. In other words, it is subjective.
I don't advocate speeding, i just think some of the speed limits are wrong.
I do too, I think many are too high. I have yet to drive though an area and think that the speed limit is too low.
It's not just silly, do you want to be my guinea pig and try it out? Although i don't really want to be the driver, i don't want to kill anyone just yet.
I didn't say that the situation is silly, I am talking about the comparison.
For all you know the chances of an increase in a crash at 80 compared to 60 could be the same odds as winning the lotto twice in your life. However depending on the conditions it could be a lot worse, but then again people should be thought to drive to the conditions.
People are taught to drive to the conditions, lowering their speed where possible. The rules in place at present, simply state not to go above a particular maximum.
Answer me this, how can something thats safe to do in germany (100MPH on the autobahn) suddenly be unsafe here? Also if i remember correctly a lot of speed limits in america are 50MPH on big roads, why is it suddenly safer to drive 60MPH on irish roads (some of which are, admittedly, worse).
It's not about it being safe in another country, therefore it is automatically safe here. It is about what different governments believe is safe.
The official German recommendation for driving on the autobahn is 80 mph (130 km/h), not 100 mph (although this is not imposed). I think the Germans have it wrong not to impose an actual limit however, which is justified by the greater number of accidents which occur there.
This can be quite easily summarised:
Lower speeds allow more response time for drivers involved in an accident.
Lower speeds reduce the damage/death rate if in an accident.
lol. I wonder which spice girl would be easiest to kill. Probably VB, as I'm sure she is the least intelligent. And it would probably be more satisfying than any of the others, too.
