The Importance of Speed Limits

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The Importance of Speed Limits

Imagine driving on I-75 as cars race by you at a blink of an eye. You are driving 60 miles per hour, the speed limit; they must be doing 100 miles per hour or more. This is not an illusion; this is the reality of driving on a highway. Believe it, it happens everyday. Cars race down the road at uncontrollable speeds that cause tickets, accidents, and sadly death. Speed limits are a must for traffic control, for safety in neighborhoods and for avoidance of collisions.

Traffic control establishes a set of rules and regulations that people rely on to help avoid collisions and other hazards. With almost 160 million motorists and 3.8 million miles of public roads in the United States, traffic control on the highways is an important aspect of daily life. Without the control of speed there would be more fatalities than we already have now. Speed limits should be obeyed. A motorist going too slow could cause an accident. When everyone is traveling at the speed limit, a car comes up going 40 mph; if you break everyone will, too, perhaps causing a collision. Motorists depend on traffic control to avoid collisions and travel safely to their destination.

Our neighborhoods need control of speed, too. Accidents not only happen on the highway, but also on residential streets, with the speed limits being 25 mph. Motorists are exceeding these limits as I speak. They would be unable to stop quickly enough for pedestrians, possibly swerving out of control and hitting a house or another car. My street has been monitored, by the city, due to this excessive speeding. The city of St. Clair Shores is trying to make the motorists aware of their speeding by posting a digital sign, which posts their current speed. Without a legal speed limit in residential areas, people would drive in excess of 25 mph all the time. We need this wild speeding controlled soon before something bad happens.

Death! It’s scary to think about that especially if it happens to someone you know. The single greatest cause of accidents in the United States is the automobile. In 1991, the U. S., automobile accidents were responsible for about 49.4 percent of all accidental deaths. That is not all from speeding, but it would be higher without speed limits.

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