That’s quite a can o’ worms to open!
What would be even safer than me bumping up to 82 to expedite the pass would be me traveling at 85 to 90 with no other idiots on the highway! However, much as I might like that I don’t think it’s happening....nor is the Trooper who just clocked me doing 83 going to accept my plea that it was safer to drive that speed because of the idiot riding my ass.
Do we have a resident highway safety expert? I’b bet there are a number of studies out there correlating higher speeds to increased incidence of accidents...as well as with increased severity of injuries and fatalities in higher speed accidents. If it’s statistically safest to limit speeds to 65/70 then maybe speed limits (and traffic enforcement) are more about safety than revenue? If everyone followed the speed limits perhaps we’d all be safer and we’d have better traffic flow?
Most of my highway driving is done above posted speed limits....so I can’t exactly say I’m a proponent/fan of them!
There is an accepted engineering approach to setting speed limits based on the 85th percentile speed—the speed at which 85 percent of free-flowing traffic is traveling at or below. The typical procedure is to set the speed limit at or near the 85th percentile speed of free-flow traffic. Adjustments to either increase or decrease the speed limits may be made depending on infrastructure and traffic conditions.
This method removes large differences between motorists' speeds. When there are large differences between motorists speed there are more accidents. States are usually supposed to use this method, but many times post slower speed limits at the 50th percentile and in many cases lower than 50th percentile due to political pressure. When speed limits are at or lower than the 50th percentile, more than 50% of motorists are now "speeding". This discourages compliance and by extension law enforcement. When a speed limit is set at 55mph (what happened to 60mph??) and the 85th percentile is 70mph, you are going to have a big deviation between drivers. This makes highways less safe.
There are sections of the NYS Thruway, a limited access highway with separated opposing traffic, breakdown lanes and long sightlines, lots of guardrails, where the speed limit is 55mph. At the same time, there are roads like Rt 28 to Gore Mtn from Warrensburg that are one lane in each direction, full of blind hills/turns and opposing traffic, no breakdown lanes, trees, telephone poles, hidden driveways, cross streets, commercial driveways, school bus stops and bicyclists, and the speed limit is 55 mph. How is this possible?
It is possible because highway speed limits are set under the fake notion that slower is "safer", but the reality is there is money to be made. If safety was a real concern, patrol officers would patrol at the posted speed limits, but this would cost money, so officers drive unmarked vehicles, hide and use radar to randomly ticket "speeders" in the name of safety.
