2018 Spring Seminar #3: The Relationship Between Public Perceptions of Speed, Speed Laws, & Safety

2018 Spring Seminar #3: The Relationship Between Public Perceptions of Speed, Speed Laws, & Safety

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I'd like to introduce our, two speakers today, we. Have Frank. Donna and Frank alarcón, Frank. Dama is a director, of state and local policy program, at the Humphrey. School of Public. Affairs, he. Manages, research projects, related, to transportation. Policy. Including. Impacts of development in, information. And communications. Technologies. And Urban, Corridor development. He was named the second, director, of the state and local policy, program, in October -, oh one, five, and his. Current projects, include examining. The interrelationship. Between traffic. Laws speeding. And safety, as well, as other policy, issues, including. Working on policies. Related, to automated, vehicles, that, may or may not obey, the speed laws in. Addition, to working at. The Humphrey School he's, worked for the Canadian Pacific Railroad's. The Metropolitan, Airport Commission and, the, Minnesota Department of, Transportation, he. Has a master's in public affairs and a law degree, when Akala Khan is a research assistant, in the state and local policy program, and a. Master's, of Urban and Regional Planning, candidate. Outside. The University, Frank, alarcón works, in transit, planning for Ramsey County, and serves, as president of the lyndale Neighborhood. Association in, south Minneapolis. Before. Joining the Humphrey school Frank, served as a Peace Corps volunteer in rural, El Salvador. Anyway. Without further ado Frank, demo we'll start then, we're going to pass the baton to, Frank alarcon and then back to, Frank Donna Frank. Thank. You max thank. You all for for being here and thank. You for the invitation to, present. This work. As. Chelsey mentioned we'll, take questions at, the end the. Advantage of the two of us today is that when, you do have a question just say hey Frank and one of us well answer. The. Research, that we, present, today is, going. To build upon work. That I have done, over. The last several, years looking. At the. Relationship, between speed, safety. Nets, and specifically, speed enforcement. Actually. I believe some of the presentations, of that previous work are. The. Roadway. Safety Institute website so, I am, going to briefly as a way of introduction go, over some, of the key, findings from these previous, a couple of previous studies if you'd like to know more I do invite you to go to the websites and get. A chance to hear me talk even, longer. The. First research, that I want to point out is, what. We call impact of exempting low-level. Speed violations. This. Was work that we specifically. Were looking at what's, known as the dimmler law in. Minnesota, you may or may not know but, in, minnesota. If, you, are pulled over for going. Up. To. 65. Miles an hour in a posted, speed limit zone of 55, or 60, you. Still have to pay the ticket, but that ticket does not go on to your state driving. Record and, we. Had, the opportunity to, look at what.

Implications. That may, have, had on people's. Driving behavior and perceptions, of speed. Then. The research immediately. Preceding, the project we'll talk about today, we. Were looking, more, specifically, at automated, speed enforcement, the idea that, you. Could be caught exceeding, the posted speed, limit by. A camera, a radar, activated, camera and the, ticket would, be issued. To you and, this is done in a number of different states by a number of different methods. But. Basically. You would not to be need to be pulled over in, person this, is a very controversial. Policy. It is not. Currently. Done. In Minnesota and we were looking at what. Are some of the reasons, for that. What. We found from these two studies in particular is, first. Of all there is a, disconnect. Between. The. Recognition, of speed. And. Safety. On, the road. Stakeholders. Those who are involved in setting and enforcing. Policy. Related, to speed, and speed enforcement. Are. Not. Aware, or. At least they're act their actions, do not show, a. An. Awareness, that some, of the public really, don't, believe, that anything. Printed, in black, and white on a sign really means what it says in black and white on a sign. And. And. Essentially, this is fueling, a perception, that. Enforcement. Of speeding should be a low, priority. More, specifically. What. We found. In this research previously. Is, that. There. Are a number of. People. In the, public at large in. Minnesota, who actually see speed as a good thing and the. Faster, they feel they can go in their, perception of safety, the. Better, regardless. Of exactly, what that posted, speed limit is, and. As, I mentioned, this, is not seen as an, excessive. Problem. By, those who are involved in enforcement, setting, those speed limits in. Particular. We find it's the younger drivers, particularly. Younger male drivers, that. Tend. To be involved, in. Exceeding. The speed limit and being. Involved in speed related crashes and. Logically. Are most. Opposed, to automated. Speed enforcement because. They believe they know better than, those who set the speed limit. Now. Let's, get. Into some, specific. Pieces. Here I think, I'm getting ahead of myself. Yeah. Getting, into some numbers though. We. Find that. Given. The data that's available that. Perception. Is not. Necessarily. Reality. In. 2014. Speed. Was a factor in, fatal. Crashes. More. Often, than. Those. Involving, alcohol, drugs, or their medication, and, more, than those that involve distracted. Driving. While. At the same time the, public the population, continues, to believe that speed is a good thing, one. Out of three respondents. To this, particular, survey said I enjoy, the feeling of speed. And. More. Than half get. Impatient with, slow drivers. And. Exceeding. The posted speed limit is is. Common, practice, I. May. Try and trip you up in the room once or twice asking, you if you've ever done it I'm not going to do it this time but you. Know who you are if you're in this room and you. Have ever gone past one of those speed, limit signs and it starts to flash at you because you are going too fast. It. It's, it's probably happened, to just about all of us whether. We actually get ticketed, or not. What. We conclude, from this previous work is that. This. Is. While. Not necessarily, what you would expect from a safety perspective. It. Is one that. Fits. The the, current environment, of speed. Regulation, and. We. See that we need to work toward a an. Environment, where speed. Is act speeders, are actually seen as endangering, others, rather, than, promoting. Some. Sort. Of greater good. And that. When, anybody speeds, they can be certain. That they will have ramifications. For. Doing that rather. Than being rewarded by, at. The very least getting. To where, they want to go faster. Specifically. Then for this research. We've. Discovered, that.

The. Number. Of speed, related fatalities, increased. From 2014, to 2015. Upton. Approximately. 9,500, and, 2015. Showing. That again even, though the, culture, says speeding, is good the, numbers show that it is probably, not. It, does contribute to the frequency, and severity of all, crashes, and. We. Were, not the only ones to. Show that if, speed, enforcement is to be effective, we, need to increase, the. Certainty. And the severity of speed. Enforcement. Despite. That we. See, laws. Going, in the other direction. Now. It has been a. Personally. Surprising, finding, that. The, typical. College, undergraduate. Now, between. The ages of 18 and 22 does not remember when we had a national, speed limit, because. They weren't born. As. Of 1995. We ended having a speed, national speed limit of 55 miles an hour now. It was enforced. And brought about through some very interesting legal, mechanisms, that I won't go into here, but, that nonetheless was, repealed, in 1995. And. Since. Then all 50, states have increased. Their. Speed limit this, was an action taken by 50, different state legislatures. As. I, mentioned Minnesota, has, a, law that even says, we. Have speed, limits that are 55, or 60, but, we really, don't mean, it like it's really 55. Or 60 that, is the dimmler law and. Other, states. Michigan. Have recently. Increased their maximum, speed limit just within the last year, from. 70 miles an hour to. 75. So. I'm trying to frame this as being not necessarily rational. And, that's probably an overstatement. What. We do see is that there is a public choice issue going on here and it's. A an issue that. Laws. Are, reflecting. Public. Ambivalence, toward. Enforcement. Of speed limits and the safety benefits of enforcing. Those speed limits in. 2011. National. Highway Traffic Safety Administration conducted. A survey that. On the one hand showed. We, as a. People 79. Percent at least do. Agree that speeding a turn or the at or near the speed limit does reduce my chances, of a crash, that's. That's, good from a safety perspective. But. Only, half, of us believe that speed, limits should be enforced all the time which. Is kind of contradictory, and. Also. Only half, believe, that some important, that something be done to reduce speeding. So. Even though we believe that there. Is a safety, benefit to having us all drive the same speed, more. Than half of us don't. Want to see it enforced to make that happen so. This led to the question of well how. Are we going to move from, that. Reality, to. A. Situation. That we all understand. And want, to. Abide. By the. Speed limits so that we can get a safety benefit and I. Will turn it over to, Frank. A to. Talk specifically, then about the findings, from. This work. Good. Afternoon I'll, be talking about the, analysis, we performed as part of this research project and. Our findings, so. Our work began with a literature review and we found a good amount of interesting stuff mostly from outside, the United States that, largely, confirms, kind. Of the dynamic that Frank Douma just. Illustrated, so, for instance a 2006.

Study By. Fleeter in Watson out of Australia, that was based on surveys, found. That while most motorists, acknowledge that speed is a problem, in some way or another, most, regardless. Of that prefer. To exceed the speed limit and they describe this as a mismatch, between beliefs. And behaviors. A, report, out of Sweden. I believe found. That, it looked at both, voting. Data and survey, data of drivers, and had. A very interesting methodology. And what it found is that people, who report, to, prefer, higher speeds, often. Do so thinking. That they, hold that policy, preference, out, of. Kind. Of communal interest rather than self-interest. But what they really find is that people who prefer to speed tend to be the speeders or the people who think that they're great drivers who should be driving faster than everyone else but. They kind of confused, that policy, preference, with something that's in. All of society's, interest. A. Recent. Report also. Out of Sweden was. More of a qualitative analysis of, the, process. For setting speed limits in one County. In Sweden, and through. Interviews, with different actors, like engineers, policymakers. Public, administrators. It, identified, two conflicting. Perspectives, that, were held among those different actors one, was the mobility, perspective, and, that was the perspective, that favored higher, speeds, in, service of more regional. Economic, development in that County, and. The second perspective was. Labelled the safety perspective and, this, is the perspective that favors lower speeds, lower speed limits and greater safety and interestingly, with. This paper basically found, was that, practically. The only people who held the safety perspective were the folks whose job it was specifically, to promote safety, so maybe the safety engineer held. The safety perspective but, most. Of the other actors, preferred, the, mobility, perspective, so higher, speeds, more economic, development and very. Importantly, the elected officials were found to subscribe, to, the mobility perspective, even though elected. Officials have you, know a dual mandate in this situation, elected officials are responsible, both for promoting economic development and, for. Protecting. The public safety but. In this study the elected officials were found, to. Kind of lean toward that Mobility perspective. Our. Literature review also, led us to the issue of lobbying. Lobbying. For, higher speeds, might come from a number of different perspectives one. Might be a civil liberties perspective, you, know regulating. Speed infringes. Upon, the. Freedom of drivers to drive as they wish and. Also there's, a there commercial, interest that might push. For higher speeds, and wider roads and. Infrastructure. That encourages, speeding, and. And, one. Study out of Norway found that, public. Officials face much, more lobbying, in favour of, mobility. And higher speeds, than. For safety and I'd be really interested to see similar. Research in the United States. So. Bringing. Our analysis, down to, region, five which was the geographic. Scope for our research. What. We wanted to do was compare three bodies of data to see if there was a relationship. So those three bodies of data were the. Speed laws in, the, region, five states. The. Speed. Related crash and fatality. Data. Out of this six, states and. Survey. Data of, public. Perceptions, and attitudes around, speed, and speed laws and, a working hypothesis. Was that the, states with the greatest clarity, and certainty of speed enforcement should, have better outcomes on the road so lower crash, and fatality. Rates, and. So. Our first body, with speed laws and we initially set out to kind of create a typology. Of. Different laws hoping, that we could create, kind of a straightforward ranking. And say you know this state has, good. Speed laws the state has mediocre. Speed laws the state has poor speed, laws, unfortunately. We we discovered, that. The. There were so many points of differing, differentiation. In the speed regimes of different states that creating. Kind of a straightforward typology. Like that would was, really difficult, so. A few of the major points of differentiation. Was. The type of speed law so some states have what's called a prima facie speed. Limit, this, means that. Exceeding. The speed limit is not actually, the infraction the. Infraction is driving, at a speed, that's unsafe, for conditions, and exceeding, the speed limit is evidence, of that infraction, but it does not be an infraction, in and of itself, and. Then on the other hand you have states with an absolute, speed law and. What that means is that exceeding. The speed limit is a, crime, and.

Then Even, to complicate, things more you have some. States which have a mixed speed law so, on certain roadways, there's. An absolute, speed limit and on, other roadways, there's a prime if at prime the faster you speed limit and somehow. The motorists. Just has to know. Which. Type of roadway, they're on. Other. Points of differentiation, as. Shown by this map, differences. In the maximum speed limit there are, some speeds some. States go, up to as high as 85. Some, as low as I believe, 65. Or 60, the. Severity of punishments. Is, quite. Varied across states the same the. Same unsafe. Driving behavior, in one state might, be a minor misdemeanor. And, it might be a significantly. More, severe, crime. In another state and you, know unless you've kind, of studied the legal, code of whatever state you're driving in you're, just not likely to know that. Also. Some. Some, states have kind, of added, penalties, for reckless, driving. So, they'll legislate. That if you're exceeding the speed limit by 25. Miles an hour or 30 miles an hour it. Tax on additional, to severity, to, the infraction other, states don't have any such law and then. Some. States allow, automated speed enforcement which Frank domina has done quite a bit of research on other, states do not and so automatic, automated, speed enforcement which uses radars, or camera, cameras. To catch people speeding, increased. The certainty. Of of. Punishment, for a speed infraction, some states use it some states don't, so. Here's a table just to show some points, of differentiation. Of. Speed, regimes throughout region five, so. You'll see half have an absolute. Speed. Limit half. Have a mixed speed limit. Some. Specify, a particular speed. That's. Considered, reckless driving, or a particular. Speed above the posted speed limit that's reckless driving other. States don't, two. Of them use automated, speed enforcement and four. Of them do not and. Then. An additional twist, that, we came across was that the, relationship across. States between the posted speed limit the. Design speed of the roadway and the operating, speed of the, roadway. It. Differs across states there's, kind of competing. Guidance, many. States use the 85th, percentile, rule which is kind of the standard way to set speed limits but increasingly, there's. Been, different. Organizations, questioning. That methodology, and. Encouraging, you know setting a target, speed. That's. Either. At or below the posted speed limit and so, that's kind of an additional, wrinkle that makes it really difficult if not impossible to, kind of. Evaluate. Different states speed laws and, regimes side-by-side. And. So we, concluded overall that the differences, in speed laws between the, six states that we were looking at are so vast that we we weren't able to, develop.

That Typology, that we had initially, hoped we could but. Nonetheless we looked at our other two bodies. Of data to see what we could find and so, the, next body of data was speed, related crash and fatality, data and probably. The most comprehensive, database. On. That issue is as far as which is the fatality. Analysis, reporting system. Which is maintained by nitsa and. So it knits a collects data around. Every roadway. Fatality, in the, country and. Compiles. That. Data, by state and so, and it does it does have a field for whether the fatality, was related, to speed. And. So we dug into this data and right away we noticed a, very, high level of differentiation, so, on the slide I point. Out the most extreme case which was that and. This table is from a Nitzer report from 2014. I believe. According. To this data, 10%. Of the roadway fatalities in, 2014, in Florida. Were. Related to speed and then, on the other hand that same year in Pennsylvania. 43%. Of, roadway. Deaths where speed, was was implicated, and so, this kind of gave us some pause how can there be quite, that much variation between two states, and. So we looked into the literature to see if there is any guidance and sure enough there's, a small, but growing body, of literature. About. Problems. With the reporting, of speed related, crashes. And fatalities across. The United States so. Just last year NTSB. Concluded. That law the law enforcement, reporting, of speed, related crashes is inconsistent. Another. 2017. Report found, that sometimes, when, an officer. Reports. A crash. In their, narrative, description. Of the crash they might mention, excessive. Speed but they don't necessarily check. The box or the the driver contributing, code DCC, for, speed and so when that crash. Is entered in two different. Databases it's, not it doesn't register as, speed related even. Though the officer reported. It as speed, related in the narrative. Area. Of that report. And. Then a very, interesting article out of the. South, Dakota the Rapid City Journal in 2015. Found. That in in, the case of that state just, raising. The speed limit can. Affect it can affect. The the, proportion. Of crashes. That are considered speed related because all, of a sudden if your speed limits higher and. Fewer, clap fewer crashes are gonna happen above that speed limit and suddenly, your date is different. So. Again with this body of data, were. Not we, didn't find a high enough level of, consistency. Across states, to be able to kind. Of make any. Confident. Rankings. Within region, five we weren't able to say that, you. Know the crashes. In Michigan. Are more. Likely to be related to speed than in Ohio. But. Moving, on to our third, and last body, of data that we looked at public. Perceptions, of speeds so those are these are these surveys, that are finding. Some really interesting things about what people think about speed, and, so Frank down my earlier mentioned, this 2011. It's a survey National. Survey of speeding attitudes, and behaviors, it's. A very, interesting read, how. And, it provides a great national, snapshot, but. It's not stratified, by state with. The sufficient, sample in each state to allow us, to compare, the. Attitudes, of drivers in Wisconsin's, to Minnesota's. So. It's it's kind of good at that high level but, didn't, enable the kind of comparisons, that we wanted to make and so. We. Decided to look for state-level.

Survey. Data of driver attitudes, about speed, and. We found some, for, three of our states and for the other three we didn't we weren't able to find anything so. We found some surveys for Michigan. Minnesota. And Wisconsin from. The. Last 10. Or 12 years or so and. It. In. These surveys. Largely. Found consistently. With kind of what the literature says and what we've previously, commented about, driver. Attitudes, about speed so, Michigan. For example, that. Survey, found that, 87%, of Michigan drivers, believe that speed, limits in their community, are just about right I remember, Michigan is the state that just raised speed limits for I believe over about. Six hundred miles of state. Highways. Furthermore. 62 percent of respondents to that survey found, that believe. That they personally, are less likely to be involved, in a crash than the average, driver. And. Seventy. Eight point, seven percent believe, themselves. To, be a better driver than, the, average driver. Minnesota. Pretty. Similar picture seventy-three percent of. Survey. Respondents, believe. That the level of enforcement and, their communities, is just about right so. Again. You're you're, not gonna see a big groundswell, of support for more enforcement if 73 percent of your population is content with the existing, level of enforcement. Seventy. Percent believe, that they are less likely to be involved in a crash than the average driver again, very confident, drivers. Interestingly. This, figure was lower. 55%, for. People who admitted, that they speed. So. What that suggests is that. People. Who are. Speeders. And and are, willing to admit to that are aware that. They're speeding makes them less likely to get into a crash and yet they, still do it, and. In Minnesota we had 63. Percent of, respondents. To the survey, consider. Themselves to be above average drivers, so again pretty, confident, drivers in Minnesota. Wisconsin. Pretty. Similar picture this, was a slightly older survey 2003.

I Believe, that. Kind of the narrative of, following. The survey found that when. It comes to the issue of speeding Wisconsin, drivers perceive this as a moderate, problem, for the state and there is little groundswell, for, treating speeding, more seriously, and in Wisconsin 50%, of respondents considered. Themselves to be better. Than, most drivers so a little, less confidence, in Wisconsin. So. I'll hand it back to Frank Donna to talk about. Our conclusions, and recommendations. So. Despite what you may think one. Of our conclusions, is not that they just teach, statistics better, in Wisconsin, and that's the only state that understands, 50 percent can. Be average. Or better. What. We did. Come. Around to conclude. Is that. General. Crash data. Literature. Survey, data and laws. Reflect. An, ambivalence. To the, need to force. A regulate speed for the purpose of enhancing safety. Despite. Data. That indicates, we have a fairly high crash, rate injury rate and fatality rate due, to speed. We. Don't see a groundswell, of, political. Push to regulate, speed and the. Laws themselves, are moving in the opposite, direction, allowing. Faster, travel rather. Than safer. Travel. This. Led, us to look exactly, as, to where the causal, chain is going and. What. We. Perceived. On a qualitative. Level is that essentially, this is a, topic. For which it's quite easy to to. Pass the buck. Politicians. Can say we are not, passing. Laws, that lead. To greater enforcement, of speed, limits because. There is no political groundswell. To, do so in fact, we're getting pressure to go the other direction and. Law. Enforcement, says. We, are not enforcing. The law we or we may be enforcing, the law but we don't. Put, a lot of emphasis on. Trying. To make people, stay. Within the speed limit. Because. The laws are ambiguous we, know that. People. Will not be held to, to. Account once, they get to court, so. On and so forth. The. Engineers, and others that are involved in designing and building the roads. Say, that they. Are, building. The roads as safe as possible. But. It's, the job of elected.

Officials And. So, forth to actually. Create, the laws that will dictate how fast people go. And. So. We go back to the elected officials and say we don't hear it and so we can then turn the turn. Turn the eye back, to ourselves. Asking. The question. Well. Are we, actually. The. Ones who, are. Telling what. Our, elected. Officials that we need to have. Better speed speed enforcement or are we pointing. The other direction. Essentially. The way, we can think about this is, I. Could, ask, folks, in the room here or as. We've seen on surveys, is. It. Important. To, obey. The speed limit. Most. People would say yes is, there a safety benefit, to. Following. The speed limit most, people would say yes and then, I would say and have you recently. Exceeded. The speed limit yourself. Most. People would say yes. We. Have. This real. Nice ability to keep saying that somebody, else needs to take that step so who would do it what would it take to get to that level and. This, is where we, get to the discussion that Frank, a just went through about the data. We. Don't have the, data available, consistently. Across. Jurisdictions. From. Crashes. Fatalities, etc. That. Allow. Us to make. The definitive conclusions. That. If we. Have roads. That are designed. For, a lower, speed, and we. Put, a posted, speed limit for, a lower speed, and we enforce, that speed limit for, a lower speed we will see a safety, benefit. As a result in the state, we just don't, have that data at. This point at. Least as we look at it in in region 5 our. If. We were to expand, to, 50. States. We. Would probably still find that problem because data. Collection, is, dictated. More, or less by the states or the local government so we, don't have this uniform database. That can give us that information. How. Can we break, this cycle. Well National, Traffic, Transportation. Safety Board did issue a report, in 2017. That, started. To, show. There's an interest, in moving. Forward. First. Of all when it comes to, the. Operating. Speed or the design speed, which. Is the this idea of the 85th, percentile, that. You. Understand, what. The average, generally. Operating. Speed is on a roadway you. If you get to rebuild it you will then design. To, have. It be safe to that 85th, percentile, of. That operating. Speed and. Then. You. Build. The road and what. We have seen at. Least anecdotally is, that, the operating, speed then increases, because, you have now made the road safer, to drive even faster, the, nitsa report. Suggests. Maybe. We think about designing. Toward, a lower speed. It's. Actually, probably going to cause people to behave more, safely, even. Though the design appears, to be less, safe. It calls, for. Implementation. Of automated, speed enforcement, simply. For the idea that increases. The certainty, of punishment if, you, are, going. Through a zone with a camera, that doesn't sleep and is always on and. Everyone. Who goes over. The. Posted, speed limit gets a ticket.

Most. Of them are going to learn they don't have the bank account to be able to continue that behavior and they will chew that behavior and. Then. Finally, working. To develop more consistent. Reporting, of speed related, crashes, so that we can compare, state to state the state, that. Certain. Behaviors, related to speed are indeed, leading to. More. Severe crashes. More. Fatalities, and other, undesirable. Outcomes. The. The, key. Thing that we need to also point out is the one that Frank a mentioned, from, South Dakota which, is that states should not be able to just improve their speed. Safety. Data by increasing, their speed limit. As. To. Our. Own final. Recommendations. We. Need, to see better, agreement as we mentioned to what speed related means whether it's exceeding the speed limit or driving. At a certain, level leads, to, worse. Outcomes. We, would love to see more, national. Level surveys. With. Sufficient, samples in each state to, enable, across state comparisons. Basically, we thought. That the 2011. Nitsa Survey provided, a lot of good information pointing. Out this. Dichotomy. If you will of. People. Who, think, that speed. Enforcement, is good but, just not for them and just not all the time, if. We could get that kind of data in sufficient, numbers for each state we, could maybe start, to understand, why. Three, out of four people in Michigan believe that they are better. Than average drivers, but only half of them drivers, in Wisconsin, are and what's. Behind those beliefs and so on and so forth that could help us better, deliver, education. About the. Dangers of driving too fast and. Then. Get. Around to speed. Laws and, enforcement of those laws that. Provides. For greater transparency. And. Uncertainty. Automated. Speed enforcement is us. Very certain. Enforcement. Having. A dimmler. Law where, some. Speed. Violations, don't, have the same ramifications. As other, speed, violations, is the, opposite, of transparency. And we, need to make it clear and understandable that, 55. Means 55, really, it. Does I remember. Billboards. That used to say that but. That was when. We had a national speed limit I don't. Recall seeing that more recently, and. Possibly. Because, it doesn't. And we would like to see moving in that direction, and. Create. A standard, measurement for certainty, of punishment in each state. Without. Necessarily, saying that every state has to have an exact same speed, law. Have, some, level of understanding that, I, can. Go 70, in Minnesota. On, the, interstate and I. Should only go 70, when. I cross the state line to South Dakota and, it says 80 I can go 80 but, in either state if I go 81, or 71. Opposite. Respectively. It's. Going to result. In in. Some. Kind of citation. So. We have finished, our full report and gone. Through various, reviews. And so forth and I believe it is on its way to being published, on the. Road Safety Institute, website. And. We, also have a shorter. Version that. Was just accepted to be published in the spring, 2018. Edition, of the, Journal of transportation. Law logistics, and policy and. With. That I will. Refer, you to a number of the works that got us to this point and we'd. Be happy to open for questions. Sullivan. Nightingale from homo park engineering, Associates would like to know have. You had an opportunity to compare residential. Street perception, of speed with main artery, perceptions.

In. Looking we, did not get, down to to, that level of of, that. That. In, some cases is, the. Relationship, of operating, speed design speed and so forth but what we were looking at was how people reacted. Overall, to their surroundings, as well as to the the, posted, speed limits. So. The question is where is the what's what's controversial, and what's the opposition, to automated, speed enforcement. This. Is what we looked at in in the previous study and, there's. A number of different pieces, behind. Behind. That everything, from belief. That it it's, an invasion of privacy. To. Belief. That it. That, government just doesn't have the the, right to be able to keep track of what you're doing on, on the roadway to, the belief that you have the right to do kind of what you want to on, the roadway. This. Is as, I mentioned the beginning. Mostly. Found in. Attending. To be younger populations. More. Male populations. That. That. You have that kind of, opposition. There. It. Does break down you. You can try to break it down in terms of different, stakeholders. But, really. It this, is what led to our research here, comes. Down to more this idea that there's just this general sort, of public. Choice that's. Being made in favor of, faster. Is better, and. Until we get over, that perception. That faster, is better there is going to be somebody and a number of somebodies, who are going to resist. The idea that we all have to travel at the same speed. That. Makes sense. The, devil's triangle of speed. Alcohol. Use. As. Percentage. Where you have all three together. As a percentage of the total fatalities in a given year and has that trend improved, over. The last 20 years or not. Um. We. Did, not look at that very, specific. Statistical. Question. There, have been studies that show, there. Is a definite, relationship that. If you are more inclined to speed you are less inclined to use your your seatbelt and more inclined to drive under. The influence. So. That there, is a relationship, in those and actually. Again you also tend to be a younger male and. Believing. That you're going to do that I, don't. Like I said I don't have the the data whether that has changed. Significantly. Over, time in terms of percentage of the population or percentage of crashes where one. Two or all three of those are present. But. It. Does you do Sinton see a correlation, in terms of how that works we we see. Seatbelt. Use is going, up quite. A bit in Minnesota its measured, at over ninety five percent and, obviously, breaking, the speed limit is much lower percentage. But. When it comes, to, how. Exactly that's breaking out in those combinations, on actual. Fatalities. We just don't have that number in front of me. I've. Done a lot of driving Montana. Says they raised the speed limit to 80 on the freeway and, the. Incidence of people, going. Faster, than 80 which, I tend to do, for a variety of reasons is, greatly, reduced. From. What it was. In. Other words there seems to be a tacit. Enforcement. Policy, on the part of I would control the a, easy, and. It, seems to be real right. Right, that that is something. That does. Seem to come into it as we, recommend, it that you know if you come up with an enforcement regime that, says this is where it's going to be. Then. Then, people, will start to respond. It's when you. Get resistance to that I. Can't. Point to a specific study, but I got a believe. I've seen some in my head that similar situations, after the national, speed limit was repealed. States. Said okay we'll, go to 65 because that's what the electric wants but what the, electric want electorate.

Wants, But we will enforce 65, and that. Works fine until some state went to 70 and. These. Drivers. Started, to push up toward 70 and maybe. Resources. Got moved within. The. The state patrol or something, like that and suddenly. The de-facto speed became 70 and so the legislature, responds, and says okay you want to go 70 but we really mean it this time it's gonna be 70 and, that. Works maybe for a while. Now. When I was in South Dakota my car really didn't like to go 80. So, I wasn't, going to be one that was going to eventually over time get comfortable going faster, than that but if I lived in South Dakota I might buy a car that does and so. Then you become comfortable going 80 and you. Start to maybe push it up a little bit further again. Asking. If you have any advice on how to get support from local law enforcement in, enforcing, more speeding violations, they, say this has been a challenge in their state for law enforcement agencies that are already understaffed. Right. And, that's. A, kind. Of some of the things that we find is you know it's the local law enforcement that are right there on the the, frontlines and they're the ones that we that, see. The resistance when they try to enforce. The the law and, they. Discover, they've pulled over their neighbor who says come on I know you drove to work going to over as well. It's. That. Becomes, the. The cultural, issue of. We. Need to start understanding this, we, need to build. This. Perception. Understanding. Recognition. That. Just. Because somebody goes, a little over it's no harm and it's, the same sort of issue. That we overcame. With with smoking that. If. I go over a little bit who's gonna hurt. When. In reality that if, we all believe that it's going to hurt quite a few of us and so. We need to begin that discussion Frank. I don't know if you've got any further thoughts. On that one. Resistance, you might expect that will encounter in referring, to this conversation. Regarding. Engineering planning and design folks in. Trying to get. That design, speed down more towards the speeds, that were actually trying to enforce because, my. Understanding of this is that that gap is what leads people to not really assign, much risk to edging. Up and further, and further into that. Well. That was one of the was really, a significant. Finding for us to discover the NTSB, issued the study saying let's turn. The idea of. Designing. Our roads on its head instead, of trying to design for, people. To go faster, that we actually designed for them to go slower and they. People feel more comfortable at a lower speed and less comfortable at a higher speed. Again. As an easing, my own self as an example in South. Dakota, I felt okay going eighty once I finally got the car up to it because, I felt, I could see anything, coming at me from a long way away there. Was no, trees along the side of the road, there were no. Buildings or anything that was going to hide something, jumping, out at me. Whereas. If you're driving, on your your neighborhood Road you would never feel comfortable going that fast because, the situation, can change that quickly and so, it's that kind of thinking that is I think in forming, the idea of of moving. In the other direction and, to. Your question of you know how much resistance do I see well, if we have the, federal. Organizations. Starting to. Initiate. That discussion, I think, that can go a long way to. Helping, people understand, that it may there. Could be a movement. Toward. That kind of a change in, the, way roads are designed and. The. The. Real benefit. Here is that to. You. And me we. Just drive it what we're really comfortable at we. Don't know that somebody is trying to engineer the, speed we're driving at so. If the roads are. Changed. To let we're driving in a safer speed we will, subconsciously. Start, to move in direction. Along. With enforcement and just, cultural change. Was. There a question over here yeah is. There a difference in states that.

Have. Multiple speed, limits for interstate, so like. Some. States have you know one speed limit for automobiles, and then one speed limit for combination. Vehicles, does. That affect like the public perception at all of either. When a safe speed is or how annoying it is to. Fight. With. Right. So, the question is you know if there's two speed limits one for personal. Autos, one for commercial, vehicles or something like that does that have, a creep. Perception. Issues in terms of we, did. Not find, we, didn't specifically, look at that question but we never found any sort of situation that that caused people to. Behave. Differently. That. Is still a fairly transparent, situation, you know whether you're driving a commercial. Vehicle or a passenger, vehicle. There. Is evidence. That. The. Traffic operating. At different speeds is less. Safe than everybody operating, at the same speed so. From. That perspective that may not be as safe that's not a perception, issue it's a it's an operational, safety issue. The. The. They. Answer the question you didn't ask which is what. About different, enforcement, regimes as frank Alarcon mentioned we've got prima, facie we've got absolute, we've got combinations, and so forth. We've. Got states with dimmler laws and we've got other sorts of you know different, gradations, of, how bad is bad, that. Is, also, that's, a perception issue that we did find that, people. It's. Not a transparent, speed law anymore and so. Folks begin, to believe that they can push the law in certain, directions whether. They can or not and that, leads again, to that same situation of, certain people feel uncomfortable at certain speeds driving, on the same roadway with. Others driving, at different speeds and that's not safe as if we're all going at the same. Obviously. Seen a cultural. Groundswell. With the old texting and driving, distracted. Driving. Well. I. Guess. I'm gonna first ask when you say groundswell, do you see that as isn't, been an effective, campaign, or, as, just, one that's been visible.

Right. Right, yeah. It has been a more visible campaign, than. Trying. To, keep people to drive the speed limit I. Would. I mean there's, two things to see here. One. Is that maybe there's something to see because when you actually look at the numbers speeding. Is much more responsible, for fatalities, and severe crashes than texting, is but, at the same time you need to merely look around as you're driving. And you see that we're, still texting, and having our phones out as we're driving so I'm not sure that it's completely, been effective, in getting us to change our behavior to the beingness as safe as possible. So. That. Raises. The question of you know okay texting, and driving somehow. We didn't. Quite get ahead of that I. Still. Remember when. That started, to become an issue that that seemed like it was being to be nipped in the bud and everybody would figure it out and instead it just. Happened. And and, and it was the initial. Efforts were never there. Instead. Looking. At, what. Is it that caused us to. Start. Over, 95%. Of, us 19, out of 20 putting, on a seatbelt, well, now you can get pulled over for not having a seatbelt on and for no other violation. And. You. Have clear. Evidence of, when. Seatbelts are used and not used and clear evidence of. What. Is the difference in, terms of your ability to survive a crash if you're using it or not using it, it's. Getting to that level of, clarity I think, that we need to look to rather than the texting and driving. Freeze. That one more time I want to make sure I understand. Will. We be getting guidance. From the government, don't, bet on it. Will, we, be getting some, effort. To try, to make sure that autonomous. Vehicles, are obeying the speed limit yes. This. Is becoming, I think a key, feature, and driver of those who are developing, the technologies. That. If, they are. Developing. What we call the level 4 the level 5 vehicles, where, the vehicle, really does the driving and is responsible, for taking, care of any unsafe, situations. Those. Vehicles are going to be designed, to, understand. The, safe driving, speed on the facility, they're on and they, will operate at that speed, until. We get there you. Can take your what we call level 2 Tesla, and you can tell it to go as fast as you want it to go and. That. Is. A. Fairly, cut and dried situation. Of we can look at the. The data and discover, that it wasn't the car that's fed it, was the. Person telling the car to speed now if you get to a car malfunctioning. And. It. Chooses. To go faster. Because. Something didn't work right even though it, was designed and told to go the, appropriate, speed what. We are seeing is the, companies. That are developing, these technologies at least for now are saying we're. Cool with this we want the liability for, that they are accepting, the products liability for, that right.

Now They. Are. Showing that they're serious enough about it and they believe the safety benefit, is, going to be so great that. Even. In a situation. Where that does happen the, safety, benefits have otherwise outweighed. The, cost of accepting. That liability. 360. Fatalities. Question. I have is what, percentage of those were on interstates. Versus. Non. If. You know that I. Don't. Know. That specifically, we, do have the the. Link on that one that, can. Go to the slides and be able to look up that report but I don't know that I've stopped my head. But. You, know I would speculate that. Because. We also know that greater. Percentage, of the fatalities happen on rural roads on two-lane roads and so forth that more likely you'll see of that, 8360. Where speed is an issue that also is going to be proportionately, higher on non, interstate, type roads. And, here comes the master of ceremonies. Clearly. Very, interesting. Seminar, and more, questions than I've seen in any seminar, until now, but. Anyway I want you join me in thanking the. Two francs for. Their presentation. And. Let. Me also invite, you to come back and next week same time same place, we. Have a presentation. By. Rhonda, Burke from General Motors who. Will be talking always, be sure to check your surroundings, driver. Performance research, in the age of driverless, cars, so. Again that we'll see you next week same time same place. And thank. You all for coming have, a good day. Yeah.

2018-02-08 15:51

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