On a stretch of road near Austin, Texas, there is an actual
speed limit. Or at least, close to one.
You can drive up to 85 MPH on Texas Highway 130 — and not worry
about receiving a “reckless driving” ticket. Or even a “speeding”
ticket.
It’s a start.
Almost 60 years ago — during the presidency of Dwight
Eisenhower — construction of the Interstate Highway System began.
Inspired by the German Autobahn, it was specifically intended to be
a system of superhighways — with traffic flowing at
speeds of at least 70 MPH. Much higher speeds were
anticipated — and designed for. There are portions of the
Interstate system that were laid out with 100-plus MPH
average speeds in mind. By implication, speed
limits would have been considerably higher.
But, let’s stick with 70-75 average speeds for just a
moment — and reflect on Texas’ 85 MPH maximum today.
In the late 1950s, when the Interstate system was being laid
out, the typical new car had manual drum brakes at all four
corners, rode on skinny (by modern standards) whitewall bias-ply
tires, had loosey-goosey steering and a suspension not far removed
from what was used in Model Ts: Leaf springs, non-independent rear
axle — perhaps shock absorbers. Really bouncy ones.
That’s it. No anti-sway bars, no four wheel independent suspension
— let alone four wheel disc brakes with ABS. And yet, the very
smart — and very sober-minded — men who designed the Interstate
system considered that the average car of circa 1958 (and the
average driver of circa 1958) was sufficiently competent
to safely handle steady-state cruising speeds of around 70-75
MPH.
It is nearly 60 years later — but we’re rarely allowed to
travel faster. In fact, it’s a fairly recent development
that we’re even allowed to drive at speeds that were allowable in
the late 1950s and through the 1960s. Just 16 years have passed
since the federal 55 MPH National Maximum Speed Limit (NMSL) was
finally repealed. For almost 20 years prior, motorists were
routinely mulcted by costumed enforcers for “speeding” — that is,
for driving at speeds that were formerly lawful and well within the
designed-for speeds envisioned by the engineers who laid out the
Interstates… back when Eisenhower was in office.
Today, we can once more drive at late 1950s speeds — and not
worry about “speeding” tickets. Celebration!
But people might ask whether, just perhaps, it might be
reasonable to reconsider circa 1950s speed limits in light of the
exponentially higher limits of modern cars. If it was
“safe” and “reasonable” for a 1958 Chevy with drum brakes and
bias-plys to operate at 70, what of a 2013 Chevy with
high-performance four-wheel disc brakes and 17-inch alloy wheels
shod with modern radials designed for safe travel at continuous
speeds in excess of 130 MPH? There isn’t a new (or recent vintage)
car that isn’t inherently safer (more controllable, less likely to
crash) at 90 MPH than any car of 1958 — or 1968 (or 1978) — was
at 70. Yet speed limits are, for the most part, just about back to
where they were circa 1970.
So, while the 85 MPH max in Texas is good news, it’s also sad
news. It is a barometer of the extent to which the public has been
brainwashed — and browbeaten — on the matter of “speeding.” Few
know much, if anything, about the Interstate system’s origins as a
superhighway system — let alone that 70-75 was considered
routine (and legal) more than 40 years ago. But they do
remember the NMSL — and Drive 55 — and so are grateful to be
allowed to run 70-75 once more. Eighty-five seems downright
sparkling. Except that on that lonesome Texas highway — with the
road straight and stretching to what seems like infinity — running
85 is damn near boring.
Ask any Texan.
A real limit on that road (and many other roads) would
somewhere in the neighborhood of 120. Many drivers — in countless
modern cars — could safely handle much higher speeds.
They do so routinely (and safely) on the first Interstate
Highway System — Germany’s Autobahn. But that would mean less
revenue. Less payin’ paper. Less excuse for the dons of
the insurance mafia to ladle out “surcharges.”
Perhaps by 2030 we’ll be able to lawfully drive as fast as we
should have been allowed to drive back in 1990.
But don’t count on it. There’s too much revenue at
stake.
