Drive 55, try to stay alive!

[Newnan]

It's unsafe for those people because the majority of the people on the road are breaking the speed limit and going much faster. if everyone else followed the rules, 55 mph wouldn't be a hazard.

I'm going to get on the perimeter today, I'll see how fast people drive

[jaz82]

People in the Atlanta area drive too fast. I've lived here my entire life, and it seems that the average speeds have definitely increased by a lot over the past ten years. Yet, I've also noticed that you find fewer speed traps in the metro area than you would see about ten years ago.

Too true. There are however a few of them left. Anyone Commuting from Villa Rica/Carrollton areas know what I'm talking about. I-20 between GA 61 in Villa Rica and GA 5 in Douglasville is still monitored by Douglas County/Douglasville F.I.N.D. units and State Patrol on a regular basis. But they still let you get away with 80 in the 70 zones.

I-285 Scares me to no end. I have a way on the backroads I head to work so unless I need to, I rarely use it anymore. Heck, even if i'm in Cobb, and head home my way, I stroll through Downtown instead of 285 West of the City. Much better drive, and view for that matter.

[Hybrid0NE]

I'm going to get on the perimeter today, I'll see how fast people drive

Uh oh, Newnan hasn't posted a reply. Someone better check the ditches on the side of the freeway, he probably got run-off into one.

[johnatl]

I-285 Scares me to no end. I have a way on the backroads I head to work so unless I need to, I rarely use it anymore. Heck, even if i'm in Cobb, and head home my way, I stroll through Downtown instead of 285 West of the City. Much better drive, and view for that matter.

jaz82 - I could not agree more, I avoid 285 like the plague. I also pride myself on knowing lots of back roads, which I believe is the reason that at my advanced age, I still have no gray hairs!

[CusK]

Hahaha, 285 rules.

[dmccall]

Like someone said before, it looks like traffic behind them wasn't too bad. If you're not driving very far (<5hrs or so) the difference between driving 55 vs. 70 around ATL only saves a handful of seconds, actually. Once you get off of the minimum access highway, you have a series of traffic signals to deal with on the secondary road.

I like 65 and 70 in rural areas, but it really doesn't serve a great purpose on metro highways other than to suggest that people go at least 65 or 70.

[orulz]

Unfortunatly, it was legal what they did.

I think you're missing the point, though, this was a protest, not a prank. They're trying to get someone to notice how the speed limits don't make sense under normal traffic conditions.

I think a big part of the problem is that most interstate highways have a design speed (lane widths, curve radii, sight distances) of 30-40 MPH above the posted speed limit. It's all in the name of safety, of course, but over-engineered highways are definitely breeding grounds for speeding.

[Andrea]

I think you're missing the point, though, this was a protest, not a prank. They're trying to get someone to notice how the speed limits don't make sense under normal traffic conditions.

It was a protest, but I interpreted it differently. I thought they were trying to draw attention to the fact that a good many people nowadays think that exceeding the speed limit is "okay." I personally think 55 mph is plenty fast on a heavily traveled, close-in urban thoroughfare with large numbers of people entering and exiting at many different points.

Regardless of whether I'm right or wrong, however, it's incredibly dangerous for those of us who abide by the law to have others tearing around at whatever speed they think they achieve. If speeders think 55 is too slow, they should approach their legislators and the DOT and get it changed, rather than simply taking the law into their own hands and creating a special set of "exceptions" for themselves. As I said earlier, why should my life and health, and that of my family and friends, be endangered because somebody got up too late or is impatient to get to the mall?

[Rwarky]

It was a protest, but I interpreted it differently. I thought they were trying to draw attention to the fact that a good many people nowadays think that exceeding the speed limit is "okay." I personally think 55 mph is plenty fast on a heavily traveled, close-in urban thoroughfare with large numbers of people entering and exiting at many different points.

Regardless of whether I'm right or wrong, however, it's incredibly dangerous for those of us who abide by the law to have others tearing around at whatever speed they think they achieve. If speeders think 55 is too slow, they should approach their legislators and the DOT and get it changed, rather than simply taking the law into their own hands and creating a special set of "exceptions" for themselves. As I said earlier, why should my life and health, and that of my family and friends, be endangered because somebody got up too late or is impatient to get to the mall?

I agree, there are far too many idiot drivers on the roads.

[Jerseyman4]

I think you're missing the point, though, this was a protest, not a prank. They're trying to get someone to notice how the speed limits don't make sense under normal traffic conditions

Im aware of it being a protest and i have no problem with it until they decided to block the passing lane as well. Too bad GA law does not have a keep right/pass left law in the books that i was not aware of when i began posting in this topic. My biggest problem is that if you had emergency vehicles (AMBULANCES most importantly) that needed to use the left lane FOR QUICK TRAVEL, when you have that jerk blocking the passing lane, the likelyhood of survival for a person who needs emergency medical care diminishes due to the domino effect of EVERYONE crawling behind these college students.

[Rural King]

I drove I-285 on my way to Florida a couple of weeks ago. I have never seen anything like it. It was like a race track, but a race track where folks were doing stunt driving at 80+ miles an hour in many cases with reckless abandon. My girlfriend and I were waiting to see two high speed travelers merge into the same lane and collide as they passed the same car in a middle lane.

On the way back at night a week later we took the downtown route and stayed on I-75 and found that route to be a much easier drive that provided some awesome city views. I have to say downtown Atlanta at night is one of the most amazing things I have seen in a long time. Really nice.

[Greens!]

where can i see this video?

[Topped Out]

As of 5 minutes ago, this link was working.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5...editation+speed

The part you are probably most interested in starts at about the 3 minute, 30 second mark of this 5-minute video.

Also, if I have posted this link in violation of the urbanplanet.org rules, I apologize. Please let me know and I will remove it...or it can be removed for me.

[dmccall]

I agree that 55, especially in urban areas, is plenty fine. More than likely we encounter 20-40 traffic lights in our travels around our areas, so 10-20mph more on a 15 minute leg on a highway will not make much difference in the ETA...THAT GOES FOR AMBULANCES, TOO!!! (most ambulances are not first response, and few use interstate highways in cases of emergencies. Even if there weren't a single car on the highway, the time savings of 20mph in short trips is minimal)