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Comment by margorczynski | Hacker News Reader

I think a general speed limit for all vehicles would be a good idea. If you want it removed then your vehicle can't travel public roads, any kind of modification of it in secret would be a crime.

Not sure about the US but in Europe (at least the EU) 150km/h max would be fine, at least it would make life harder for some sociopaths that treat public roads as a racing track.

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EU includes Germany with its no-limit Autobahns. Left lane usually does around 180km/h, with occasional vehicles going way past 200km/h. Even 300km/h is not unheard of.

I kind of hoped more EU would become like that, not the other way round.

I am convinced after having spent time in Germany that for Autobahns to work in other countries, you'd need to import Germans to exclusively drive on them. If you are used to driving in the US or in the central/South America, the German driver is basically an incredibly superior species from another planet.

When I visited, Autobahn left lane traffic seemed to be about 50% people in black Audis and BMWs tailgating and flashing their lights at other drivers who dare to only drive at 90MPH.

To be fair, they should move to the right if they aren't passing.

I grew up in Texas, but have spent most of my adult life in Germany. It's not that Germans are innately better drivers, it's that there's not the same level of cultural entitlement to a driver's license. Driving is a privilege, not a right. This causes them to take it more seriously.

For starters, driver education is taken a lot more seriously - it's not a one-semester elective in high school or something your parents pay $500 for you to do over a few weeks in the summer before you turn 16, and you cannot take a road test without it, no matter how old you are. People save up for driver's ed in Germany; depending on how many lessons it takes for you to learn the actual driving part, it costs anywhere from 2000 EUR to 5000 EUR. Your license will have a note if you took your test on an automatic, restricting you from driving a manual shift, so everyone makes sure to learn how to drive a manual shift for the test.

They also more readily accept strict suspensions for a level of traffic tickets that most Americans would find excessively harsh - get a few 15-20 km/h (10-15 mph) over within a two or three year period, and your license will be fully suspended for a month, no "work and school" exception.

DUI is also taken far more seriously - if your license is suspended for that, there aren't any "work and school" exceptions either, and if you were drunk enough, or it was a repeat offence, you might have to pass the "medical-psychological exam" (MPU) to ever get it back, involving six months without touching alcohol and a bunch of other things that I've heard are a huge pain.

Part of what sustains widespread acceptance to high barriers to a license is that while Germans love to complain about how bad Deutsche Bahn (rail service) delays have gotten (even I'm starting to get irritated), it's still far more feasible to live a middle-class adult life without driving in a mid-sized city than it would be to in a comparable US metro area.

You'd also have to import German road design, construction and maintenance, and I'm pretty sure my people are unwilling to pay for that. The first time I visited home after a few months in Germany, I was initially afraid I'd get caught driving like I do here.

Nope, not even a temptation, because after a few months of driving here, the roads in Texas had too many random cracks and other inconsistencies for me to feel comfortable driving any faster than the other people on the road, and I even found myself driving a bit more slowly than a lot of the others!

I feel far safer driving here than I do in Texas or anywhere else in the US, no matter how fast the occasional vehicle blasts past in the left lane. The price of fuel and the level of strict attention that going any faster requires keeps most people cruising at a max of 130 kmh/80 mph.

more people have driver license in los angeles metro area than entire country of germany :)

in america everyone from 15/16 through their death needs a car for basic functioning life, in germany though - not as much. german driver only seem superior…

It really is so obviously reasonable it makes you wonder why this isn't already in place. For instance e-bikes are all speed and power limited, why aren't cars?

I think this is a valid comparison. I believe eBikes are limited for safety of the rider and other cyclists they share the bike lane with, otherwise they would practically be a different class of vehicle and a menace. The exact same logic would apply to cars.

It would take a lot more effort and political will to roll this out to millions of vehicles already on the road than to enforce it on a budding new vehicle category, though. That's pretty much how new safety codes always work.

No, they aren’t. The big brands’ sell limited e-bikes, but there’s a massive market for unlimited e-bikes that are basically electric motorbikes with nominal pedals to try and pass as bikes.

Well I mean, in Canada, Europe and the US these would be illegal if they're able to go more than 32, 25, and 40 km/h respectively. That doesn't mean there aren't illegal ebikes out there but I think the vast majority of e-bikes on the road comply with the legal limits.

40kmh? What’s that in Freedom Units? (j/k)

The US is a hodgepodge of local laws. AFAIK, there is no federal speed limit for e-bikes. The class 1/2/3 designation is optional. And class 3 often conflicts with local laws.

Combine this with a -/- 10 km/h per speeding ticket for a year or two and you’ve got a pretty optimal situation!

In my younger years groups of friends would rent time on racing tracks in Ontario and Quebec. Mecaglisse and Shannonville tracks were a couple that I drove on, at speeds of over 220kph.

This would be incredibly annoying. You what, have to tow your car to a track if you want to race? So now you need two vehicles?

Given that outright street racing is common amongst blue-collar or inner-city demographics, this is an unrealistic expectation that will just push more people away from legal venues. It's a policy that says "you can't enjoy your hobby" in disguise that shows disregard for others' preferences, plus it's practically difficult.

I don't know how much racing you do, but as far as I've seen, racers do tow their race cars to the track. They rent or own tow trailers and transporters.

Race cars are usually heavily modified and aren't street legal, and the drivers don't want them dinged up on the way to the track, and if they fail while racing they need a way to get it back home.

If you're racing a street-legal car on a track... it's unlikely to be very good at racing, compared to all the other cars there that are stripped to bare minimum.

Perhaps you're thinking of a demographic who can't even afford a second car but like the idea of racing anyway, so they break all laws and race the one car do they have, on public streets without permission, which is strongly disregarding others' preferences for remaining alive, uncrippled, and their vehicles and street furniture remaining unscathed.

You are talking about serious people not street racers. This is not the demographic who's going down my street five nights a week at a hundred mph in clapped out mitsubishi.

It's a spectrum. If you're really serious you buy a trailer and all that. But people do bring their street legal cars to the track all the time. Either because they go to the track as an occasional hobby or they don't have the money to shell out for a second car just for racing (i.e. they're young).

Towing your racecar to the track is an incredibly common thing. You're going to be using your vehicle to its limits, things can go massively wrong. You don't want your only way home to break on the racetrack. Plus you probably have some amount of supporting equipment.

You seem to assume this particular demographic you speak of only does so in venues:

https://komonews.com/news/local/teen-to-be-sentenced-for-hig...

Would you be willing to say the same for firearms and their availability? It meets much of your criteria, sans perhaps the portability part and location of many enthusiasts.

My point is precisely that. How can you hope to encourage people to move to tracks if you require them to find a pickup that can tow cars there? If you keep closing down more and more tracks?

I believe in high availability of firearms because I'm principally against prior restraint. The state doesn't get to take machineguns away from people who haven't demonstrated abuse of them to the standard of reasonable doubt. The state doesn't get to take hellcats away from people who haven't demonstrated abuse of them to the standard of reasonable doubt. That's my moral position, which I assume you don't share, so I'm trying to point out a more practical reason why this is a bad policy in terms of outcome.

> How can you hope to encourage people to move to tracks if you require them to find a pickup that can tow cars there? If you keep closing down more and more tracks?

I doubt most people speeding in the streets do track or street racing as a hobby, so I think track availability is pretty much irrelevant.

I think I should have the freedom not to get splattered by dumbasses going 100 in a 50MPH zone. Why don't I get that freedom?

You are allowed to use the state to restrict the freedom of people who are going 100 in a 50MPH zone. You don't get to use the state to restrict people with a theoretical capacity to go 100 in a 50.

> You don't get to use the state to restrict people with a theoretical capacity to go 100 in a 50.

Says who?

This isn't how I believe free societies should be constructed. It's morally wrong and I really don't care to share a society where people who believe otherwise get to vote, because it's an irreconcilable values break that has no place in America. Safetyists fit much better in places like Europe.

And can you believe it, they even make you wear a seatbelt when driving! Downright communist.

Not communist but this is basically at odds with how we should run. It's a great shibboleth for where people's values lie. I don't think I've ever driven a car without a seatbelt. It's stupid and has no benefit. But I am deeply opposed to any government that says someone must.

This isn't something on which we can compromise or establish bipartisanship, generally, so the conflict will only continue to escalate. There's just no frame in which I can frame a society which mandates seatbelts as good or just. People like you like to use it to deride my values, purposely picking a trivial example to trivialize what I believe. But that's neither constructive nor respectful nor a rebuttal of my views. Those who wish the state to impose safetyism on them should self-segregate into maybe a few states and spare the rest of us having to group together to counteract their votes.

Ideally, the virtue of a federalist system should be that it offers choice in under what regime one elects to live. Strip every vestige of this from the federal government and ensure safetyists can promulgate their desires only at very local levels, so they can go live as they choose, where they choose, without polluting the rest of America.

Anthony Burgess in his novel "A Clockwork Orange"

I used to race cars. Driving a race car on the street is dumb AF. Rollcage will crush your skull if you aren’t helmeted and in the 6-point harness. Suspension is bone jarring (and expensive to maintain). The exhaust is not legal. And on and on.

Nobody races steeet legal cars. Except maybe a few drag racers, and half those cars probably have illegal tires or emissions removals, but they drove on the street anyway.

Source: Many years in the car hobby.

> Nobody races steeet legal cars.

Most people don't but that's an overly broad generalization.

I raced Spec Miata in its early days (2000-2010) and it was possible (and I did) to keep a moderately competitive Spec Miata still street legal. I didn't have space for a trailer so had to drive it to the track.

Ha! I cut my teeth on Spec RX-7. I drove it to the track for a season and it was a terrible idea. The car was nominally legal (catalyst in place, full exhaust). But it was loud AF, the rollcage was dangerous on the street, and getting 4 race wheels in the back with a jack, tools, tent, etc was an endeavor.

Most street racers have some illegal modifications, but the guy driving the riced-out kia isn't really safety-conscious. The hope is to use punishment to shove those people towards tracks (which more people might use if they hadn't been pushed out by noise complaints and such).

Is the guy in the riced out Covic or whatever really interested in the track? Actual racing would require most car prep, different insurance (or none), more effort overall. The generic car person is doing it for social reasons, not because they want competition.

He might capitulate and put up with it if tracks were more common and not pushed out everywhere and if punishments for specifically street racing were increased. Plenty of places "takeovers" should be addressed by bringing about a dozen cop cars and arresting everyone but aren't.

Sure. Or if you don't want to have to tow a non-street-legal vehicle to move it on public streets, we could probably include a provision for GPS/vision-based dynamic speed limiting, allowing you to make your vehicle automatically street legally-speed-limited on public streets where others are at risk, and unlimited off public streets. The technology already exists and is very reliable for this.

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