I'm tired off safety experts telling us speed is bad and raising speed limits will kill all kinds of people.
Then why does the autobahn have 1/4 of the death rate of the USA's interstate Highway ???
Your thoughts ???
Printable View
I'm tired off safety experts telling us speed is bad and raising speed limits will kill all kinds of people.
Then why does the autobahn have 1/4 of the death rate of the USA's interstate Highway ???
Your thoughts ???
Ive never been on the Autobahn but I watched an interesting documentary.Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
If you so much as give someone the finger your in trouble.
It is also better regulated than Highways in the US.
Tailgating is a No! No. Nice little cameras everywhere from what I understand to catch these kinds of drivers.
The autobahn doesn't run past a grammar school or a playground. If you have a problem with highway speedlimits, then you can make a case to raise the limits. But they exist, and you pretty much have to deal with that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
Quote:
Originally Posted by meatwad
But don't tell me that an interstate highway speed limit has ANYTHING to do with safety. It's about TAXES... Nothing more just $$$
Oh man, where to start? I'll go in list form, you hunt these facts down for me.
1: How do the loads (as in car density per mile) compare between the US interstates and the autobahn?
2: How much larger is the US interstate system than the autobahn?
3: How is the "1/4" statistic reached? Is it numerical or proportional?
4: Are there any traffic laws that aren't applied to both evenly?
5: What is the average distance traveled on the autobahn vs. US interstate?
6: How many people use each?
7: How different is the vehicle makeup of each?
8: What is the DUI rate on the autobahn vs the interstate (DUIs account for half of all traffic fatalities in the US)?
That is a good starter.
I would imagine the likelihood of a fatality from a blowout at 135 is a little higher than at 55.Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
Pretty likely at either speed (considering how many light trucks and SUVs there are), but at 135 you are a helluva lot more likely to take out 3 or 4 other cars in your rather energetic exit from this mortal coil.Quote:
Originally Posted by meatwad
Quote:
Originally Posted by jaeger
I've had tires shred a couple times on the highway at high speed (75). Makes the car shake like hell and scare the crap out of ya, not much more as long as you keep your wits about you.
Escape, have you ever been unexpectedly sideswiped and forced into an uncontrollable spin at high speeds, then crossing over into oncoming traffic lanes only to strike another car, while doing the current posted speed limit of 50 MPH? Have you ever had a blow out on a front wheel at high speeds? Or the best one I can recal, had to avoid a wheel and tire bouncing down the road at 65 while the car that lost it was sliding out of control alongside of you? I have done all three. Let me tell you something...it takes allot of cold sweat sleepless nights to decompress from having survived near death experiences to get back out there on the road and keep up with traffic, especially at the speeds of today’s roads.
Honestly, Speeding is a killer when coupled with the wrong circumstances it can really mess you up! You should take the time to go to a few salvage yards where they store some of the total losses with. If you can find the drivers seat on some of the real bad ones, look for the blood, and pieces of scalp, hair and face fused into the shattered windshields, and the baby seats crushed under the weight of a multiple rollover…Cars today are made to perform very well, and very comfortably at very high speeds. But none of them are capable of guaranteeing your life at any speeds over 35 Miles per hour. Even at speeds that slow you could be killed, but as you increase things, the odds of death increscent exponentially.
Again, al lot of sleepless nights my man, if you haven’t been through any of those, you don’t know what you are talking about!
But were they front tires that you lost? I lost a rear once, didn't even know it, thought it was a bad stretch of road, turns out I was sliding on a complete flat.Quote:
Originally Posted by ilovetheusers
Front blowouts are not even close in comparison...trust me!
1 the rating is death per million miles traveled So size and distance makes no difference.Quote:
Originally Posted by jaeger
2 Germany is not a little back water country the have a very urban areas and traffic congestion is a very real problem
3 DUI is another very real problem in Germany...
Speed Limits are TAXES
If the government was really worried about safety then there would be more training for drivers with retesting every 10 years.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ya_know
Done all that and more... It's not the speed that make those situations a danger it is the driver... And as for blowing tires I have blown a tire in my fathers Explorer and didn't flip you know why ???? I didn't slam in the breaks I hit the gas until the tire was gone and then slowed down slowly... Once again I restate it is the drivers that cause accidents NOT speed.
Speed Limits = TAXES
I lost a front tire at about 110mph, sidewall blew out. I knew it happened, because I watched the sidewall disappear, rolling down the highway, with little other indication of problem. I knew that would change, so braced myself and took my foot off the gas. At about 65, the front tire went flat, and I went for a ride. Got it under control , changed the tire, and hit it, tech emergency, you know? Rotational force can keep the shape, just don't slow down! Or, stress the tire at all!Quote:
Originally Posted by meatwad
Speed is one of those things you must prepare for. Few in America today do. JMHO.
Well, that addresses two of my questions adequately, but how about trying to find answers for #s: 2, 4, 5 , 6, 7, 8. Both #1 and #3 of mine were addressed by your first point while your second is irrelevant and third is unspecific.Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
Last second addition: I found that 1/4 statistic you were talking about. Let me post it and see if you can spot where it falls flat on its face.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Nevada Journal
Don't forget that the German police are, well, German.Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
The entire point of this link seems to be that there has been a dramatic increase in accident rates since the speed limit was introduced yet the modern increase along with the past low rate can both be attributed to variance. Look at 1997 vs 2000, do they look similar? Can you tell the major difference between these two years?Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
Aren't we also ignoring the difference in what it takes to get a license in Germany compared to what it takes in America?
OK, now you're just trying to tick me off. I never said that speed causes accidents, what I said was that when speed is coupled with the wrong circumstances, that combination is a killer, and the faster you go, the greater the chance for fatality!Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
You say it's the driver that causes the accidents, well, when I was sideswiped, I wasn't the driver that caused the accident, nor was the guy in the oncoming traffic that I hit. I was only going 50, which was the posted speed and we walked away with only some injuries, had I been doing 60 or more, even 70, we would have all been tits up in a box! But needless to say, I wasn’t responsible… the girl that hit me just lost control and turned hard into my rear wheel…after that I had zero control of the car, I couldn’t even slow it down with ABS, cause the car was sideways almost instantly…
Oh, and going back to this point, but putting it into your own terms, if so many drivers are causing accidents because of carelessness, how is a greater speed limit, or no speed limit, going to weigh in with those people? Do you really want someone talking on a cell phone, eating French fries, doing 100 by you with bald tires? That is you asking for trouble...how old are you anyway, your profile says almost 28, but I don’t believe it? Driving dads explorer doesn't qualify you for know_it_all status, because you obviously don’t.Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
YupQuote:
Originally Posted by Cleetus
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ya_know
I've had 2 rear tires blow out and one front but the front was at 40mph or so, so I just pulled over right quick.
What I'm saying is that we have this Speed Kills BS ... And it's just not true... Bad Drivers kill and Cleetus hit the nail right on the head... We need more Driver Training... Not lower speed limits
We have more drivers, more roads, more everything, it ain't all black and white dude. Honeslty, shut the **** up, drive withing the speedlimit and you don't have to ****ing worry, you don't get "taxed", you have not near the problems, and your car will appreciate it a little more too.
I read a superb article earlier this year when a reporter spent a day or two with a police (anti) speed unit. I will try to track it down later. At the end of the day the policeman who took the reporter out told him this…(or close to it anyhow)…
“Out there somewhere is a car with your name on it being driven by a bad driver. Sooner or later that car will find you and you will be involved in an accident with that car. The speed you are doing at that moment in time will decide whether you live or die.”
Speed does kill, take it from the experts.
(I really will try to find that article, it was excellent)
So would you rather there be less cops out there on the roads?
IMO, speed limits are just another way of the government trying to protect the stupidest people in the population from themselves. Same with seatbelt laws. If people had common sense enough to control their car at any speed (speeding causes some people to have less control of their car) and to wear their seatbelts, we wouldn't need these kind of laws. Just like the stupid warning labels on products (ie. Do not use electrical device in bathtub), someone has hurt themselves because they were a moron.
Coupled with better drivers, we all need better cars and safer driving conditions...but unfortunately we are stuck driving tin cans with 20and 40 ton trucks all around us, and you can't correct that with better training.Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
Bottom line is this, I want you to explore this point for just a moment, no matter how well you drive, how safe your car is, no matter what speed you are going, you are taking a risk on the road. Those risks are partly your own responsibility, and the responsibility of every other driver you may encounter on your road trip—people you’ve never met before you have to trust with your life! Responsibilities ranging from proper wheel alignments, good tires, securing loads in the back of a truck, and tuning out the crying baby in the back seat, just to name 4 of the 2 or 3 million variables that will be encountered. (here comes the part I want you to discuss), fact is that if all circumstances are absolutely identical, would you rather your family (mom, dad, wife, kids, girlfriend, who ever it is, as long as it is someone you care deeply about), be in a high speed collision, or a slower, more easily controlled, or at least easily absorbed wreck?
And that my friend is a somber note. Cops investigate accidents often enough to be able to determine how fast a car was going, from skid marks, to how deeply crushed in the car is around it's victims. They know when this was a 50 mph hit or a 90mph hit. Escape, you are no expert, you are not all knowing. Neither are these cops, true, but they have a much longer track record and life experience to qualify for their credibility.Quote:
Originally Posted by gazzak
Consider this question...
Two vehicles are travelling along the Motorway/Freeway/Autobahn whatever, one in lane two and one in lane three.
The vehicle in lane two is travelling at 70 mph
The vehicle in lane three is travelling at 100mph
At a given point the vehicles are alongside one another.
At this point they both have stop because of an obstruction ahead.
The vehicle in lane 2 skids from 70mph to a stop. At what speed is the vehicle in lane three still travelling when the vehicle in lane 2 is stationary ?
Answer below.....
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
The answer
The vehicle in lane three will still be travelling at 71mph???
100mph = 147ft per sec. On impact it all ends in less than half a second?
Will you have time to work it out......?
I've driven in Europe, North America and Australia... I grew up on a farm so I started driving at 7.... I have driven 25000Km in one month and over 100,000 KM in one summer... And you are commenting on the fact my father need my truck and we traded for the weekend... Get your A$$ of the high horse and talk about the issues not personally insult me.... And you are right with your first point Carelessness is the major problem... And being careless a 5 MPH can kill very quickly... TRAINING TRAINING TRAINING that stops careless Errors.. Thats the way the army stops carelessness...Quote:
Originally Posted by Ya_know
Then how come German AutoBahns have less deaths per million miles ??Quote:
Originally Posted by gazzak
And your an Expert ???Quote:
Originally Posted by Ya_know
Found that article, have a read here. It is very well written.
Here's the best bit...
"We're here to make the roads a safer and better place, we only want the drivers that drive badly, showing no respect to other road users", one officer told me.
Ok once again what does a speed limit have to do with bad drivers... Get bad drivers off the road and give them tickets... Speed does not make a bad driver... Carelessness and lack of training does !!!Quote:
Originally Posted by gazzak
I think we need electric "smart" cars that drive themselves (like in several movies). You program in the destination and it drives you there, all the while it is communicating with the other cars on the road and working in unison with them. It will have a few bugs to work out but in the long run make everyone much safer. I know I drive too fast sometimes, and others may drive too slow. Traffic usually has a flow to it, the best drivers get in this flow, not too fast or slow. Unfortunately, everyone has their own way of driving, and too fast or slow, or talking on cell phones, etc. are all hazardous. My ride to work would just be so much more relaxing if a computer drove. I would just chill out and play a game or read a book. It would be good.
Yep thats a great idea.... Now thats an idea that would make things saferQuote:
Originally Posted by edball
Unless it ran on a Microsoft product. That would give systems crash a whole new meaning.Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
I was stationed in Germany for 3 1/2 years, and drove quite a few kilometers on the autobahn. Here's why you have a statistical difference:Quote:
Originally Posted by Escape_Driver
1) The autobahns are very well maintained. No potholes. Just long, sweeping curves and straightaways.
2) German drivers take classes for two years to get their drivers license. This doesn't necessarily make them better drivers, but it probably helps.
3) Passing on the right is against German law. The faster cars are in the left lanes, and slower cars and trucks in the right lanes.
MD
Passing on the right is illegal here too, but people whine that cops are pulling them over for "stupid reasons" when they get caught.Quote:
Originally Posted by MadDog