Make sure to never be in a hurry to get anywhere because you might then get stuck behind a fleet of them going exactly the speed limit, grid locking you in.
* Unless we're talking about removing a speed limit altogether and regulating unsafe driving using other criteria.
I think 75 is memorable and roughly in the region where the tradeoff between increased kinetic energy and decreased time to arrival per additional unit of velocity becomes untenable.
Sounds like a warning page out of the back of a 94 Geo Metro owner's manual.
Humans with adequate following distance in the entire lane can probably manage 10 mph delta. I routinely travel dozens of miles very safely at ~80 with the flow of traffic (including the cops), and been stressed out at 55 in the carpool lane through stop and go traffic in the right-hand lanes due to on ramps/offramps.
There was a huge fight over it, car drivers in those cities were mad. Plenty of politicians opposed it.
One year later stats were super clear: streets got way safer and the number of fatal accidents dropped to near 0. Time to traverse cities didn't change much, as it was already limited mostly by traffic and lights.
"Only 46.5 percent of U.S. drivers consider going more than 15 miles per hour over the speed limit on the freeway to be "extremely" or "very" dangerous — with 40.6 percent openly admitting to doing it at least "a few times" in the last 30 days" [1].
[1] https://usa.streetsblog.org/2023/11/30/why-so-many-u-s-drive...
Most Americans ignore speed limits. This stems from it being socially and legally problematic to permanently revoke our driver’s licenses. We should raise a lot of limits. But many others are fine and still sped through.
Yes, this sounds about right. In the metro area, 55 mph on a limited access interstate freeway. Arterial surface streets typically 40-45 mph, lower level surface streets commonly 25 mph and sometimes 20 mph depending on locality.
In the US, in particular out west where I live, 'urban' does not have the same meaning as it does somewhere much more dense, so it amounts to 55 mph in many places you might regard as rural.
The speed limit itself is a separate convention and regulation. In some places you can be cited for obstructing traffic by going the speed limit in the passing lane if you are matching the speed of cars to your right, effectively blocking the road.
A custom that (where I live) is becoming more honored in the breach than the observance. It makes driving very much more dangerous.
In Britain they have a sardonic nickname for people who do this: CLARAs. "Centre Lane Residency Association".
To your point, I think the middle lane of a three-lane road is, ideally, the correct travel lane. Cruising there at the prevailing speed leaves one lane more lightly traveled for entering and exiting, and the other for passing. Predominantly using that lane minimizes lane changes, which are the most dangerous driving moments. You're right, though, that the strategy breaks down as traffic gets heavier, and gets ruined entirely when (as under discussion in this thread) people gum up the supposed "fast lane".
I think this undersells it a little. It does not just impede faster traffic, when the lanes are pacing each other it makes navigating harder -- simply switching lanes is more difficult. The highway moves so much more efficiently with a small but steady difference in speed between each lane.
When traffic isn't balled up so tight, you can plan for a lane change in advance and accomplish it without having to slow down traffic. Everything flows better.
I haven't experienced people riding right on me for a tiny speed change.
It's not just customary in many (most?) states, it's the law. People who sit in the left lane are the problem.
The last couple laws like that I checked only talked about limiting flow below the speed limit.
> (b) An operator of a vehicle on a roadway moving more slowly than the normal speed of other vehicles at the time and place under the existing conditions shall drive in the right-hand lane available for vehicles, or as close as practicable to the right-hand curb or edge of the roadway, unless the operator is:
> (1) passing another vehicle; or
> (2) preparing for a left turn at an intersection or into a private road or driveway.
https://tcss.legis.texas.gov/resources/TN/pdf/TN.545.pdf#545
Note this law specifically mentions "normal speed of other vehicles at the time and place" and doesn't directly mention speed limits. So by the text of this law, if you're driving the speed limit and hanging out in the left lane while the normal speed at that time is like 10 over you're technically breaking this law.
We have specific signage for highways where this is supposed to be the law.
https://www.txdot.gov/manuals/trf/smk/regulatory_signs/left_...
Cops won't pull you over or write tickets if you're not at least 15 mph over, we basically don't have speed cameras, everyone's trying to win the rat race and dehumanizing other cars around them, and it's not considered morally wrong (by most) to break that specific part of the law.
So a single vehicle obeying the law will quickly get a long line of tailgaters and tailgaters of tailgaters trying to "push" the vehicle to go faster.
They can suck it, I'm not late or in a hurry, and my ancient truck, steel bumper, and class 5 receiver hitch will not be badly harmed by your plastic grille. I get better gas mileage and have a longer stopping distance when I drive the limit, and I don't care if others are honking or riding my ass because they think I should drive faster.
I've been rear-ended in my truck, and the receiver punched a nice hole right through the radiator of the guy who hit me. Definitely fucked his car up way more than it did my truck ... except man, that is definitely one of the hardest impacts I've ever felt in my body. I now appreciate how hard the head rests really are, despite looking a little soft. I think I'd rather have crumpled crumple zones and a new truck next time.
A lot of science and work goes into the construction of those headrests - if it was less firm, you'd get a concussion from the rotational forces in the whiplash or just break your neck, more firm and you'll get a concussion from the linear impact. It's not at all arbitrary, there's a reason they are exactly as firm as they are.
But there are also people who drive in the left lane, who will tailgate you at 1 or 2 meters because you're doing 130 km/h. These people are idiots, but you get these sorts of people everywhere.
On American freeways, you don't have a choice, every lane is doing about 10 mph over the limit (or in LA way under) and it is disruptive or dangerous not to. These freeways tend to be running at full capacity so it actually makes sense since it improves capacity.
In theory, braking distance scales quadratically with speed. In practice, people leave less room on highways, because they rely on others driving predictably, but spacing still increases faster than linear.