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First the latter: came off an off-ramp behind a Fit that was moving OK, going the arbitrarily low yellow sign speed, but that's all I ask for here. But once we got onto the surface street (divided 40mph arterial with limited access), the slow set in. Suddenly there's a line of cars behind the Fit, and a taxi beside it, both going no faster than 5 under the limit, side by side. I thought a guy in a Civic was going to explode as he changed lanes back and forth before realizing we were stuck. I had to hit the horn as I got beside the Fit for my left turn lane and zoomed by at the limit.
Phone yappers: small woman in a Lexus LX sitting at a green light and then turning without signal, a guy in a delivery fan, and 2x high maintenance types in late model Range Rovers who were too lazy or inept to use bluetooth. No enforcement in the galaxy, of course.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
That's one fun thing about my area, ordinary weather doesn't change the overall driving experience. Cloud, sun, light rain, etc - it's always a crawl. A heavy rain can create issues, and snow is armageddon, but that's not uncommon in many places.
"Anecdotal" in the scientific sense means "presented without evidence". Even the worst lawyer knows that eye witness testimony can easily be punched full of holes.
So yeah, unless you have a tail fin from that spaceship, or really good video that can withstand rigorous examination, you got nothin', no matter how many saw it.
When people say they witnessed a train wreck, they have to actually produce a train wreck.
Why do you think all those stories people tell about "why my car crashed" sound so lame? Because they "think" one thing is going on when in fact it might have been something entirely different.
If a scientist who is good enough to win a Nobel prize is not a trained observer, I don't know who is. If 25 of them say they saw exactly the same thing, I'd tend to think they saw what they saw.
But if one driver, with unknown credentials as an observer, said he saw something or other... THAT'S anecdotal to be sure!
What happens is that people take an ACTUAL event, let's say "blue lights flashing in the sky, and an object making extreme maneuvers"
OKAY, a bunch of people saw that, and probably there was something in the sky.
The PROBLEM is that it isn't "aliens". You can't make that leap without evidence.
So, one person reporting blue lights, or 1000 people reporting blue lights, does not prove "aliens" or anything remotely like them.
For this reason, all these reports are "anecdotal".
If a person says they saw someone hit a wall at 100 mph, and walk away unscathed, I would have to see police reports, photos of the car, and a follow up as to the person's condition. Otherwise, it's just a tale told on a bar stool. I don't have to believe that "anecdote", or even 50 more such anecdotes or claims.
Aggregating the number of anecdotes doesn't give the event any more weight. If 20 people report runaway Toyotas but none of these events are reproducible, it proves nothing.
You couldn't convict someone because "6 people say they saw gene at the scene".
Now if a video camera saw you there, and you dropped your cell phone, well then....:)
This all came about when we were discussing the Prius UA cases, remember? And I was speculating that many drivers who make dumb mistakes try to blame the car e.g. "I didn't see you because of a blind spot!" or "the car just started to skid", etc.
The lady driving the Acura was doing fine and I was a good distance back, too.
Until we hit a downhill portion of the road.
The lady driving the Acura decided that, on an empty road, the proper course of action was to brake... killing off half of her speed (50 down to 25mph).
I didn't feel like stopping for nothing, so I passed her via the other lane. To which, she gunned her car and got on my tail, cursing and making wild gestures in my rear-view mirror.
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Seriously, what is with people nowadays? Braking down to half speed on an empty road, for no reason at all. And then frothing at the mouth in rage because others didn't do the same?
Her lack of confidence is what causes this irrational braking...not knowing what to do, the instinct is to "think about it" while pressing on the brake.
She sees no harm in this (I'm just being SAFE) but I keep telling her that it drives all the cars behind her bananas...when SHE brakes, they ALL have to brake...this creates the dreaded "accordion" effect, with a conga line of cars slowing and speeding and slowing and speeding.
I'm working on teaching her to just let off the gas, or to use the overdrive cut-out button to "downshift" a bit to go slower around curves.
I'd prefer she NEVER brake in a turn, but that ain't going to happen.
I took about a 300 mile road trip yesterday - escaped the westside sprawl and am now in podunk eastern WA. Driving with less population density is so much nicer - really haven't seen anything bad since I've been here. People move along at the limit, phone service is spotty so no yappers.
That's enough to establish that Gene was at the scene even without any physical proof. 6 people saying it is better than 5 people which is better than 4 and so on. People have been convicted purely on eyewitness testimony.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
My current pet peeve with drivers---the ones in parking lots who are driving jacked-up 4-wheel or AWD SUVs, with huge 19 inch knobby tires, menacing push bars and tail light cages..... and who....creep....ever....so....gingerly....over speed bumps at 2 mph while I'm waiting to leave with a bagful of melting ice cream.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
I motioned to a 20-something in his rental car silver toyota Scion C that I wanted to back out in front of him as the car ahead of him pulled forward. Instead, He pulls up to fill the spot. So I started my car, glanced in my mirrors and prepared to back up slowly to fill the 10-15 feet so the next car would have to wait since I had my rear already clearly there to back up. All the 20-something guy had to do was wait. He would not have lost any time or place in his line.
I saw the 20-something grimace when he realized I was starting backward. He thought I had overlooked him when I glanced in my mirrors. Good, I thought. I could see him look to see if he could back up so I wouldn't hit him. I just kept on moving so it would appear I was going to back right on into his prize possession. Then I stopped.
I could almost see him pushing on the floorboard as he stressed out while I was still moving. Priceless. Maybe the next time he won't be inconsiderate to people trapped in parking spaces by the drive-thru line.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
2020 Acura RDX tech SH-AWD, 2023 Maverick hybrid Lariat luxury package.
Exactly what I'd like to do, but my wife has a bad back and has trouble walking, so parking closer and using the handicapped tag is helpful. We also time our lunch stops to avoid the heaviest drive thru traffic from the local businesses and office towers there along the freeway.
One of the Chic-Fil-A's nearest Cincy rerouted their drivethru line and eliminated the blocking, but now the handicapped is on the far side of two drivethru lines. They had a larger lot so they could shuffle their arrangement.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
I made eye contact with the "young" man and pointed to my car and pointed along a line backing out in front of him while holding my driver door open. I can only assume he was thinking off in space and didn't understand my hand signal and smile. He did not have a cell phone to his ear.
We had an appointment to get to for my wife's second opinion on back surgery or not, so I didn't have time to sit and wait.
And the next visit to the same ChickFA, as we got in the car a lady driving a large Ford pickup (250 or 350), stayed back and waved to me to back out. I hadn't even made a hand signal request. So there are people who think ahead.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Trip home wasn't bad, apart from LLCs, who were heavy on I5 from Olympia on, and many on 167 as well. The passenger of an Explorer I passed on the right gave me an "I'm sorry" look as I zoomed by at 4 over the limit, followed by several other cars. Fastest cars on the road tended to be SUVs and big trucks, the same people who will whine about gas prices at the first jump. But I did get passed by an old Lexus GS going maybe 90 on a state highway.
On my city streets today - first winner was a distracted dope in a Crosstrek who made it a point to get around me, then went around a corner at a crawl. That earned a honk. Then got behind a headscarf in a Pilot timidly going 25 in a 35 with a line behind her - yay for multiculturalism. Finished it off in a parking lot by having a close call with an old woman in an Outback who just backed up - didn't look, then proceeded to go 6mph. I have brakes and a horn.
http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=9296167
One of the women was reportedly pregnant. What the (censored) is the matter with some people?!?!?!?
In all seriousness, though, that's a sad, sad situation, and it sounds like there's a little boy out there now that will grow up not knowing his mother for no good reason at all.
The point is that we can't live our lives at the unreasonable expense of time, money, and resources just so you can eek out .0000001% more safety.
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For the same reasons a Judge Judy might assign partial blame to a drunken uninsured undocumented unlicensed driver involved in an accident that really wasn't there fault.
I don't agree with this "judicial" procedure, but some seem to think it deserves consideration. I think it breeds the moral hazard of people deliberately causing accidents with cars they know to be "breaking the law in some way."
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Actually, as is usually the case with your statements, the opposite is true.
For multiple reasons:
1) You are assuming accidents will go up; I know they will go down (look at the Autobahn).
2) Higher speed limits mean less speeding tickets which means less rate surcharges.
3) Less accidents means less injuries and less fatalities (along with less body shop and tow truck expenses).
4) I don't buy your higher maintenance costs argument. Most cars today are designed to handle higher speeds just fine, and with higher speeds the car will be off more time than it spends being on going slow.
1) Avoid the deer by slamming the brakes hardest possible.
2) Avoid the deer by hitting the brakes fairly hard.
3) Avoid the deer by quickly applying the brakes with some force.
4) Avoid the deer with average brake force.
5) Slightly slow down with brakes to avoid getting too close to the deer.
By going faster you can scoot by the deer before it ever crosses and avoid wasting gas hitting the brakes.
Going faster is not less safe in any way shape or form. You can only make it seem less safe when you add other variables such as saying there is more road traffic for cars than air traffic for airplanes. When you say that I point out that speed limits are not designed for high traffic scenarios in mind.
Just because the deer doesn't hit you doesn't mean it wouldn't alter your path and speed.
100x1 is still less than 20 x 10.
However, you ignore the biggest insurance money maker of all, surcharges on speeding tickets. Trust me, insurance companies are only against higher speed limits because of this reason alone.
Sorry, just as you don't believe anything I have to say, your just saying "because I said so" isn't quite good enough for me to buy that accident rates will magically decrease once speed limits on US highways go to 100+ mph. And as even you admit, severity of accidents, meaning greater property damage and human casualties, will increase with increased speed limits.
The idea of officer's accurately estimating the moving speed of a car at over 1,000 feet is laughable to me.
I'll pay $100 an hour for the officer's time to prove them wrong.
Want more? OK. When speed limits went from 55 to 65 accidents didn't go up. When speed limits went from 65 to 70 or 75 accidents didn't go up. In fact, as speed limits have increased at a snails pace (but in one direction, only up the past 30 years, accidents have gone nothing but down; except just this last year).
I'm still waiting on data for Utah and Texas' 80 and 85 MPH zones. For what it's worth, I believe they are not in the top 5 for car insurance costs vs. the 50 states.