An Experiment in Civil Obedience

[billroper]

For my friends down in Atlanta, this five-minute video shows the result when a group of young people decide to obey the traffic laws.

Interestingly, this act of civil obedience would be illegal in Illinois. (Via Instapundit.)

Comments

[pheltzer.livejournal.com]

Help me on this one.... why would this be illegal in Illinois? Hell there are places where minimum speed limits are posted... so theoretically as long as you're going the minimum or higher they shouldn't be able to issue a ticket.

[billroper]

Our legislature passed (and Governor Rod signed) legislation that makes it illegal to block traffic in the left lane, even if you are doing the posted speed limit. It's an interesting bit of hypocrisy.

[shsilver.livejournal.com]

I'm still waiting for that one to be challenged in court. I sort of have the feeling it has never been enforced.

[pheltzer.livejournal.com]

I recall that legislation... but I don't know that they could effectively write a ticket for doing the speed limit. There were also all sorts of interesting exceptions to that law as well.... since otherwise technically one third(depends on how many lanes of traffic there are) of all cars on the expressways would be breaking this law during rush hour and traffic is crawling.

[shsilver.livejournal.com]

Back when I lived in Bloomington, a group decided to do this around I-465 around Indianapolis. During rush hour they were going to drive around the entire circle, in the right and middle lanes only, at the speed limit.

The cops later commented on how easy it was to spot the speeders.

[tigertoy.livejournal.com]

Since I'm on dialup, I can't see the video. I can only hope that the point is to show how stupid the speed limits are.

[figmo.livejournal.com]

A bunch of people did a similar protest in the SF Bay area a few years ago.

It was amusing.

[unkbar.livejournal.com]

It would be illegal in New York, too.

New York Law (Title 7A25 S1120 6.b) says "In addition, upon all roadways, any vehicle proceeding at less than the normal speed of traffic at the time and place and under the
conditions then existing shall be driven in the right-hand lane then
available for traffic, or as close as practicable to the right-hand curb
or edge of the roadway, ..."

Note that it says "the normal speed of traffic", NOT "the posted speed limit". Violation of this section is called "failure to keep right" and is a moving violation that'll cost you two points.

The drivers who wanted to pass that "rolling roadblock" may ALSO have been guilty of ANOTHER moving violation, such as speeding, but that doesn't excuse the demonstrator's failure to keep right.

[pheltzer.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure if it's the same in NY but in NJ it was Keep Right Except to Pass. So as long as you were moving marginally faster than the person to your right you would still technically be in legally correct place.

[oreouk.livejournal.com]

I don't think the result would be quite so dramatic in England, but it would still be felt. It's interesting enough on country roads when people come right up and tailgate because you're keeping to the posted limits and are on a bit of road where they feel the posted limits are wrong.

I love the image of the river of cars coming round the corner :-)

[jeff-duntemann.livejournal.com]

Rolling roadblocks like that are illegal in Colorado, too. I don't know all the details, but the cops can ticket you for cruising in the left lane if you're not passing somebody. We all think the ulterior motive here is to make it easier for people to speed if they want to, since if nobody can speed, the state can't make the ticket revenue it's come to depend on.

[madfilkentist]

Another theory: It's generally understood that "Speed limit n" really means "Speed limit n+10". The cops don't ticket people driving in this range. The legislatures don't want to change the legal limits to match the de facto limits, because that would just create a new, higher set of de facto limits. So anyone who is driving the de jure limit can be blocking people who want to drive up to the de facto limit.

Yes, it's crazy, but it's consistent craziness.

[billroper]

Our priest, Mary, who is a chaplain for the Illinois State Police told us that the police on the Chicago-area expressways (speed limit 55) set their radar guns for 72.

Usually.

[penngwyn.livejournal.com]

My father is a retired traffic engineer.

One of his recurring complaints was "zero tolerance" speed enforcement campaigns. He insisted that the posted limit was *engineered* to be about the 95th percentile speed of traffic moving well under good conditions and within designed capacity of the roadway. [The typical bumper-to-bumper results when load tries to exceed capacity -- you increase the number of vehicles that can be accomodated by dramatically cutting the speed they move at.]

So in general -- ie., unless this stretch has been designed to function as a speed trap -- the n+10 rule pretty much matches the engineering design.
[The other exception is that there are freeways engineered for ~80-90 mph that are politically limited to 55/65/75 by ordinance.]

--

The situation that I encounter far too often has to due with the HOV lane. Vehicles with multiple passengers, whose drivers decide to only do 55 (perhaps because their vehicle is overloaded) shouldn't be scared out of the HOV lane by speeders, so that they putter along in the left single-occupancy lane. Likewise those who assume "it's dark out" counts as an implicit -20 on all posted limits. [It's not a bad rule to follow, but trying to impose it on everyone else is not going to help.]

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

I think it's illegal in most if not all states. It's called "impeding traffic".

Even if not technically illegal, they'll still try to ticked you for it. I read on BikeForums fairly often of bicyclists getting ticketed for "impeding traffic." In reality if taken to court this gets thrown out most of the time, and gets thrown out on appeal every time it's taken high enough. But most people just pay the fine. Most of the time things don't have to be illegal, you just need to irritate a cop.

Two observations:
1-This has been going on for decades. First time I heard of it was in the 70's.

2-The van driver really missed his opportunity. Once you get by, you get in front of one of the drivers and slow to 45 MPH, breaking up the rolling roadblock. Of course, most drivers don't give a damn about anyone else on the road as long as they've gotten their way, so that may be a bit much to ask.

Personally I do drive actually below the limit in Michigan (usually 60 to 65 in our ubiquitous 70 zones). I do go about what everyone else id soing (70 in a 55 zone) in Chicago, but my numbers there are skewed because the only time I drive there is when I'm in the beginning/end of a long trip, and I do tend to drive a bit faster when I'm driving hundreds of miles at a stretch.

But I do take advantage of opportunity when it happens; if I come across a semi in the right lane driving a fair amount below the limit, like maybe 60 in a 70 zone, I will drop in and tail him. I'd rather drive slower anyway.

[ash-blackwell.livejournal.com]

Watching this, I was rather amused because my father was doing 60 mph on the same road during rush hour in the far right non-exit lane and had a cop come up beside him and signal that he needed to speed up, he was obstructing the folks around him trying to do 85!