What about the extreme of No Speed Limits on 4 lane Interstate and rural federal–aid primary two lane highways? These same fact–based engineers point to the German
Autobahn, where with no speed limits, authorities are consistently reporting lower fatality rates than comparable US highways.
For the last 5 months of no daytime limits in Montana, the period after its Supreme Court had ruled that the Reasonable and Prudent law was unconstitutional, reported fatal accident rate declined to a record low. Fixed speed limits were reinstated on Memorial Day weekend 1999. Since then, fatal accidents have begun to rise again.
This begs the question, do people change the way they drive when there is no speed limit? The evidence suggests the answer is yes. The measured vehicle speeds only changed a few miles per hour as predicted – comparable to data collected from other western states. What changed? The two most obvious changes were improved lane courtesy and increased seat belt use. Did other driving habits and patterns change as well?
The lower–than–US fatality rates on the German Autobahn (where flow management is the primary safety strategy), and now Montana's experience, would indicate that using speed limits and speed enforcement as the cornerstone of US highway safety policy is a major mistake. It is time to accept the fact that increases in traffic speeds are the natural by product of advancing technology. People do, in fact, act in a reasonable and responsible manner without constant government intervention.
The Montana experience solidifies the long held
traffic engineering axioms, “people don't automatically drive faster when the speed limit is raised, speed limit signs will not automatically decrease accident rates nor increase safety, and highways with posted speed limits are not necessarily safer than highways without posted limits.”
The study on the effects of no daytime speed limits in Montana is clear. Traffic safety, if anything, actually improved without posted limits or massive enforcement efforts. Highway safety wasn't compromised nor can the lowest fatality rates recorded in modern times be ignored. Something happened, it was positive, and it needs further research to analyze what worked and why.
This doubling of the fatal accidents in Montana is a real life example to the potential catastrophic consequences of passing politically correct laws. Safety can only be achieved when sound engineering practices are allowed to overrule unfounded political conjecture. The sooner we as nation follow these precepts as adopted in the Highway Safety Act of 1966, our roads will be as safe as they reasonably can be while protecting your rights too.
