Bear's Ramblings

Pet peeves plus

2005-06-30

Speed Limit ----Yeah Right

'What is the speed limit', you may ask yourself as you have cars flying past you. You KNOW that you are going the posted speed limit. Is there something that we, the general public, don't know.

I have lived in a number of different states and have driven in about 70% of the states. It is hard to respect the speed limits when many states have a policy that they don't ticket or even stop persons that aren't going at least 10 or 15 mph over the posted speed limit. Yet again there are states where you can get pulled over for going 1 mph over the posted speed limit and Idaho is one.

If states are not going to do anything about speeders then why do they bother to post a speed limit. Right, we all know that it is to get a larger chunk of Federal Highway Funds.

There is a 2 lane highway, between where I live and Boise, Idaho, that is a grand total of about 14-15 miles long. There have been a large number of fatal accidents along there from people trying to pass cars that are going "too slow". They say that they have stepped up the police coverage which includes 2 different counties and the State Police, but for the life of me, I still rarely see any police at all. My wife has to commute to Boise 5 days a week and it is sad when she gets stuck behind someone that goes about 15 mph under the speed limit with a string of cars for miles behind them. it is people like this that are the underlying cause of many of the accidents along that highway. This is something that I know is rarely dealt with by the police even though in most states there is a law that you must pull over and let cars pass you if more then a certain number of vehicles are behind you. It is a rare thing to see people abide by that law.

But, of course there are always those people that are never satisfied with the speed of the cars in front of them. They will try to pass anyone in front of them and then they will slow down and go slower then the cars that they just past.

What I really hate are those people that ride almost on your bumper but will not pass you even if you hug the right side of the lane and slow down. Sometimes they get so close that you can't even see the front of their car in the rearview mirror.

Enough said.