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Originally Posted by Bror Jace
In the midst of $4 per gallon hysteria, I started a thread about this a year and a half ago. The discussion in it was very good, if I do say so myself:
http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...5mph-3732.html
I came to my own personal conclusion that speed limits are a foolish and misguided way to save fuel nationally.
1) Most fuel is wasted idling at parking lots or stuck in traffic, NOT cruising at 70mph on the highway. |
It is refreshing to read an observation that makes sense.
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2) It costs a great deal of money and fuel to enforce speed limits, reducing the gains you are trying to make.
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Oh, but it guarantees employment for Highway Patrol squads - most of whom probably enjoy their duties.
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As one person noted very early on in this thread, let's encourage manufacturers to make more efficient vehicles that can do 60-70mph and still get 50mpg. It's do-able ... but not if we are going to be driving gas guzzling, squared-off pieces of $#i+ that get terrible economy at any speed.
Until then, please err on the side of freedom. 
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Government is not geared towards doing that. Government has the tendency toward increasing its power, with the approval of the electorate, whom they constantly persuade that more is better, legislatively speaking.
Unfortunately, in our society the voting public believes that more laws will somehow make them safer. Politicians and legislators are nearly always lawyers by profession. They will be the first to exploit the sentiment of the public that says "there oughta be a law!" or "a thing like that shouldn't be allowed!". Both are authoritarian tendencies in our culture.
Legislators justify their positions of power (and their employment) by churning out more legislation. Hence, we get more laws which are essentially restrictions. More laws = less liberty.
So don't expect America to "err on the side of freedom" any time soon. One of the few virtues of democracy is that we end up getting what we deserve and much later realizing it wasn't what we expected.
Here's a suggestion: Do you really want to cut gas consumption? Take down most of the stop signs and replace them with YIELD signs.
But don't expect any litigation lawyer or legislator to be in favor of the idea. If you go through a yield sign and hit someone it's a prima facie case. Lawyers don't like that. It would leave them with less to argue about or debate in court... and that might result in less work for lawyers.