A 1930’s city-planning rule has drivers setting their own speed limits

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Speed limits are set by drivers “voting with their feet.” That’s a problem for everyone else on the street. Sources: NACTO | City Limits Los Angeles City Council | 2008 Speed Limit Report Los Angeles Department of Transportation | 2018 Speed Limit Report Brian Taylor and Yu Hong Hwang | Eighty-Five Percent Solution: Historical Look at Crowdsourcing Speed Limits and the Question of Safety ITE | Speed Zoning Information A Case of “Majority Rule”  Hammond, et al. | Traffic Engineering and the Police US Bureau of Public Roads | Accidents on Main Rural Highways, 1964 Research Triangle Institute | Speed and Accidents, Volume II AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety | Impact Speed and a Pedestrian’s Risk of Severe Injury or Death US FHWA | Methods and Practices for Setting Speed Limits Learn more: Controlled case study on speed limits in Seattle Background on California’s speed limit laws “Right of Way: Race, Class, and the Silent Epidemic of Pedestrian Deaths in America” by Angie Schmitt Strong Towns explainer on the 85th Percentile Rule on roads

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline A 1930’s city-planning rule has drivers setting their own speed limits on Oct 7, 2020.