Coming back from the Angels game last night I was driving in the 2 lane and came upon a car doing exactly 58 miles per hour (I know because I followed it for a mile or so). My first inclination was to become frustrated but my second inclination was to write a post about it. The freeway is the greatest and the worst thing about driving. By nature I love to drive, but nothing makes me want to take public transportation more than the freeway. Sometimes I think about how great it would be to have an Autobahn like system. Then I snap back to reality and realize that it could never happen in this country. Why is that? Let us count the ways.
1. We do not have enough aggregate driving skill. Many of us in this country, especially in the Los Angeles area, come from different areas of the world where driving is not an everyday part of life. It is very difficult to take a mature adult who has never driven and make them drive. It is a skill that needs to be learned from early in life, sort of like speaking a second language. It is hard to trust those with little to no history of driving with being able to choose their own speed on the highway.
2. Government and law enforcement still have a worldview that is set in the 1950's. Basically it is slow down, slow down, slow down. Setting low speed limits 50 years ago made sense for a couple reasons. First, there were gas shortages and going slower improved gas mileage. Second, cars were quite unsafe compared with modern standards. Seat belts weren't even standard yet. If there was an accident at those speeds a driver would surely be killed. Now there are routinely accidents on the freeway where everyone walks away. Cars are built better and safer and will not fall apart and shudder if the odometer hits 90 or 100 mph. Speed differential kills. There are folks who will drive as fast as they want regardless of the speed limit and many who stick to 65 mph because it's the law, many of these folks occupying all lanes instead of the right hand lanes. If we had a system where those slower cars had to stay to the right and fast cars could go fast we would have much better traffic flow without all the lane changes to clog everything up.
3. There are too many trucks on the road. I understand that these large 18 wheel trucks are the backbone of our economy. I get it. But can we tell these truck drivers to stay in the right hand lane? There is nothing more aggravating than coming up on a snarl of traffic created when a truck ventured into the 2 lane to pass a truck in the 3 lane at 61 mph who was passing a truck in the right hand lane at 59 mph. Seriously guys, I know we're all trying to make our times but we need to just accept the 59 mph and move on. There are many other cars on the road who would like to do more than 61 mph. There is no reason to have trucks 3 wide on a 4 lane freeway. Any truck in the 2 lane should get an automatic ticket. Any truck in the 3 lane for longer than it takes to pass another vehicle should be ticketed as well. It would keep the other 3 lanes free for cars and allow for better traffic flow. This will never happen however because "long-haul trucking is what built this country."
4. Americans are simply too distracted when they drive. If you ever go to Germany you will find that on the Autobahn, drivers are doing something revolutionary: they are driving! They are not talking on cell phones, yelling at their kids, eating, applying makeup, reading the newspaper or conducting an orchestra in their cars. All they do is focus on driving. This is a great idea since driving at 110 mph takes quite a bit of concentration. I just do not think American drivers have the discipline to simply focus on the road with a little bit of light background music to ease the long drive. Driving at over 100 mph while trying to read a map or talk on the phone is a recipe for disaster and would be inevitable.
I wish we could all be better drivers and could enjoy the liberating feeling of being able to get to your destination as fast as you would like without having to look in your mirrors every two seconds checking for Highway Patrol cars. Driving from L.A. to Las Vegas shouldn't take 6 hours if one travels the speed limit. You should be able to get there in 3 hours if you have a safe car and are comfortable driving at high speeds. Unfortunately we have no way to insert a driving chip to make everyone a great driver. Yet.
Thanks for reading and big balls.
1. We do not have enough aggregate driving skill. Many of us in this country, especially in the Los Angeles area, come from different areas of the world where driving is not an everyday part of life. It is very difficult to take a mature adult who has never driven and make them drive. It is a skill that needs to be learned from early in life, sort of like speaking a second language. It is hard to trust those with little to no history of driving with being able to choose their own speed on the highway.
2. Government and law enforcement still have a worldview that is set in the 1950's. Basically it is slow down, slow down, slow down. Setting low speed limits 50 years ago made sense for a couple reasons. First, there were gas shortages and going slower improved gas mileage. Second, cars were quite unsafe compared with modern standards. Seat belts weren't even standard yet. If there was an accident at those speeds a driver would surely be killed. Now there are routinely accidents on the freeway where everyone walks away. Cars are built better and safer and will not fall apart and shudder if the odometer hits 90 or 100 mph. Speed differential kills. There are folks who will drive as fast as they want regardless of the speed limit and many who stick to 65 mph because it's the law, many of these folks occupying all lanes instead of the right hand lanes. If we had a system where those slower cars had to stay to the right and fast cars could go fast we would have much better traffic flow without all the lane changes to clog everything up.
3. There are too many trucks on the road. I understand that these large 18 wheel trucks are the backbone of our economy. I get it. But can we tell these truck drivers to stay in the right hand lane? There is nothing more aggravating than coming up on a snarl of traffic created when a truck ventured into the 2 lane to pass a truck in the 3 lane at 61 mph who was passing a truck in the right hand lane at 59 mph. Seriously guys, I know we're all trying to make our times but we need to just accept the 59 mph and move on. There are many other cars on the road who would like to do more than 61 mph. There is no reason to have trucks 3 wide on a 4 lane freeway. Any truck in the 2 lane should get an automatic ticket. Any truck in the 3 lane for longer than it takes to pass another vehicle should be ticketed as well. It would keep the other 3 lanes free for cars and allow for better traffic flow. This will never happen however because "long-haul trucking is what built this country."
4. Americans are simply too distracted when they drive. If you ever go to Germany you will find that on the Autobahn, drivers are doing something revolutionary: they are driving! They are not talking on cell phones, yelling at their kids, eating, applying makeup, reading the newspaper or conducting an orchestra in their cars. All they do is focus on driving. This is a great idea since driving at 110 mph takes quite a bit of concentration. I just do not think American drivers have the discipline to simply focus on the road with a little bit of light background music to ease the long drive. Driving at over 100 mph while trying to read a map or talk on the phone is a recipe for disaster and would be inevitable.
I wish we could all be better drivers and could enjoy the liberating feeling of being able to get to your destination as fast as you would like without having to look in your mirrors every two seconds checking for Highway Patrol cars. Driving from L.A. to Las Vegas shouldn't take 6 hours if one travels the speed limit. You should be able to get there in 3 hours if you have a safe car and are comfortable driving at high speeds. Unfortunately we have no way to insert a driving chip to make everyone a great driver. Yet.
Thanks for reading and big balls.
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