KY Governor Fletcher, why raise speed limit?

Friday, 16 February 2007

Governor Ernie Fletcher 700 Capital Avenue, Suite 100 Frankfort, Kentucky 40601 Online Contact Dear Governor Fletcher, Could you please answer the following question? Considering what I have stated in this letter, what significant benefits can you offer regarding the proposed increase in speed limits on any highway in Kentucky that truly outweigh the benefits and need for a more sensible approach to our environment, health and energy crisis? In the interest of clarity I will offer my thoughts less any sarcastic or ill-humored rhetoric, but make no mistake, I am angry. While it is hard not to editorialize on the following, in the interest of keeping this as short as possible knowing your time is valuable in your service to the people of Kentucky, I will attempt to limit this list to what I perceive to be a stronger case to lower the top speed of any Kentucky highway, not to raise it. The price of gas has an impact on much more than just your pocket book. The high price of gas makes it necessary for those with a more limited source of income to choose between gas for transportation or necessities such as medication and other important needs for a family. An increase in the speed limit not only sends the wrong message considering this limited resource, but will perpetuate the increase in price as demand continues to overwhelm a system incapable of sustaining both the economic and environmental stability with severe consequences. Sadly as you are probably aware, lower gas prices also seems to send the wrong message and that wrong message is that this resource is not regarded as as valuable and important to our lives, our state, our country and the world as it really should be treated. If there wasn’t this silly notion that speed limits over 55mph were necessary, auto makers could more easily meet the EPA mileage standards by not having to design and provide autos that are capable of meeting both high speeds and fuel efficiency. In addition, the safety requirements for an auto that travels at higher speeds demands the added weight necessary to accomplish this task, further reducing the efficiency and adding extra cost to the price of the vehicle. To some this may be viewed as progress and a sort of natural evolution of this type of transportation. For those people who are fortunate enough to comfortably accept rising costs in this country I can understand how easy it is to think that there is nothing to be concerned about. To the less fortunate and especially those who are unaccustomed to being without the security of their once good paying jobs, we are creating insurmountable obstacles simply by an apathetic race for most to get somewhere 5 minutes sooner. While it is worth considering how little is gained in time over various distances by increasing the limit, I’ll assume that you are capable of that simple math and not insult you by including such computations. But please consider what is lost by the ever increasing tendency of this population to speed past what is really important. So much of our lives has changed and not necessarily for the better. We have abused a really wonderful means of transportation, maybe not the most sensible, but certainly a means that has given us an individual freedom like no other in the history of man. Is it so much to ask that we slow down just a bit? A Model T could get me 15 miles to the grocery and back with most of the day left for anything else, what an improvement over the horse and buggy of the 19th century. Why have we turned this into such a speed driven monster? Are our lives truly any better at 70mph verses 65mph or even 55mph? I think not, I believe worse and somehow it has isolated us from each other in a very sad way. Last year I rode in a friends vehicle as we approached the Atlanta city limits and while the speed limit dropped to 55mph this army of autos we were part of continued to hurl onward at speeds closer to 80mph. A great number of people all in their own hurried worlds separated by their own auto shells speeding to avoid exactly what they were themselves, crazy traffic, a rushing herd of lemmings like creatures with little or no regard for each other and certainly unconcerned in any way with the where or how that oil was made available. This kind of thing happens over and over again each day. The situation is out of control and I don’t see how raising the limit is going to help. Have you considered what is the real cost of oil? Look to the future and consider what may be in store for a nation that is racing toward a world in which supply is desperately inadequate. As multiple countries face severe shortages and become unable to sustain their now growing economies not just because of the high cost of fuel but because it just is not available, we will be locked into a vastly different life style while a constant state of conflicts give no recourse other than force. The cost of a barrel of oil should be calculated by the amount of blood it takes to obtain it? While I believe the blood of Americans has paid in part already, it is not solely that of Americans either. Raising the speed limit is shameful if we are to regard this resource in such an arrogant and irresponsible manner. Even in today’s world it is definitely evident in many parts of the world that oil is at the heart of so many horrific atrocities. People in other nations lose their lively hoods or even their lives because of it while factions struggle for control and ecosystems are trashed as in the Niger Delta so that people who once fished for food now live in squalor unable to feed themselves. There are several nations, people and ecosystems that are being hammered into heaps of intolerable dismal shells of what they formally were by the forces that constitute the oil industry. And we are just as responsible for what that industry is. Should we have to experience such misfortune for just a moment each time we shove that nozzle in to fill our tanks then maybe we would have some idea what it is worth. But we don’t have to know this, we don’t have to feel guilt because we earned the money that pays for that, that must be the reason we can flaunt the value of it by speeding down the road at ever faster speeds. Maybe it’s that the faster you go, the more unlikely it is that this knowledge will catch up to you, you won’t have to pause and look it in the eye if it just can’t catch up with you. Is it at all possible that somehow by the raising of speed limits that the cost of fuel in the future could be less? I suppose you can propose some economical benefit that supports your position for one reason or another, but does what is in your heart and what you believe that is the right thing to do really agree with that position? The affects of higher prices does not affect the economic range of people equally and maybe for some reason the idea is that it is felt that the hardships of the poor are an acceptable sacrifice in order for others to experience affluence. It is certainly your right to have money, extra money even, especially when you have earned it and I am not saying there is anything wrong with that. But is having enough money to not care about anything a good thing? How much money is enough to not care about the welfare of others? There is a need for some one to step up and say, “Slow down and look at the real cost.” Maybe you think we are going to be rescued by some new technological advance, or that turning corn, formally known as food, into fuel is the answer, or that science will find a way to save us or by whatever else you think is going to change or help alleviate this problem. How many more ecological disasters will it take to open our eyes to the further disruption of ecosystems already being stressed by human encroachment? Even if there is something, it is not going to come soon enough because we needed it yesterday. What we can do right now is change our ways for the better, conserve, slow down, know the value of what we have and face the possibility of suffering if we continue to be ignorant of the consequences of our wasteful behavior. Either way, whether you have money or not, what we are doing to our environment will create hardships for everyone. The longer we continue to ignore what should be common sense in regard to the world we live in, all the worse we all will suffer. I would like to know how driving faster is going to help us, all of us, and why in a time when other states and cities are enacting policies that are intended to reduce carbon emissions does the Governor of Kentucky see raising the speed limit a reasonable action? Signed, Larry Sanazaro

 

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