Suzuki Samurai was Re: [geeks] SPARC proprietary (waaaay

[N. Miller]

--On Monday, October 13, 2003 3:10 PM -0400 Phil Stracchino 
<alaric at caerllewys.net> wrote:
> Well, I don't know where "out west" you are.  But I lived in Washington
> State and California for almost 20 years with significant driving back
> and forth between, and while the highways aren't always as well
> manitained as I've seen them in *some* other areas of the US, it's
> frequently several hundred miles between cities.  I recall a study some
> years back which found that the largest single cause of fatalitles on
> interstate highways in the western US was "single-vehicle accidents
> involving driver inattention" -- translation, the driver fell asleep at
> the wheel because he was bored out of his skull.  Quite honestly, on
> most of the western-US interstates, I see nothing whatsoever
> unreasonable about the late, lamented Montana highway speed-limit
> policy:  "Reasonable and prudent during daylight hours."

And the Montana answer to the 55-mi/hr speed limit:
$5 fine payable to the officer at the time of ticket
writing, assessable once.

Nothing in the federal law that said that the states
had to *enforce* the speed limit, just that they had
to have it.

The 55mph limit was passed during the "energy crisis"
based on dubious evidence that 55mph was the optimum
speed for highest miles per gallon.  Additional support
for it came from the high number of highway fatalities.
Research had shown that the highway fatality rate was
largely due to vehicles traveling at disparate speeds
(i.e. the speed limit was 85; some drove 90, some drove
85, some drove 60).

Interstate speeds in CA, AZ, NV, NM, and TX are now
75mph (other highways in NV and TX are as well, can't
remember about AZ or NM); I don't know whether this
speed was based on statistical analysis of the
fatality rate prior to the 85 mph limit or not.

(FYI: It is a felony to drive over 85 in NV, regardless
of conditions--they can arrest you on the spot if they
are in the mood for it.)

=Nadine=