That is the traffic flow on the new I-355 extension.
Flat, straight, and three lanes, with nearly virgin pavement.

Blago has got to go! (so does Daley)

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/blagojevich/1095739,CST-NWS-blago07.article

James my point exactly. Us has only 75,000 compared to Geramans 12,000. How much larger is the Us than Germany in size?

James writes:
“While secondary and tertiary roads (and urban streets) endure higher crash-, injury- and fatality rates, it is not at all clear that “speeding” or even “speed too fast for conditions” *caused* those crashes in the first place. NHTSA does not assign causation although they do want the reader to infer it when they use “speed-related” in their verbiage. That currently includes any vehicle in excess of a posted limit, too fast for conditions, too slow for conditions, and “unsafe lane changes” (their words). So, if you have evidence that is unavailable to NHTSA, you need to present it here. The insurance companies will send buckets of cash your way.”

James it does not matter in a crash if speeding was the cause or not. If it is even involved in an accident it makes the accident worse unless you think that getting hit at 60 mph is better than getting hit at 30 mph. It is a fact that speeding is a primary factor im a certain percentage of accidents. When you pull out onto a road that is at the bottom of a hill you have no control how fast someone is flying over the hill. You just hope there is no one driving 60 mph because they will hit you because their stopping distance is a lot lot farther.

James says:
” {It has been proven that many drivers start driving more and more aggressively. The longer they do it the more aggressive they drive with faster speeds because their confidence level then increases until they have an accident or a near accident or get caught by the police a few times.}

Who proved this? When? Where?”

I do not have the reports in front of me but it was a phsycology report. Did you start driving the first time you started drving at 120 mph? I know there are some that have. I had a classmate at high school that did. He was not at our first reunion for a major reason.

Your reports that you are always referring to are often flawed. Things like miles of road or speed at a location are true and verifiable. Things like cause of accidents and miles driven in the US are far more complex. An example : There may be a hundred different factors that make up the results what a report should be showing. How many of these factors are used in a report? 10? 20? To get a report of miles driven to be accurate you would need hundreds of thousands of sample points on our roadways to be close to accurate. The same is true for miles driven on interstates. Our roads heve hundreds of variables in them from visibility road conditons turns onramps and it goes on and on. There are very few reports that show the exact reasons and percentages why things happen on our roads.

Yep, so far so good. Why, then, do highway patrols focus on the safest roads?

{ If a country has more of these it is going to be safer. Germany has far more multilane roadways also making it even safer.}

Far more than what or where? If you’re comparing with the US Interstate system, you’re a little short. The US has 47,000 miles or over 75,000 kilometers of Interstates, not counting the Interstate-grade but excluded mileage such as the Hollywood Freeway (US 101). Germany has 12,000 kilometers of Bundesautobahnen. You’re only off by a factor of 6.

{ In the US the standard interstate has only two lanes going one direction except near major cities making large differences in speed between the two lanes at times. Interstate roads have cars all driving the same direction and limited merging traffic from other roads compared to roads in towns or even rural roads in the country.}

Just like the autobahnen. Note, however, that US standard lanes are slightly wider than their German counterpart but the autobahnen uses a thicker, stronger base.

{ Speeding on these other roads causes a lot more deaths and injuries and accidents.}

While secondary and tertiary roads (and urban streets) endure higher crash-, injury- and fatality rates, it is not at all clear that “speeding” or even “speed too fast for conditions” *caused* those crashes in the first place. NHTSA does not assign causation although they do want the reader to infer it when they use “speed-related” in their verbiage. That currently includes any vehicle in excess of a posted limit, too fast for conditions, too slow for conditions, and “unsafe lane changes” (their words). So, if you have evidence that is unavailable to NHTSA, you need to present it here. The insurance companies will send buckets of cash your way.

{The other roads often follow the contour of the land having far more small hills and turns and cross streets than interstate roadways making it far more likely to have accidents.}

The autobahnen follow the contours of the land, utilizing wide sweeping curves that help keep drivers awake and alert.

{That being said it is still more dangerous to travel an interstate road at a faster speed than to have everyone drive slower speed.}

Source, please.

{It has been proven that many drivers start driving more and more aggressively. The longer they do it the more aggressive they drive with faster speeds because their confidence level then increases until they have an accident or a near accident or get caught by the police a few times.}

Who proved this? When? Where?

{James you are all about proof. All I can say is how did you get to be as old as you are without killing yourself reading some book while you are driving trying to figure out what you are to do next. Too bad you can not think for yourself.}

You are talking about establishing public policy and that requires a solid, quantifiable basis of knowledge rather than the guesswork that has generated so much of our legal framework, e.g., Nixon’s establishment of the NMSL in the hopes that it would do something about the embargo, not to mention make him look assertive in the face of the looming impeachment. I have this old-fashioned belief that laws (public policy) must actually work, hence the demand for proof.