80 Mph Limit on the motorways

I take it the recent talk of actually REDUCING motorway speed limits has been completely overlooked by you people? There is a strong environmental argument for doing this in an attempt to reduce emission levels.

So who is likely to be more popular in this PC world we live in? The party that wishes you to be able to put your foot down/twist the wirst a bit more? Or one with a far broader and arguably sensible agenda in mind?

Your argument that most people already exceed the present speed limit will hold absolutely no water at all in a debate on this issue.

[timwilky]

OK I drive 500 miles a week on the motorway and most of that somewhere between 90 and 120. Motorways are fairly safe with the exception of the clowns that appear in the outside lane doing 60.

Yes raise the limit, but to at least 90mph and permit overtaking in any lane. It is infuriating when you find yourself in a queue simply because the idiot at the front wont move back in

It's not just the emissions - it's the volume of fuel. I drove the length and breadth of the country last year as a field based IT support and I could save masses of fuel by staying under 90.

This obsession with lane hogs is misguided too. What causes congestion is people pulling out from the middle lane and making those in the fast lane brake, thus causing the domino effect a mile down the road. Staying put in one lane makes the traffic flow a lot better - fact. Same goes for when you see signs saying the lane is about to end. Staying in the lane until nearer the lane end eases congestion and you will see signs encouraging this at some road works these days. Obviously forcing your way in 5 yds before the end of the lane at 70mph isn't safe but using all of the available road space is necessary to ease congestion.

I agree that there should be limits but think that the limits should be variable for traffic control. Much like the M25, which I'm sure people hate but it works.

I would vote for a max speed of 90 when the road is quiet, ie 10pm till 7am or something with that speed variable upon traffic conditions. They have the technology now to do this all automatically.

Argh I get so ****ed off with people that sit in the middle or fast lane when there is space to their left. Move over!

I drive at about 85-90 usualy, and it seems perfectly safe, so I would certainly be in favour of raising the limit to 80.

In terms of emmissions, stationary traffic jams in towns and at rush hour are by far a bigger problem than people going at 80 instead of 60. Any driving in top gear is going to be way more effiecient than just sitting with your engine running. For this to ease we need much better public transport, and some more park and rides possibly. e.g. my girlfriends commuting train to brum and back is ALWAYS rammed and uncomforatble, and this morning was delayed by "82 minutes"!n Sort it out Virgin. Every day there is like 3 2nd class carriages and thats it!

I'm for 100 MPH aswell.

I was an IT Field Enginner driving through Essex.

On Motorways everyone was going 90MPH to 100 MPH where possible anyway.

If people would go slower @ 70MPH there would be more traffic jams than there already are...

The fact is that this debate is never going to end.

The limit now is 70 and everyone exceeds this by at least 10mph as a general rule and the police show tolerence up to around 80, because otherwise they'd have to pull over EVERYONE.

If the limit is raised, then eventually the cycle will begin again, with faster cars being made and people saying "80 is too slow, we need at least 90 to be safe" and so on.

I think its perfectly acceptable to drive/ride at 90 and its not at all unreasonable to say that it can't be done safely. I think the most dangerous part of motorways is actually coming onto them, which will not be helped by raising speed limits, but perhaps using the German system mentioned earlier of making a kind of courtesy law making drivers let you in.

Anyhoo, we'll see how it all plays out.