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FlySurfer said..
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Australian reasoning: Speeding kills.
German reasoning: Stupidity kills.

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Sums it up.

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Cassa said..
My main country driving is to the nearest capital city , it is 1400km's
at 130 it woul take a min of 12.7 hrs flat out
at 110 it woul take 10.7 neither allows for any stopping or slowing down
all of which in reality will happen
I usually do the drive in 2 sections , sleeping at about the half way point.
Some parts of the road are straight as far as you can see, even at 80 km's
comming over a small rise and finding cattle on the road is a scary ,dangerous
situation, let alone MOST of the roads are just wide enough to pass road trains which are every where.
Can't understand all the talk about something that might save 20 minutes in an average small (couple of hour journey).
I don't need to be that much of a hurry.
Take a chill pill, drive to the limits, and think how better, you could have used all that time you have WASTED on here .
Obviously you have put many hrs into this, coud'nt that have been put to more fun use on the water eh!

"You" might need to be in that much of a hurry, maybe other people are?

Finding cattle on the road, road trains, road widths, soft edges, gravel, wet, bored, tired, distracted, the vehicle you're driving - add any factor you like. They are all factors that you use to determine your speed. The posted speed limit of 100 might be too high in some circumstances.
EG, A roads in the UK are 60mph, they could be 4 lanes wide or a poxy windy single lane with rock hedgerows.

Would I drive at 140km in my landcruiser? no. Its topping out around there anyway, but the massive increase in fuel use from 110 to 140, the crappy brakes, the high centre of gravity etc would make it too dangerous. Would I do 140 in my wifes mazda 6, certainly but that would probably be about as far as I would go. Did I do 140 in my Saab 95 Aero in the UK, all the time and it felt about the safe as my troopy does at about 60.


Speed cannot be treated, policed, PSA'd in isolation of every other factor that can cause an accident - just because its the easiest to measure. If the govt is truly committed to Zero then it needs to lift its game in every other factor - and people need to take responsibility to be better drivers.

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rod_bunny said..
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Speed cannot be treated, policed, PSA'd in isolation of every other factor that can cause an accident - just because its the easiest to measure. If the govt is truly committed to Zero then it needs to lift its game in every other factor - and people need to take responsibility to be better drivers.

Indeed, yet speed is the only thing that seems to be properly policed on rural freeways.

Never been breath tested. (we see those "Police Targeting Drink Driving" signs sometimes but I've never seen any evidence of this.)

Never been stopped to ask if I'm tired. (we see those "Police Targeting Fatigue" signs sometimes but I've never seen any evidence of this.)

Never seen right lane blockers pulled over. (we see those "Keep Left Unless Overtaking" signs but I've never seen any evidence of this being policed.)

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FormulaNova said..

ThinkaBowtit said..
...Like this driver not reading the congestion ahead as a sign to slow down on the Autobahn:

Your Youtube video of the idiot on the autobahn shows us why those speeds seem great, but in reality there are idiots. Watching that video, I was thinking, slow down now, when I could see more than 1 car, let alone the relative large amount of time between seeing the stoppage and when the guy decides to slow down . I guess that shows that you do need to cater for the lowest common denominator.

Exactly. And all the people up ahead who can and do drive well are about to have their day (and car) wrecked through no fault of their own.

I spent a good part of yesterday arvo watching these http://dashcamownersaus.com.au/monthly-on-the-road-compilations/dash-cam-compilations/
"You fckn idiot!" is the most common reaction on the recordings - just a heads up if you're at work.

I'm all for strict driver training before licensing and even re-training for everyone already licensed to be fair and thorough - there's a lot of people out there who shouldn't be on the road, let alone on the road doing 140 km/h. A lot of them probably have no clue what they've caused, they just drive off leaving the carnage behind them.

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FlySurfer said..

Cassa said..
Can't understand all the talk about something that might save 20 minutes

The problem is staying conscious while doing it, not about saving time. If your doing a task that doesn't engage your mind, your mind will tend to drift.
Travelling at 70kmh on a road which can easily handle 180kmh will bore some people, causing them to become distracted... so the will either get angry, daydream or play with their phone... or even watch a movie.

I'm not saying to drive slow at all, have comee across many driving well under the limit on straight open roads , just overtake, simple .
If you fall asleep while driving no matter what speed , you should rest , not difficult, if it bores you to become distracted, well you should'nt be on the road at all. I drive with lotsa music and often sing, even though I sound like shyt, no one can here me, but have never ahd an accident or been near one ,
have seen lots of close misses all caused by fkd if I know.

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Adriano said..
Indeed, yet speed is the only thing that seems to be properly policed on rural freeways.

It's the only thing properly policed, bcos everybody does it, so it's easy to profit from it.
Sit in your car with a LiDAR resting on the door, wait 5 mins, fine $855.

Police aren't there to help you, their there to control and steal from you... it's the way it's always been.
3rd world countries it supplements their meager pay, here it goes to their performance targets.

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Cassa said..
I drive with lotsa music and often sing, even though I sound like shyt, no one can here me

My point exactly.

I don't have any distractions, and generally ride ~10kmh above the speed limit, bcos I prefer to concentrate on object coming from the front instead of concerning myself with objects coming from the front and back.

I also take a cocktail of cognitive enhancers, which make every driver seem real farking slow.

That's a good point. On a rural freeway, either you choose to be the one constantly overtaken by 10km/h or the one doing the constant overtaking by 10km/h.

To me, sitting there on cruise control while everyone else drives in a more engaged way seems silly to me.

When driving 110kms/ph puts me to sleep I allways arrive refreshed at the emergency ward

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Cassa said..
My main country driving is to the nearest capital city , it is 1400km's

Yep.......

You know its going to be another long day when the Tom-Tom says "left turn in 1600 kilometers"

Picked up my 93 year old grannie with a Tesla S P90D /w insane mode (has about 700ish HP). She did enjoy the Christmas playlist and getting in time to Christmas cookies.



And now something that may be of use as from someone who learned to drive in Germany and was a personal driver in the German armed forces for officers:

There are speed limits in place on the Autobahn that range from 80kmh to 130kmh depending on road and traffic conditions. There are sections without speed limit which account for about 10-20%(?) where deemed save.

As a German you are trained to be always aware what is behind you and to drive right when not overtaking. If you overtake another car at 110 and someone approaches from behind at 230 then it can become dangerous quite quickly. You also don't overtake on the right, its not just illegal but also frowned upon and very offensive to the other car.

Driving at 230km is stresfull and you barely get anywhere quicker as you have to de- and accelerate a lot because of other traffic. Also, constant acceleration and breaking uses a lot of gas - or in this case battery. I tend to cruise at 130 to 170 depending on conditions and feel most comfortable at 150kmh. Driving 90 or 100 kmh on Australian roads is annoyingly slow and you have to really concentrate on not going over.

I feel saver driving in Germany mainly because drivers are more predictive. Also, in Australia drivers seem incapable of reactive driving and instead just focus on their own right of way and are stuck in rules. In Sydney most blow the horn quickly and get upset over small things. Very few are courteous and actually share the road with others. A smile and wave, letting people in who indicate go a long way.