Speed limits

I read a disturbing article in the paper today saying that 3 out of 4 people are uncomfortable with the open road speed limit and would like it dropped to 90k's!
80k's on dirt roads! and this gives some uni professor a warm fuzzy feeling and the right to pester the government to follow threw on this!
This is outrageous! we should find out where these 3 people live and give em a stern talking to! there probably the same people that had the Adelaide hills zoned as a blanket 80ks WTF! this is getting sillier and sillier! meanwhile the rest of us sit by and watch as they nanafy the whole country!

If it wasn't for the fact that I saw it a couple of days ago I would have said "Hahaha, very funny, I know it's April Fools, but you're not fooling me".

The actual study paper is impossible to find. I know a few people are looking, if they find it I'll post it up here.

What I'd be interested to see is how a political party would fare in an election with this as their main policy.

3 out of 4 people that's not possible surely. Where are these people from and do they only drive in cities or towns etc. It would be interesting to see them do that and when the road toll doesn't drop decide to leave it at 90 anyway. I wonder what the cost of replacing all the 100 signs would be. And the extra revenue generated by an extra 10ks over on speed tickets.

That speed limit was brought in when we had some very ordinary cars, now almost everything has abs, better brakes in general, better suspension, better tyres and impact protection. And the best they can come up with is lower speed limits.

I would love to read an unedited copy of that report.

What really shits me is the governments and statutory authorities keep banging on about speed kills and how bad the road toll is.

If you look that the figures properly, i.e. per head of population, the road toll is far lower now then in the past.

It's not exactly up to date but have a quick look at the tables here http://www.aph.gov.au/House/committee/trs/roadsafety/report/chap2.pdf

If you look at the table that shows fatalites per 100,000 population, then these show that less than 1% are dying (unless I've got the math wrong). If the medical profession could achieve that with say cancer or heart disease I'm pretty sure they would count that as a victory.

I saw the very same article in the Advertiser, all I can say Big Al, is what a pack of knobs . The 'tiser is not exactly a credible source of useful and honest info. Unfortunately it's the only paper we have........with crap like 'hoon watch' , these people influence popular opinion with useless surveys and opinions. I can only hope that it will fizzle and die. Like B12 Mick said, lets watch a political party run with it and see what rational free thinking people really think. To add to that they no longer print 'The Far Side', what sort of paper is that....hhhmmmfff.

90 KMH! I shudder at not being able to do 110 legally over here! If people are not comfortable doing 100 or 110 then they should slow down. Dont make everyone go slow. And dont even get me started on the hoon laws!!!! I may be 40 but I still remember what I used to do when I was on P plates. Bloody hell, what a nanny state this country is turning into.

They keep going on about the road toll.

Smoking is the single largest preventable cause of death and disease in Australia killing 50 Australians daily, 350 each week, and around 19,000 every year.

Smoking causes 20% of all cancers, 21% of all heart disease and costs $12.7 billion a year in health care, lost productivity and other costs (1998).

And we have an average of 6 people a day committing suicide here as well. I think we have bigger problems than the road toll.

Oh, and thanks for the report Mick, it's an interesting read.

Was quite pleased to see a news paper today that had a heap of letters complaining about this situation!Obviously were not the only ones pissed off about this, hopefully these nut cases will get shown off!