Posted on 02/26/2014 11:06:56 AM PST by Kennesaw
Those who lollygag in the left lane of highways and interstates could be ticketed under legislation approved in the state House on Wednesday. House Bill 459, by Rep. Bill Hitchens, R-Rincon, was approved 162-9.
The bill makes it a misdemeanor for any driver on a divided highway who does not move to the right when a car going faster approaches from behind.
(Excerpt) Read more at ajc.com ...
Slow driving in general no, but neither does fast driving in general. The part of speed that causes the most accidents is being outside of the norm, the guy that’s got more than a 20 MPH differential from the rest of traffic is the guy that is going to get somebody hurt, maybe from too much bobbing and weaving, maybe from being in too many blind spots too often, maybe from being a rolling roadblock and being in the way.
We can make it so driving 90MPH won’t result in more accidents, unfortunately to do that we ALL need to go to driving school, and REAL driving school not the crap we do in America. The fact is our licenses come out of crackerjack boxes. I know a lot of people who’ve switched countries, both leaving America and coming to it, every American I know that got a license in another country failed the test at least once, every European I know that got a license here was shocked by how short and easy the test was. The average American DL exam is easier than the average learner’s permit in Europe.
Slower speeds don’t mean less accidents, the accident rate dropped when we went from 55 to 75. Slower speeds mean the accidents cause less fatalities but you run into issues like driver boredom, more road fatigue (25% reduction in speed means 25% longer time behind the wheel), and more scofflaws making up their own speed limit getting more variations in the speeds people are driving. The best was to reduce fatalities is fewer accidents, and the best way to have less accidents is better drivers, drivers that are competent at 90 or 100 MPH. Our fatality rate is 10.4 per 100,000, Germany’s is 4.4, England’s is 2.75. The answer is better drivers.
The truth is always a good answer. Confrontational drivers are reckless drivers. And being the rolling roadblock guy is being confrontational.
Texas DPS began enforcement of this driving in the latter part of 2013 in the Houston area.
I don’t know the results of this effort.
DPS to enforce left lane law today
snip
Although relatively unknown and rarely enforced, the state of Texas has a statute that
prohibits driving in the left lane of a multiple lane road, unless for the purpose of
passing other vehicles, or making a left turn.
Department of Public Safety troopers from Montgomery and Fort Bend counties will
spend today patrolling areas in Montgomery, Fort Bend, Waller and parts of Harris
County to enforce the statute.
“The violators of this statute (545.051 of the Texas Transportation Code) clog
freeways and highways causing needless obstructions to the smooth flow of traffic,”
said Warren Diepraam, chief prosecutor of the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office.
end snip
Statute is cited at the source article.
A lane for law abiding citizens and five more for the rest of us.
That’s part of the sublime quirkiness of your remarkable proposition — that obedience to law can be “confrontational.”
You are raising a thought provoking question — almost Zen like.
You can't be serious.
I see idiots driving the speed limit driving dangerously all the time. How about the guy dawdling along in the 4th lane starting from the right, who is getting passed by traffic to his right that is normal flow, who suddenly decides he needs to cut across all those lanes to make an exit? Besides all the near-collisions, let’s throw in a likely gore violation as well. And all at your wonderful speed limit.
I can come up with plenty of other scenarios seen regularly that meet your criteria. Anyone who drives around the ATL area regularly and is paying attention does.
Cutting across lanes or committing other infractions— reckless.
But what about obeying the law, absent infractions? Is that reckless?
Seriously, I’m curious about what people seem to be thinking.
http://www.motorists.org/chapters/alaska
I remembered this one from living there. Even if there is only 2 lane, one each direction, they have to pull off the road when able to let the other traffic past.
Twisting mountain roads with lots of rise and fall and a land yacht from the lower 48 make a lot of Alaskan Drivers wait too long.
I saw a 18-wheeler do something that helps out a lot.
When traffic is heavy on the highway where there are no lights or stop signs to disrupt the flow, he got in the middle lane and gave the vehicle ahead of him a LONG distance. Everyone around kept pace, changed lanes, and traffic kept moving. Sure, everyone wasn’t doing the posted speed limit, but at least it wasn’t stop-and-go the whole while. Traffic flowed smooth and constant.
I can’t understand how riding on the bumper of the car in front of you somehow makes you get to your destination any faster.
If you are blocking the passing lane, you are not obeying the law.
If there is a passing lane, you should be passing.
A couple of years ago I was passing by Atlanta on 285 when I approached someone in the left lane doing 55 in moderate traffic. After a couple of minutes, I decided to flash him to get over. For what ever reason the driver, decided to make a total stop in the left lane on an interstate. Either the person was too stupid to have a drivers license or they were contemplating suicide and taking me and my passenger with them. Be careful out there...
There is little worse than a smug NorCal Prius driver self-righteously slowing traffic. I have seen that type often on visits out there.
>>So what you are saying is that people who obey the rule of law while driving are evil people.
Anyone who calls most highway speed limits “the rule of law” (while implicitly genuflecting) is nominated for jackboot-licker status in my book.
And the only “evil” (I’d say “sociopathic”) ones are those who self-righteously impose their own speed judgment upon others, cloaked with the mantle of government authority, just because a bureaucrat put a number of a sign. It’s OK to drive slower than others - but not in the left lane.
>>But people, like you I suppose you, who drive dangerously i.e. 15-20+ mph over the speed limit are not unlike radical leftists for whom laws are made to be broken.
Your rhetoric begs the question (look I used that phrase correctly) of whether those who drive over the limit are really dangerous to the public than others, or less safe to the public than they would be if they drove slower. The engineering studies would surprise you. (The slowest are more likely to be involved in accidents than those who travel at 10-20 over the limit.)
To be a thinking conservative, you must open you mind to the fact that there’s a question of whether a speed limit might not be respectable as “rule of law” but instead the imposition of irrational and harmful (to the public safety) regulations for other purposes.
If your mind won’t open to that question, then my only question for you is: How do you get the taste of jackboot polish out of your mouth?
Blind obedience is for dogs and children.
One of my kids pointed out that we were speeding on the Perimeter one day during moderate traffic. I slowed down to the speed limit for them to make a point. After about 60 seconds they were begging me to speed back up.
do you expect me to speed up and make an unsafe lane change?
And unless you’re talking about motorcycles, it’s “Bimmer” not “Beamer” (sic).
And if you want to enhance your case, try “crashing into my bumper at a million miles an hour!” instead of your rhetoric.
I doubt slow driving in general leads to more accidents than fast driving.
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