Never drive faster than your angel can fly

There's a few reasons why people don't drive the speed limit.

People have always driven at a speed which feels comfortable.  The speed limit regulations were mostly designed back in the 1950's in relation to 50's cars.

Today's cars are vastly superior to the cars of the design guidelines so one would expect the "comfortable" speed of the average driver to increase and it has.

Now, for residential zones the guidelines are setup more around reaction times, visibility, and braking distances.  Unfortunately two of those have gotten worse.  Visibility is worse with all the tall, opaque SUVs around and reaction times have gotten worse because of distracted driving.

Another reason people drive faster is all of the tall SUVs out there.  The further away from the road you are the lower the feeling of speed.  Most driver are oblivious to how fast they are actually going.

I had 5 people die in front of my house, on my lawn when I was a kid. I know all about hills, too fast and, no skills.

Quit the SUV hating nonsense. Trucks have been out selling all other vehicle types in the US for years. Trucks are, on average, as tall or taller then the typical SUV.

Colin Wood said:

I might be in the minority here, but I don't understand why no one (at least here in Florida) drives the speed limit. What makes you so special that the rules don't apply to you? And if it's acceptable to drive over the speed limit, what is the point of limiting the speed?

Alright, I'll get off my soapbox.

Also, I can attest for the stopping abilities of trees from personal experience.

I'll probably catch grief for this but Florida drivers are such notorious as$hats that I even cringe to get a rental car with Florida plates outside of Florida.  

I heard a motorcycle winding up from my work once. Going through the gears, and then silence like someone had turned the sound off. A guy and his girlfriend on the back of a rice rocket. It was a quiet Saturday morning in the industrial park and they thought they had the road to themselves. But a semi pulling a 53 foot dry van crossed at an intersection and they went more or less right under the van. The girl was decapitated. She could not duck as low as her boyfriend I guess. 

FMB42 said:

Quit the SUV hating nonsense. Trucks have been out selling all other vehicle types in the US for years. Trucks are, on average, as tall or taller then the typical SUV.

It's only been a decade or so since trucks started to be used as daily drivers in suburbia.  Tons were sold as work trucks but the average person wouldn't consider owning one as a car replacement.  Also trucks used to be lower to the ground.  Manufacturers used to compete with each other to advertise the lowest load-in height,  That went out the window 30 years ago along with large glass area.  Tall vehicles, smaller glass area (to save weight and cost) coupled with today's blackout tint aesthetics lead to vehicles you can't see through.

In my street car the average modern pickup truck bumper height is level with my eyes.  I can't see E36 M3 past the car in front of me.

So yes, trucks and SUVs are part of the problem.

We just went for a walk with the dog. FWIW, our grounds crew has totally cleaned up everything. If you didn't know that a car flipped there, you'd never notice. 

Honsch said:

FMB42 said:

Quit the SUV hating nonsense. Trucks have been out selling all other vehicle types in the US for years. Trucks are, on average, as tall or taller then the typical SUV.

It's only been a decade or so since trucks started to be used as daily drivers in suburbia.  Tons were sold as work trucks but the average person wouldn't consider owning one as a car replacement.  Also trucks used to be lower to the ground.  Manufacturers used to compete with each other to advertise the lowest load-in height,  That went out the window 30 years ago along with large glass area.  Tall vehicles, smaller glass area (to save weight and cost) coupled with today's blackout tint aesthetics lead to vehicles you can't see through.

In my street car the average modern pickup truck bumper height is level with my eyes.  I can't see E36 M3 past the car in front of me.

So yes, trucks and SUVs are part of the problem.

 

You're right.  Vehicles have changed.  In many ways for the worse.  I was noticing a later model Camaro today.  Guy was obviously not even able to rest his elbow on the window sill.  Too high.  It looked like an armored car from the ´30´s with just a little mail slot to see out of.  Sat in a mid '90ˋs Accord the other day.  The first thing I though was...WOW...I CAN SEE.  There's no way you can argue that a modern car that you can't see out of is safer than this old Accord.  I don't care if it does have side airbags and 900 lbs of steel reinforcements.  It's insane.  I had a Scat Pack Challenger that I rented from Hertz a few years ago.  I could not park the berking thing --too many blind spots.  Combine that with almost 500hp plus all the distraction of the gadgets and I'm surprised more people aren't killed.