The C is for Crank
Texas Increases Speed Limit to 85 (!!) MPH
Texas---yep, my home stay (hook 'em Horns)---has increased the maximum speed limit on its highways to the absolutely insane level of 85 mph.
The state hasn't actually implemented the new rules anywhere---they take effect today, but it will take some time to determine on which highways drivers can travel "safely" at that speed.
The real answer, of course, is "none." The evidence that higher speed limits equal more highway (and street) deaths is conclusive, both for pedestrians and cyclists (in the case of city streets) and for drivers (in the case of highways).
The evidence is conclusive: Speeding kills. The faster you're driving (and on highways, most people drive between five and 10 mph above the posted speed limit), the more likely you are to die if you're in an accident. Some basic facts worth knowing here:
• Traffic injuries kill more than 40,000 people a year in the US alone, and more than one million worldwide.
• In 2009, speed was a factor in 31 percent of deaths from motor vehicle crashes, killing 10,591 people. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) speed-related crashes cost more than $40 billion each year.
• The energy that has to be absorbed by a car (and its driver) increases by the square of the speed, so that increasing speed from 65 to 85, for example, increases the amount of energy that has to be "managed" by about 140 percent.
• And that's assuming the energy can be managed; above a certain speed, a car's safety systems---air bags, seat belts, etc.---will start to fail. Crashes above 35 mph are considered serious. When states started increasing speed limits above 55 mph after the national speed limit was abolished, deaths on rural interstate highways due to speeding increased 19 percent.
• Although highway speeds are less likely to affect pedestrians than speed limits on local streets, it's worth noting that, for pedestrians, the death rate for a collision at 20 mph is five percent; at 30 mph, it's 45 percent; and at 40 mph, it's 85 percent.
When Texas drivers say you'll have to pry the steering wheel out of their cold, dead hands, they apparently mean it literally.
The state hasn't actually implemented the new rules anywhere---they take effect today, but it will take some time to determine on which highways drivers can travel "safely" at that speed.
The real answer, of course, is "none." The evidence that higher speed limits equal more highway (and street) deaths is conclusive, both for pedestrians and cyclists (in the case of city streets) and for drivers (in the case of highways).
The evidence is conclusive: Speeding kills. The faster you're driving (and on highways, most people drive between five and 10 mph above the posted speed limit), the more likely you are to die if you're in an accident. Some basic facts worth knowing here:
• Traffic injuries kill more than 40,000 people a year in the US alone, and more than one million worldwide.
• In 2009, speed was a factor in 31 percent of deaths from motor vehicle crashes, killing 10,591 people. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) speed-related crashes cost more than $40 billion each year.
• The energy that has to be absorbed by a car (and its driver) increases by the square of the speed, so that increasing speed from 65 to 85, for example, increases the amount of energy that has to be "managed" by about 140 percent.
• And that's assuming the energy can be managed; above a certain speed, a car's safety systems---air bags, seat belts, etc.---will start to fail. Crashes above 35 mph are considered serious. When states started increasing speed limits above 55 mph after the national speed limit was abolished, deaths on rural interstate highways due to speeding increased 19 percent.
• Although highway speeds are less likely to affect pedestrians than speed limits on local streets, it's worth noting that, for pedestrians, the death rate for a collision at 20 mph is five percent; at 30 mph, it's 45 percent; and at 40 mph, it's 85 percent.
When Texas drivers say you'll have to pry the steering wheel out of their cold, dead hands, they apparently mean it literally.
