Life

The Worst Place to Drive Fast | Considerate Driving | Redneck Rant

Drinking coffee and speeding
Drinking coffee and speeding

Take a moment and visualize something for me.  Visualize that you are late for work.  The clock says 8:05 and you need to be to work at 8:30.  The problem is that your commute takes you 30 minutes at minimum and you have an 8:30 meeting.  You jump in your car and start driving through your neighborhood.  You get to one of the main streets that runs through your neighborhood and decide that you’re going to go 40 mph instead of the posted 25 mph so that you can shave a few minutes off of your commute.  You come to a stop sign, stop, grab your coffee and start to accelerate through the stop sign, getting back to 40 mph as fast as you can.  You take a quick drink of coffee, lower you glass and CRAP there’s a kid on a bike in front of you!  You slam on your breaks, your coffee goes flying, you hear a loud THUD as you skid to a stop.  What just happened?  Where’s the kid?  Are they OK?

I’ll let you figure out the rest of the story in your head, but I have one question for you, “was this worth saving two minutes for?”

The worst places that you can drive fast is in a residential neighborhood.  The likelihood of hurting someone, especially a child, is way to high to take the risk.

If you hit a pedestrian:

  • At 20 mph 5% will die
  • At 30 mph 45% will die
  • At 40 mph 85% will die

And what is the risk for?  Two extra minutes, at most!  My bet is if  the unfortunate occurrence did happen and you were to hurt someone else or you, you’d gladly trade in those two minutes.  So next time you are in a hurry and come to a neighborhood remember what the real risk of speeding is in a neighborhood.