top | item 25220919

(no title)

pritovido | 5 years ago

The great thing about Autobahns is freedom.

If I travel in Spain, the speed limit is 120km/h. Now they have removed the 20 kms/h extra you could do for overtaking other cars. It is ludicrous.

Everybody goes over the limit, and hence everybody goes against the law, and everybody could be fined with 300 euros, like my father 1 month ago.

In cities, they are putting limits under 30km/h.

Politicians love the fines because it is an extra tax of an extra billion euros nobody controls.

discuss

order

usrusr|5 years ago

The great thing isn't freedom, it's that the huge speed differences between cars help a lot with keeping drivers focused. People drive instead of just waiting out the time until their exit pops up on the nav. This effect has quite a bit of inertia so that even the speed-limited parts benefit from it so that a blanket speed limit would likely make the already limited sections less safe, after adapting to the relative ease of blanket speed limits. Chances are that overall safety would still increase, but I'm not sure of that (short term it would definitely increase, but that effect could quickly erode as people get used to it).

crispyporkbites|5 years ago

Reducing the speed limit saves lives and reduces overall traffic as people switch to alternative modes of transport.

Do you object to seatbelt laws under the premise of "Freedom"? What about car safety standards? Isn't it more "Free" if we can make whatever car I want and sell it to whomever wants to buy it, even if it kills millions every year?

The truth is that we need to look at improving society holistically, which means implementing and designing society in a way that benefits humankind over the long term. Civilization isn't very "Free" but it's a trade off we make to live in a fair and progressive society, and allows us to combat things like covid, natural disasters, growing populations and other challenges that face the human race.