Here’s how double-talk works in Washington:
The Governors Highway Safety Association sent out a “survey” to
automotive journalists under the header, “Speeding a Serious
Problem 10 Years After National Speed Limit Repeal” — implying
that traffic accidents and fatalities have increased since Congress
repealed the 55-mph National Maximum Speed Limit (NMSL) law back in
1995.
The accompanying short press release from GHSA Comunications
Director Jonathan Adkins stated that the “survey” would “detail
state efforts to combat speeding-relating fatalities” — further
hinting none-too-subtly that the repeal of the 55-mph NMSL has made
the roads “less safe.”
In essence, the “speed kills” argument is being trotted out
again by parties who would like to see the 55-mph speed limit
re-imposed — for “safety’s sake.”
But as an automotive journalist who has been covering the issue
since the early 1990s, I knew something was not right here. The
fact of the matter is that since the repeal of the NMSL in 1995,
overall accident and fatality rates on U.S. highways (per million
vehicle miles traveled, or VMT) have either remained the same or
declined. There certainly hasn’t been a major (or even
statistically significant) uptick.
So I asked GHSA’s Jonathan Adkins for clarification. Here’s my
verbatim question to him:
“Hi Jonathan,
“It’s my understanding that accident and fatality rates per VMT
have not increased significantly since the1995 repeal of the
NMSL.
“Is this not correct?
“Your release appears to claim that ‘speeding’ has resulted in
an increase in U.S. accident/fatality rates.
“Do you have data to support this?”
Here is his “answer” — if it can be called that:
“The issue is more that speed fatalities haven’t decreased in
the last decade. Rather shocking considering all the advances with
vehicle safety (i.e. airbags) and the fact that seatbelt use has
doubled since the early '90s.”
But that, of course, is not what the “survey” or the press
release implied at all. It wasn’t titled, “Fatalities Haven’t
Decreased” — or “Safety Advances Haven’t Saved As Many Lives As
Hoped.” It was an open broadside against higher speed limits — and
without a shred of factual support for the revival of the “speed
kills” mantra that has become a sort of fetishistic religion in
some quarters, all evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.
Adkins may find it “rather shocking” that airbags and increased
seatbelt use haven’t saved more lives — but that’s got nothing to
do with the question: Have higher-than-55-mph speed limits made the
roads less safe?
“Speeding” merely means driving faster than whatever number is
posted on a highway sign — a technical foul, so to speak. Before
1995, for example, it was “speeding” to drive 65 or 70 mph on most
U.S. interstates. Now it’s perfectly legal. The important question
for those concerned about rational traffic laws is whether
“speeding” (as defined by Adkins, et al.) necessarily means less
safe. And all evidence says it doesn’t. If it did, driving faster
than 55 mph (“speeding,” under the Adkins/GHSA definition) would
automatically and always mean more traffic accidents, more people
being killed in cars. But people today routinely (and now lawfully)
drive at speeds that, prior to 1995, put them in peril of very
expensive tickets for “speeding” with no more risk of being
involved in an accident than was the case prior to the 1995 repeal
of the NMSL.
Those are the facts — as distinct from the agit-prop coming
from the Governors Highway Safety Association.
Trouble is, many news outlets will take the “findings” of the
“survey” at face value — and help spread the lie that our roads
are less safe today than before Congress repealed Drive 55.
Don’t believe a word of it.
It just isn’t so.
