Report 7

Links to pages on speeding

For all the stats on speeding, traffic accidents, fatalaties related to traffic, and tickets you could ever want on California, check out The California Office of Traffic. Did you know that Speed is a factor in 31 percent of all fatal crashes nationwide and is one of the most prevelant contributing factors in all traffic crashes. The human and economic sacrifice is immense with an economic cost to society equaling almost $24 bilion each year. Last year in California, 493 people were killed and 78,516 were injured. For more stats like this check it out!
Most of the pages that I found on speeding were about how to avoid getting caught speeding and how to react to the officer in court. One such page gave tips on speeding and tells of how to be more alert for the police and how to make yourself less visible to them. Another gives us tips on successful speeding.

Another went as far as to tell us what to do when caught speeding . It tells of what to do and how to act when the officer pulls you over for a ticket. It also gives tips on what questions to ask and how to present your case in court and many different ways to get out of a ticket or at least the maximize your chances of getting off.
Another page talks about the lifted speed limits Yes, It's official. The federal speed limit of 55 miles per hour was abolished on Tuesday (11-28-95). In a move to return more power to the states, Clinton signed a bill that will allow the states to decide the speed limit of their highways. States have reacted in interesting ways. Some, such as Montana, have completely abolished the speed limit on its interstates during the day. A few other states raised their speed limits to seventy-five.

Although I often find myself accidentally going a few miles over the speed limit, I don't think that is such a good idea to raise it to 75 MPH or to abolish it durring certian hours. The reason being that it is too dangerous, people will be driving faster and as a result if an accident occurs it will more likely result in death or at least a higher percentage. We have enough problems, cutting each other off and tailgating with the current speed limits in place, how can we expect to get along at higher speeds? We are just setting ourselves up for more trouble.
Some argue,"the fact that the fifty-five mile per hour speed limit was set during an energy crisis, and that we are not in one now." Although it may be true that we don't have an energy crisis, there are rapidly increasing environmental issues and until internal gasoline combustion is reduced to nothing we can not take the environment for granted. Some of you may be aware that Honda has a running model of a Civic with a new engine that has almost zero emitions, although this may be so, there are still billions of cars which don't have this kind of technology. And anyways I heard a fact that if we keep useing fossil fuels at the same rate, in 20 years we will completely deplete our supply of any fossil fuel.
Another point that people raise is, "the blatant disregard that most citizens show for the speed limit today. Police barely seem to ticket anyone for less than reckless driving. People are frustrated with the current system of speeding ticket distribution. A driver may pass a police officer untouched at 80 miles per hour one day, but receive a ticket for driving at 75 the next. This random apportionment of punishment does very little to curb speeding; the only purpose it seems to serve is to anger citizens.

Well I think that people who get away with it one day and get caught the next, should be glad that they didn't get caught both times rather than be frustrated that they got cought only once!! It seems to me that these people will speed even if they caught. So by lifting the speed limit we are only giving in to them and making their dangerous actions legal.

I think that people will speed no matter what the speed limit is, it's only because we are acustome to having speed limits at 55 that we feel the need to go faster. If we raise the speed limit to 75 MPH then soon that will be the norm and we will want to raise it to 90 the 100, and on and on. In Psychology its called desensetization. It's like music, television, and the movies, look back at the movies of the 70's, 80's and 90's and compair them to each other. We once fealt that Elvis' swingin' hips were not appropriate for television, at first we told him that he had to sing sitting down, then camera opperators were told to only shoot him from the waist up! Now days thats nothin'! We always want to push the envalope. A regular television show like 90210 or Married With Children would stun parents in the 70's. Now it OK to say crap and bitch on TV, I've heard it myself! We can't let this same kind of thing go on with the speed limits, because they can kill.
One point that people for higher speed limits point out is, "The police can play a part in making higher speed limits work. While recognizing the fact that drivers will be allowed to drive faster, they can impose stiffer penalties on those who do speed. Instead of a slap on the wrist, a speeding ticket should become a much more serious matter. This disincentive to speed, combined with the boost of the speed limit, should create a more homogeneous population on the roads. For those who don't believe that harsher penalties will decrease speeding, we can always commission Michael Fay to do a report on the speeding problem in Singapore."

Well my resopnse to this is, "Why can't we do this now with the current speed limits?!!"

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