I think one thing that I saw in the US that you'd never get away with in Europe is ping-ponging in the lane, boucing from lane edge to lane edge. In the US the lanes are so wide that a lot of drivers don't seem to be capable of staying in the center, of course every other driver being on their phone doesn't help either. If you're bouncing around in the lane in Europe you may well get the police called on you as someone will think you're a drunk driver. :)
Traffic lanes are usually wider in the USA, so there's plenty of room to "ping pong" as you call it. On many European highways, it's not uncommon to be within arms reach or so of the vehicles beside you. Further, most states long ago banned cellphone use while driving, so it's certainly not "every other driver" doing so.
@@robinstewart6510 Exactly, I'd say this gives European's better lane discipline. :) We have a lot of narrow back roads too where you're folding in mirrors to pass each other whilst millimeters from a hedge on the other side. Obviously not everyone is good at knowing how wide their vehicle is, but at least 'most' are.
@@robinstewart6510 Yeah, I think it's... Fine... I'm not sure lane discipline is the issue in the US, it's more-so people being on phones so they swerve around quite a bit or brake super late.
i drive home from work sometimes with 230kmh... a short part on autobahn... had to go smoothly right because others drive 350kmh...(logic, sight and 2 free lanes) that happens and it is no problem... like other people let me go also... YOU HAVE TO CONCENTRATE or just go right and chill at 140kmh
@@qlum And here we are in France, vomitting insults at all the camping cars with dutch plates clogging our highways. German drivers in France are also frankly dangerous.
As a Swede who has driven A LOT all over Europe, I have to say French roads are my favorites. That's perhaps related to the traffic rhythm in France fitting my personality, but whatever the reason I really prefer French traffic. Calm and relaxed on the highways, a bit more spirited in the cities. It's pretty dramatic driving into France from Germany and seeing the traffic changing as you pass the (invisible) border, as if by magic. Go in the other direction and when Porsches and Mercs start to whoosh by to the left at insane speeds, well, you know you're in Germany.
There's an additional reason for higher speed limits in general in Europe: the cars' road ability. In Europe, cars are built for narrow, curvy roads and high speeds on motorways. In the US, cars are built for long, wide, straight roads and medium speed on freeways. I have driven several US makes of cars both on US roads and European roads. In a US car on a European road, I've always felt a bit uncomfortable and have driven at a lower speed than when driving a European car on the same roads.
@@hexgraphica some of my friends have like Z06 Corvette, Hellcat Widebody Challenger and that stuff. Honestly the Corvette feels like an Amg Gtr or everything else compairable on that pricepoint. The Challi, yea its for the straight line, but drives very good on the German Highways. We could argue about the baseline Dodge and Chevi V6 models or eco boost mustangs, they are garbage compaired to equal German cars
5:45 I have to complain about that. The Autobahn IS the motorway. It's just the German word for motorway. About ⅔ of the motorway in Germany doesn't have any speed restrictions.
@@dwerg1 And also they tend to be in rural areas and not in urban areas where most people live thus people giving it perception that it’s less cause people drive on it less often(eg only on long distance trips)
I live in Germany quite close to the Netherlands. The local Autobahn, the A31 has average speeds of between 160-180 km/h on Sundays when there are no lorries. It also has two lanes.
Well as an Indonesian all I can say is that 90% of the people who’re driving don’t even know the rules. Even using a seatbelt is seen as not a mandatory thing when driving 🙄. Many people called me a nerd when I enforced them to wear the seat belt onboard my car.
Do crash compilation videos count? I know its weird but for some reason I watch many dashcam footage from different countries but they are all crashes....
In Poland you have 140km/h + 10km/h leeway (but the speed is almost never enforced on motorways so lets say that if you drive on the limit you will be overtaken constantly :D).
@@StraightOuttaPaddock Ukraine has a speed limit of 50 in cities, but you can only legally get fined when you go 20 kmh above the speed limit. So you can technically go 69 kmh I'm cities without being punished, and that's pretty bad imo. By the way, hi, neighbor!
I would say, the reason for not enforcing speed limit on motorways as much lies in lack of average speed counting on most of roads, thus relying only on traffic police cars, which cannot be everywhere.
@@MilvenTheDwarf By average speed counting, do you mean speed cameras? That'd definitely be a reason, but I don't see why there wouldn't be speed cams on motorways in Poland. Maybe only dangerous stretches of roads are monitored, and the rest is just very safe and thus not worth it?
I makes sense for me. Not all roads are created equally so inclusion of express road is fine, and when there are multiple lanes you can overtake trucks safely, so different limit there also make sense for me. It's just most of those signs in compilation are simplified so none of them include heavy vehicles, and some countries have their own weird rules like France has a set limits when there is rain, where as here in Poland everyone just drives 30 over on express roads *unless* there is rain.
I'm not sure if it is already mentioned, but the "autobahn" is just the German word for "highway" or "motorway". There is no difference between "the autobahn" and "the highway" in Germany as there is between "snelweg" and "autoweg" in the Netherlands. So saying "Germany has 130kph speed limit on the motorways, except for the autobahn" doesn't make any sense. Germany has an advisory speed limit of 130kph unless otherwise indicated (as shown in the road sign you display on 1:45). On some places they limit the speed to 130, 120 or even 80 (when the road is wet for example).
We have that distinction here in DE, too. We have the "Autobahn" which can only be reached via connectors and the "Kraftfahrstraße" which can also have intersections and junctions. Both have the advisory speed limit of 130 km/h unless explicitly stated otherwise. Besides, even if it isn't an explicit highway here in DE (you don't see any of the telltale signs when entering said road), it still can have the advisory speed limit, however, it has to be constructed like a highway (that is, you can only reach it via connectors, thelanes must have a certain width, there must be emergency lanes present, and both directions must be separated by a median). However, in contrast to the "Autobahn" the "Kraftfahrtstraße" can be constructed like an ordinary country road. Another limitation (I don't know how this is handled in NL, though): If it's an "Autobahn" or "Kraftfahrtstraße", you may only enter it with vehicles that are capable of traveling at least 60 km/h.
@@Robidu1973 The "Kraftfahrtstraße" is what we in Belgium and the Netherlands call "autoweg" and "Autobahn" would be what we call "autosnelweg". In the Netherlands, speed on the "autoweg" is limited to 50 (= minimum) within city limits and 100 outside. In Belgium, there are no specific rules. It can be 50, 70 (in Flanders, 90 in Wallonia) or 120 in case of a dual carriage way. I didn't know the "Kraftfahrtstraße" did not have a maximum speed either, unless otherwise indicated. But I guess they're almost always limited to 80, 100 or 130 due to being constructed near city limits.
@@MaartensTravels Some "Kraftfahrstraßen" are even called "Schnellweg" like the "Messeschnellweg" in Hannover but as far as I know the speed on there is limited to 100 kmh since it goes directly through the city area.
@@Robidu1973 actually 130 on kraftfahrstrasse only applies if the is a built barricade between lanes in different directions. if only lines its only 100
In Austria this is called Schnellstraße. The difference to Autobahn is the standard of building and securing it. That's more or less the biggest difference. Some Schnellstrassen can appear as Autobahn, but for some construction reasons they are not. Another confusion is also the difference how older highways and some newer highways are built. A new gen. of a highway, 200 kmh is absolutely not a problem.
The funny thing about the speed change depending on the daytime is how it's the complete opposite in Germany: many stretches of Autobahn close to cities or houses have a limit of 80 km/h starting at 10 pm for noise abatement.
Some Autobahns were built way too close to existing residential areas - or (even worse) some scrooges bought land surrounding the Autobahn cheaply, developed new suburbs there and then sued their state for a tighter speed limit and a noise buffer.
@lucas actually it isnt too much different. In lot of places where the cities hug the highway so to say, the speedlimits were already lowered explicitly (to 100 or 80) and are not depending on the generic limit. As a result they are not affected by the generic speed limit change in daytime.
Towns built along the railroads in the US have been getting these complaints, too, hence the 'quiet zone'. While in towns, it makes sense...it's not like a roving gang of railroad builders came through after you moved there - you knew that there were 40 freight trains going by every day, or at least, you should have
It looks like that's one of the few things we did right with our motorways. We built all ours to deliberately avoid large settlements (apart from the M6 in Birmingham; that's a complete mess) and abandoned most of our plans to build urban motorways in London, and the few we did build all got downgraded to A roads. Here there has to be very good reason to impose a permanent lowered speed limit on a motorway. It does happen, like with the start of the M11 and the M27x mini-motorways in Hampshire, but it's rare. We're not like most European countries where you get speed limits sprinkled in on certain sections. It's not exactly a law of motorways but it's an unwritten rule that motorways essentially can't have permanent lower speed limits throughout and to get any at all there has to be exceptional circumstance. I can't think of a single motorway that has any section of lower speed limits throughout in the entire country. The only ones I can think of are at the beginning and ends of motorways as they reach a roundabout or urban junction, or the previously mentioned M27x motorways.
Me as a German going at 160+ on the Autobahn here be like: *chuckles* "This speed limit thing in these countries these days..." (hope the irony is conveyed in this)
@Yarne Verminnen tbf so long as everyone is following the rules, driving predictably, with appropriate distances between vehicles and not cutting anyone off or squeezing in etc - then it can be perfectly safe. That’s why the non speed limiter sections work okay, since the predictability and consistency has to be in the road as well (straight enough, good enough surface, etc). Speed is really only a danger when people act unpredictably, since you have reduced reaction time and increased stopping time. Of course even the most disciplined country will sometimes have someone being unpredictable and that’s why you get more places getting speed limits. But that’s why also people propose no speed limit once driving is fully automated, since the computers should be able to act perfectly in accordance with the rules and communicate intentions with each other. It’s basically the same reason trains can be safe going so fast, because there’s predictability and rules-following (no sharing a signal block, not having to deal with turns, etc).
In Germany on an autobahn, a foreigner not used to it need to be careful and recalibrate your rear view mirror use. When at home you look and see some lights and think to yourself, “yeah I got plenty of room to pull out”.. in Germany, take a proper look and watch to see how fast they are moving or you are about to seriously piss someone off and have lights flashing in your rear view mirror. Pulling out in front of a high powered BMW or Porsche doing 180mph is bad manners. They will have seen you and they will be watching you and typically they can react quick enough, but it is annoying when someone just pulls out late. Especially as I will be by in a blink of the eye.
it's not just bad manners, it's fucking dangerous. Sometimes you have rich people taking their Porsche for a spin going 300+km/h - if you pull to the left lane at 80km/h to get rid of a slow, overtaking truck, that can get really dangerous. Of course, the Porsche driver is also to blame if he doesn't anticipate that, but that's not gonna be much help to you.
@@pixelmaster98 The blame is always in the car behind. Anticipating is always necessary. I really don't understand the autobahn concept of having no speed limit as too many variables have to align: no relatively slow car in front on the left lane and not suicidal driver behind that car. In the case of somebody overtaking a slow truck or slower diver in the middle lane with no time to check the reckless Porsche behind... you see the picture. Besides, the kinetic energy goes with the square of speed, so an increase of speed from 120 km/h to 140 km/h is not the same than from 160 km/h to 180 km/h, the risk of death is exponential. Some German drivers are arrogant even out of their country. In Spain we have a speed limit of 120 km/h, although you always have speed radar signals in advance (mandatory by law) and you can speed up easily when you know there is no one (does not work when the radars check your average speed for a concrete section or you get caught by a traffic helicopter). Nevertheless, I hate Germans in my own country flashing me the lights when I take the left lane to let other cars join the road from the right, especially if I am not over 120 km/h and the guy is coming full speed from far behind. Buddy, this is my country, so respect me and our traffic rules! I am not going to brake because you come at 160 km/h, slow down! BTW, my bull icon is a well-known signal on the sides of the Spanish roads.
@@jabato9779 I'm not saying the car behind isn't to blame. But that doesn't matter to the driver of the car in the front if he's dead. Thus, not checking for cars in your rear view mirror is both dumb and dangerous. Rule of thumb: always drive as if everyone else is an idiot, because they probably are.
In Germany the driving lessons include the autobahn and the final drive test includes autobahn driving where you're specifically tested on how you enter and exit the autobahn. At least this was the law when i got my license back in 1992. Regarding the electric cars: yes, they do not have emissions but we must not forget that electricity is not produced without emissions.
Well, if you electrify anything you can do like cars and use nuclear energy or other renewable energies and such, you do reduce the CO2 emissions by like almost 0
That's not the case anymore. You have mandatory driving lessons on the Autobahn but it's not a mandatory part of the test anymore. It can be though. Basically everything you learn can be tested but it's the TÜV tester's decision what they're going to test you on. I didn't have to do parking or Autobahn, for example. But I did Landstraße and 30 km/h zones. The TÜV in my city is also conveniently placed right next to a Autobahn exit so the tester had the choice to test me on Autobahn driving. There's still a huge focus on proper discipline though. 3rd gear until you're on the Autobahn so you have the torque to quickly speed up, blinking way before you change lanes, no breaking on the main lanes if you leave the highway, no breaking in general if not necessary and so on.
Also note that not even the motorways have long straight stretches around here. Not only because there's so much old stuff to wind around but also to keep drivers' minds occupied. Boredom is a major factor of road accidents.
@@albertlugosi Not only because of boredom but mainly because of the known phenomena called speed blindness. After a while at a certain speed, your mind gets used to that speed and this could be very dangerous in situations where you have to slow down at an intersection or in any other place where the circumstances make it too dangerous to drive at the speed you were just driving at. If you at this point are affected by speed blindness, it is very easy to think you have slowed down enough, because in comparison to the speed you just were at, you are driving much slower, but in reality it might not be slow enough at all. What causes this is straight, wide and open highways. Mainly because of the lack of different reference points like trees, buildings, pedestrians, curves etc that normally give you an idea of how fast you are going.
@@albertlugosi If I remember right, the interstate system in the US was intentionally designed with curves every five miles (8km) or so, as a means of keeping people at least a bit more attentive. They tried...
Not to mention the discipline most drivers have when it comes to merging in traffic. One car from the left lane, a second car from the right lane, alternating to ensure smooth flow of traffic
In Belgium we have alot of ''trashbincamera's'' which are basically speed camera's put in and disguised as a trash bin, they are always watched by either a marked or unmarked police car nearby, sometimes easy to spot, other times impossible, like on days where the trash is being collected, they are put everywhere in urban to suburban area's
The aim of a speed camera should be to reduce the speed in a given location. Therefore every speed camera in a country with safety in its mind should be well visible so the less fines it produces, the more effective it is. Unfortunately they are also a good source of revenue, so many countries will resort to these tragicomic forms of selective taxation and that's a disgrace.
The way it works here is that highway speed limits are 130, this changes to 110 when you reach something like a city limit. So highways near or around cities are limited to 110. The stretch between cities is where the limit is higher. I believe Germany is the same. Another difference some might notice is that EU highways tend to curve more. It's not that we can't make straight lines, the issue is your brain gets bored with straight lines. By slightly curving the road left and right, your brain is more engaged as you have to provide input to the steering wheel, even if it's just slightly. This creates safer roads.
Dutch guy living in Spain. The automated speed checking in the Netherlands is obviously fairly new. Speed used to be enforced by a branch of the police force that would hide unmarked vehicles behind bridges and other constructions. The speed camera they used (a Dutch invention btw) could also be hidden inside grey metal boxes sitting along side the road. But these were dangerous cause drivers would know where to expect them and hit the brakes once they got close. Not very safe if you've got someone unfamiliar with the road driving behind you. Now in Spain, or rather the province I live, that old system is still in use today. You will still see the fixed camera positions in grey boxes, although most of these boxes are clearly recognizable by the fact they look like (and indeed are) recently set on fire. Don't let that fool you though, set on fire or not, they may work just fine. Also Police sometimes will have speed checks, mainly in built up areas from what I've noticed. There will be an unmarked vehicle parked near a bus stop or something like that and once you pass that too fast, you'll find yourself being pulled over by a police welcoming committee not much further down the road. Having said that, in comparison with the Netherlands I find most Spanish drivers to abide to road regulations better than the Dutch. (in general of course). This is immediately apparent when you see pedestrians crossing the road on a marked passing where cars will actually notice and stop whereas in France I've noticed crossing the road is more of a suicide mission. What I really don't like about Spanish roads compared to the Dutch is that there barely are any clear bicycle lanes. Especially during milder whether you'll see bicyclists on the roads where traffic is allowed to do 50 and up and its really dangerous because they're even less visible than a motorcycle is, they're doing half the speed, and in stead of showing themselves by claiming the lane, they'll stay to the right which just invites cars to pass them at mirror to elbow distance. Usually unintended, but it often leads to dangerous situations and accidents of cours.
Burning speed cameras? Stone age solution. Use polyurethane foam applied into the housing. Of course, this was a joke. Don't do it. Although proven successfull, this method is so barbaric, that it is not used even in Poland.
In Czechia, radar must be marked by traffick sign before so everyone will slow down and nobody get fined. :-D Police uses mostly Octavia RS or Passats, people are used to looking for such cars, if there is some suspicious blue Octavia RS, everyone will slow down. :-D
Most of my life I lived in NL and in 2015 I moved to the US because of my US wife. Despite the roads being as big as an average airstrip, in my first 6 months in the US I have seen more accidents than in all of my 15 years of driving experience in NL and other parts in Europe. The accidents in the US are a lot more violent too due to higher speeds in urban and suburban areas and bigger cars. Driving culture in the US is just horrible, speeding, unnecessary driving in the left lane, passing left and right, road rage, being on your phone, not knowing how to use a roundabout, tailgating, unsecured cargo on pickups and/or trailers, not using their rear view mirror. In Europe drivers will see you coming and will actually move to the right and will not impede traffic or change lanes when you are passing them which is why on the German Autobahn driving fast actually isn't unsafe. On top of that, the roads in the US are poorly maintained, all sort of debris on the shoulder lines (regularly I see things like chairs, ladders, seats, truck tires). Also, many vehicles are simply not safe to be on the road, and general there is a lack of traffic information. In NL there is constant feed of traffic information to warn you about traffic jams for example, it will let you know to reduce speed in time instead of hitting the traffic jam at full speed. There is no way telling an American that there could possibly be anything better outside the US but driving absolutely is one of those things.
Well in the netherlands they drive unnecessary on the left lane, being on the phone, tailgating, not using the mirrors and of course speeding. We got a lot of tv programs that shows how people react on the roads. Not sure about belgium and germany cause i haven't been there for awhile
@@eacamo2986 I get it. Living in Australia is the same. You quite literally cannot 'drive' because everyone is doing something stupidly unexpected. All you can do is operate your motorvehicle and hope for the best
@@TBMFan in my years in NL, I have never sat behind a car overtaking for 18 mins while a policecar was sitting behind it with lights and sirens. Now I live in Australia and witnessed it a few times
Yeah it does my head in too and i have to live here haha, but mostly it's due to intersections but then there are those loooong boring stretches that is 80km only while there is nothing wrong with the road itself and it is divided with a centre wire barrier
on for example motorways E6 in sweden its pretty much either 110 or 120 the whole way from denmark to norway.. cant say for other roads as i rarely go elsewhere
In from Italy, and from my experience, at least on the motorway speed limit is respect (also because with the Autovelox, if they catch you, the resulting fine will be a good reason for respect the speed limit 😂). Although on country road... Yeah they are not so respect Anyway I'm from northern Italy, so I don't know about south 😂.
@@francescoboselli6033 Well, I went down to Amalfi and avoided Autostrada due to high road tolls. Starting from about Rome, traffic got worse. Yes, north is more civilized. Traffic in Balkans is much better than South Italy.
Here in Austria, we have automatic 100kph speed limits, which turn on when emissions get to high in the area (IG-L). However, in some stretches electric cars don't have to stick to 100kph, in order to test the traffic flow and check if it is feasible to implement nationwide.
Actually I don't think it's a good idea to specify different maximum speeds for different vehicles on the same stretch. There's a good reason why trams and inter-city trains don't share the same track, if you give it a though. As for trucks, which have lower speed limits outside of residential areas, it is a big problem which is a major cause of incidents.
Actually, whenever the IG-L is on, you don't have to follow that limit as an electric car at all, no matter where you are. In Salzburg there are 100km/h speed limits at every on-ramp so that if IG-L 80 is on, you are only allowed to drive 100 instead of 130.
@@alexnefi Years ago I remember reading how the suggestion to implement an exemption to IG-L for electric vehicles was rejected because it's dangerous to have too much difference in speeds on the road. Is this not the case anymore?
@@albertlugosi There is no reason to blame trucks. Any car could be driving slower than the limit for any reason. Drivers are supposed to adjust their speed according to the road, weather and traffic. The alternative would be for the slower limit to be applied to all vehicles, because allowing heavy large vehicles to go faster would be more dangerous than having different speed limits. However, on motorways visibility is generally good. If large speed differences work on the Autobahn with vehicles doing anything between 120 and 200kmh, 30kmh difference shouldn't be that dangerous if people stay alert before changing lanes.
@@noxis93 It was passed about 2 years ago I think. I regularly "ignore" the IG-L restrictions. They put up some green, barely readable signs with way too much text on every motorway entrance in the IG-L zones. www.fuerboeck.at/verkehrsrecht/verkehrszeichen/zusatztafeln/immissionsschutzgesetz-luft/
Being an American, my times driving in the Netherlands I am always amazed on how disciplined the truck drivers are by staying in the right lanes. In America you could be driving over the speed limit and there would be a big truck on your tail wanting to go even faster - scary. Also, in America police sit on the side of the road with their radar. Finding someone going too fast means they have to race out and flag you down. This is so very dangerous. Plus, how many cars can they stop in an hour? Maybe four, while a camera can take hundreds of pictures without causing a dangerous situation.
No that's not true, trucks pass each other (even when it's not allowed on some stretches) with a small difference, clogging up our roads and don't forget the people who are overtaking them with 95 kmh during the 100 kmh daytime speed limit. One thing I like about the US is that cars and trucks are allowed to go the same speed, I mean it don't have to be 75 mph for trucks here but 65 mph (105 kmh) would be much better than this stupid 90 kmh (56 mph) limit for trucks and that's also the speed they're speed limited at.
In Europe the level of the average driver is way higher than in the USA. It is way harder to get your driving licence in the Netherlands than in the USA. The level of the USA is more like, drive forward without hitting anything and congratulations, you are passed!
@@Kolket1389 not really - but if you take in automatic your driving licence will be marked that you are authorised to only drive automatics. Since its a big commitment to get a licence everyone learns and takes exams on manual even if they are planning of buying an automatic.
@@Kolket1389 ''you need to take your exams in manual car'' Not necessary. You can decide to take your exams in an automatic but you won't be allowed to drive in a manual car.
I like the times when there was a speed limit of 130km/h. The only downside was that there were too many speed limit changes. On the A4, where the video was taken, there used to be so many speed limit changes that I only drove 100km/h. Just in case I missed a speed sign, all to avoid a ticket. Between Amsterdam and The Hague there was almost every 5km a different speed limit, the range was from 90km/hr to 130km/h. And those two cities are maybe 60km apart. It was ridiculous. Bye the way, you should know that a speeding camera at a crossing with traffic lights, is almost always a red light camera also. So don’t take the risk and hit the gas pedal in order to hopefully drive through an orange traffic light. You will get two fines. One for speeding and one for driving a red light. And fines are higher if you speed alongside road construction, when they temporary reduce the speed limit. And the overhead matrix signs on highways go over the road signs. So if a road sign says 100km/h and the matrix sign says 70km/h, the speed limit is 70km/h. Also when the matrix sign displays a red cross above a lane, that lane is closed. Driving on it will bet you a very high fine. The matrix signs are also use to indicate if the emergency lane becomes a rush-hour lane. In that case there is a green arrow pointing downwards at every lane that can be used. If that is the case, you may also cross the continuous line on the road and drive over a ‘verdrijvingsvlak’ (Google translate says it is called an expulsion plane, but I don’t think that is the correct translation). It is the white triangle shaped form (or wide oblique white stripes) on the road to indicate a separation between a highway lane and a diverting exit lane.
Yes, all of this is explained in the theory booklet they give you when you attend any European driving school. Most American highways don't even have a matrix panel lol. An average speed camera is like witchcraft.
Yeah... I'm worried about the ever increasing prevalence of speed cameras. Recently google maps has been routing me through obscure small village roads instead of more main roads because (and I'm not exactly proud of this, but eh) you can maintain higher speeds for longer stretches. It is just a tad absurd when some unmarked little road through fields gets you somewhere faster than that lovely lit and renovated road running parallel a ways over. Speed cameras are a-okay in residential areas, I get it. People. But they keep touching long distance driving and that's a big no-no.
Good vid! Love seeing that the road conditions, speed limits and driver capabilities in Europe are recognised. I lived in Germany and The Netherlands and after reading most of the comments there are a couple of things which are worth mentioning. First, the speed difference between vehicles is always a issue for safety which is why most highways in Germany for example have 3-lane highways going uphill to separate fast vehicles from lorries with different speeds uphill. However, it is not always the speed difference but also the routine of driving in certain situations. Especially in Germany where the advised speedlimit of 130 km/h is often seen as sign for "pedal-to-the-metal" foreigners are most often involved in accidents because they are not used to fast driving cars on the left lane. This means that the overtaking procedure for a lorry needs to start way earlier than you would on a Dutch highway with a low speed difference. I live close to a stretch of Autobahn which is frequently used by Dutch people to just drive fast. A friend of mine is a rescue worker and gets called at least once a week because people with sporty cars, often from The Netherlands, drive fast and miss the signs stating that there are damages to the tarmac and lose control of their vehicle. Second, yes, the Autobahn has in general no speedlimit. But most people do forget that above 130 km/h you as a driver are by law a "careless-driver" and thus responsible for anything that happens. This is mainly for the insurance company which in case of an accident, even if you were not at fault, states that this accident could only occur due to the high speed you were driving. So driving fast on the Autobahn also means that your insurance of the insurance of others in case of an accident is not obliged to pay a dime in some cases or makes you as a driver partially responsible and you will have to cover some of the costs. The same applies to the "adviessnelheid" you see at interchanges in The Netherlands from one to the other highway. And last but not least, Dutch highways, pre covid-19, were way to full anyways during rush hours to actually drive the 130km/h and it in many cases lead to more capacity on the highways which benefited the commuters in the time spent on the highway. Especially in the evening or during the night the 130km/h makes a lot of sense to me because of the empty highways and the herewith connected comfort of driving.
"But most people do forget that above 130 km/h you as a driver are by law a "careless-driver" and thus responsible for anything that happens" I actually like that system. "You're allowed to go faster than we say you should, but if anything happens it's your fault". I like how the German government treats it's population like adults.
I think it has more to do with how you got your drivers licence. Here in the netherlands you have to drive with a instructor and you wont get your licence unles you pass the exam with litle to no mistakes. In the U.S. most people learn from their parents or family member. And then just get a simple test to show you can handle the car a bit. So it has more to do with how you are instructed than dicipline.
In Bulgaria the speed limit on a 2 lane motorway in not so good condition is 140km/h. Keep in mind the cameras don't catch you at 140 but rather somewhere at 180 so I can imagine how crazy this sounds to an american.
Very nice video but can I complain about traffic annoyance number 1. In Dutch we call it ‘onnodig links rijden’ which means ‘driving on the left unnecessarily’ you can even get a fine of €210 (or $252) (2021). Sometimes I see you’re hogging in the middle lane. You need to drive in the most right lane and yes most dutch people do this, it’s very annoying (see 6.50 the white Volvo V40). For example if I’m in the most right lane and I want to overtake you, I have to switch to the middle one, then to the third one and then switch two lanes back to the most right one. Can people please just drive in the right one, and only drive in the second lane or third or even the fourth, only use the fast lanes when overtaking. Stop using the argument ‘there’s a truck ahead I have to switch again’ thats the rule. Please let other drivers who want to drive faster pass by. German drivers are much more generous in this (check the white number plate’s they are more often on the right lane, and make room for faster moving vehicles). The Germans even have a funny joke of the Dutch numberplate (NL) Nür Links, which means that they only drive left. Check your rearview mirror before moving to the fast lane, and check it twice, so you can make sure someone isn’t moving faster than you thought. This is what Germans do and what makes an unristricted Autobahn of 220 km/h+ (or 135 mph+) easily possible. I’m not a fast driver in cities or small villages but on highways it’s easy to drive 160 km/h (100 mph) and not dangerous.
We used to have lots of radar speed traps on the highway, people used to suddenly break hard and this caused accidents and traffic jams. They are very rare nowadays, just enough that the idea still deter people from speeding care free outside the average speed zones.
Imagine overtaking a queue of trucks when on a 'trajectcontrole' area. You are now going to have to overtake trucks with a maximum of 5 to 10km/h or walking/running speed. I've gotten a fine for doing 104 on average where 100 was allowed. All i did was overtake a long row of trucks that day... It's my only speeding ticket to this day and it really feels unjustified, especially given that the roads are safe enough to drive 130 on.
@@AwoudeX Except trucks have a speed limit of 80 km/h Now not all abide by that completely but they will be doing 90 at best usually and 85 at most in a ticket area
In Poland, we have 140 kmph speed limit on 2 lanes motorways, furthermore there is few speed cameras on these road, so there is a lot of drivers driving on 160-200 kmph
Just be sure to check the insurance stuff about driving on the autobahn in Germany ;) You are insured...just realise that if you go past the recommended speed limit you might be financially held accountable for a portion of damages (in case of a crash/accident), that you yourself will have to pay, and will not be paid by the insurance company (20-30 percent I believe, but it has been a while since I drove in Germany...so a bit rusty with the knowledge).
Just remember how much it costs (time and money) to get a DL in places like Germany, and how well you have to maintain your vehicle there (no rust spots, etc). Those costs would be considered "Discriminatory" here in the USA. That's one reason why your average driver in Germany is better than one in the USA.
So the nazi like germans wont let you drive with a rust spot or mismatched part on the car, seems like class and thus race warfare, something the nazis germanys are good at. Maybe I can put a yellow star over my rust spot! will that make the nazis happy?
We have to pass technical inspection every 2 years to stay road worthy and they inspect every critical component(they really don't care if your engine makes weird noises and stuff but they do care a lot about everything that makes your wheels attached to the car, they religiously check and test all the components, wheel alignment etc.) I've once failed technical inspection because one of the break lines were showing what I would call micro-tears on the outer rubber and I wasn't even mad about it(those tears were really micro, they weren't deep but still it signals that this break line is already aging and needs to be replaced asap and they won't let you drive with it). I quickly went to service and got it replaced in 20min and got back to complete my technical inspection.
@Arwiiss Here in the USA, inspection laws vary depending on which state the vehicle is registered in. Some states require an annual safety and emissions test, others only require the safety inspection, while some states have no inspection requirements at all.
Me, a Pole: "Oh, fuck... I forgot that limit changed from 110 to 100 on 1 lane express road... but it's not like it matters... in good weather everyone just drives 20 over anyway."
Only 20 over? 😂 One of the roads i drive every morning to work has 100kmh limit... if u go 120 there you will be overtaken by everyone exept trucks and busses... i may have been driving 130-140 myself there and i was still getting overtaken by litterally everyone😂
Here in Czechia, limit is 130, but when you are slower than 180, cars are blinking to you becuase you are pretending. When you are in left line, you must drive at least 160 or 170 or someone will hit you from behind. :-D
Here in Australia (sorry if this is long-winded, but our speed limits are quite complex, & vary from State to State!)... Urban areas: 50 km/h for un-signed residential roads and some built up areas (60 km/h in Northern Territory); 60 km/h for major roads; 70 & 80 km/h limits are occasionally used for major arterial roads which have more than one lane in each direction. Common speed zones below the default built up area 50 km/h limit are: -Shared zones (signposted areas where pedestrians and motorized traffic share the same space) are 10 km/h. -School zones are variable speed zones, with a 40 km/h limit applying during gazetted school terms (which may include pupil-free days) & at specific times of the day when children are expected to be present. In South Australia, the limit is 25 km/h. Some school zones have flashing lights to indicate when the lower speed limit applies. In Victoria & Western Australia, most school zones have a flashing speed zone sign, most of which are solar powered. -Some local governments have introduced special speed limits (usually 40 km/h), mostly in shopping precincts or other areas with high amounts of pedestrian activity Rural areas: Cars & motorcycles (single carriageway): Generally 80-110 km/h depending on the conditions for that road. In remote parts of Australia, such as outback Northern Territory, Queensland, New South Wales, South Australia & Western Australia, 110-130 km/h speed limits are used. For learner drivers & probationary drivers in certain states, speed limits of 80 to 100 km/h apply as a maximum along all roads where the posted limit is equal or higher. Cars & motorcycles (urban/rural motorway/freeway): 100-110 km/h. Trucks, road-trains: 80-100 km/h. Enforcement tolerance: in Victoria = 3 km/h (strictly enforced by fixed speed camera & at the discretion of Victoria Police), in Western Australia = 7 km/h. Generally 10% over speed limit in other states/territories, but a ticket will be given for less when detected by fixed speed camera. However, new laws may see drivers issued with a ticket for exceeding 2 km/h over the posted speed limit. Heavy penalties apply for speeding in Australia. Despite introduction of uniform national road rules by the states in 1999, Western Australia & the Northern Territory retain different default speed limits. Yes I'm finished now! ;)
What you forgot to mention is we have third world roads outside the capital cities and that’s why we have to drive 4x4s to combat the crap roads. Our roads are crap distances are great, serious and fatal accidents are unfortunately to common.
As a former truckdriver I like the 100 km/h speed limit. The reason is that there is les 'conflict' with trucks and trailers, and therefore better flow of traffic. In time gain or loss is makes almost no difference it only feels that way and I've done lots of experiments on this.
Conflict with trucks and trailers on highways? Don't trailers and trucks basically always drive on the right lane? How faster vehicles affect traffic at 130 km/h?
@@Z3t487 Nope, there are stretches where trucks can (and will) overtake each other. As on a two lane motorway this will result in small traffic jams when the speed differences are high reducing the limit during the day actually often creates a faster total traffic flow overall.
@@michiellombaers3198 they also do it on stretches where they're not allowed to overtake. Their speed limit of 80 ( which they hardly ever abide to) compared to 130 is dangerous. Also their overtaking can take for ever. Its not uncommon that the truck that gets over taken speeds up to frustrate the other truck driver. The maker of this video complains he can't drive 130 during the day anymore, but in reality on most roads we couldn't anyhow because of trucks behaving like this.
My opinion is that trucks should get a 100 km/h speedlimit and be limited to 105 km/h but these bureaucratic monsters in the EU probably won't change it. Cars and trucks got the same speed in the US, usually between 65-70 mph (105-113 km/h) and the traffic flow is much better.
In Hungary, motorways have a general limit of 130 km/h (90 for vehicles over 3500 kilograms), except for M0 (110 km/h (70 for heavies)), which is a speedway ring around the capital weaving in and out of residential areas, but its construction allows for speeds well over 130. Most speed cameras are on fixed spots, but our new system (basically a set of camera gates everywhere around the country) can actually double as an average speed camera depending on its position in relation to the next camera on the same section of road. It also functions as a driver cam (mentioned in your Why European drivers are better than Americans video), checks whether you're distracted while driving, your seatbelts, your MOT and insurance info based on your license plate, and it even checks your road tax and road toll status. They also have a very generous tolerance of 18 km/h over, so if you're in a hurry, you can actually squeeze some more speed out of your car without getting an expensive letter two weeks later. Also, even basic bidirectional "country" roads have a general limit of 90 km/h, but they're usually quite shit, so about 70 is the recommended speed if you're happy with your suspension being attached to your car.
I drive 160 to 170 kmh in Poland, the same speed that I drive with in Germany. Highways in Poland are usually very suitable for speed, more suitable than most highways in Germany, and its normal to go with the flow of the traffic. Its actually very pleasant except that many people keep no distance (I mean like 5 or 10 metres at 140 kmh), and that you have to pay for the highways.
Yeah, tailgating is annoying as shit. And there are people who try and overtake you if you yourself dont tailgate, despite moving at the pace of the lane. It could just be hungary, or the fact that two lanes a side is really not enough for a proper highway, but its needlessly dangerous.
There is a reason for the design of those Polish highways. Poland once was Prussia. The reason for the autobahn to exist was the preparation for invading Poland, in 1939 they used it...
@@Kerleem hey am American in NYC. I have a question about European driving Etiquette. Should I apply those same skills here in NYC? Now knowing the error of my old driving habits?
Nice videos! I am a Dutchy, but I love the Autobahn too. Most of the time I set my cruisecontrol to 160/180kmh(depending on the road and business) as it feel just a bit faster than the recommended speed
Kerleem, they researched it a while back. In the Netherlands the difference between 100 a 130 from 1 end to the other end only takes a couple min travel more. And as you know with all the traffic jams, busy roads driving 130 for long stretches was hard to do anyway
Implementing a different speed limit for the different types of vehicles would cause more traffic and increase the emissions even if only the electric vehicles have an exception.
@@noefillon1749 and an increase of electricity consumption (like 20-30%) form the electric cars ONLY and gas/diesel usage will also increase for the other cars.
It's also interesting that Europe doesn't only have motorways but also expressways (the semi motorways with the car sign) which tend to be more common near smaller cities which tend to be a bit easier to build and generally have a speed limit of 100 or 110 km/h
Here in sweden : the expressways has the same type of crossings and so on as the motorway ie divided BUT no dividing stretch or railing between the lanes so we had a lot of head on collisions - now most of thoose sections is rebuilt into motorways with separated directions and railings between. And those roads could have a speed limit of 110 km/h --- head on at 110 km ie 220 km/h OR MORE.
We don't do that in the UK. You'll find the word 'expressway' being thrown around to describe new 'smart' motorways, but that's not really what it is. The only legal classification we have in this country is the motorway - anything else is just an All-Purpose (A) road or a B road. Dual carriageway A roads in suburban areas tend to have lowered speed limits, so I suppose they could be classed as expressways, but in the UK the word has no real meaning and no road in the UK has ever been officially called an expressway. The closest things I can think of that could be considered to be 'semi-motorways', 'sub-motorways' or 'expressways' in the UK are the M271 and M275, short motorways in the Southampton and Portsmouth areas respectively that have a hard shoulder and motorway restrictions, but have a 50mph limit. I'm not entirely sure why they were built as motorways when they could just as easily have been built as dual carriageway A roads considering both ends have an escape route from the M27 for non-motorway traffic. Non-motorway traffic using roads like that would be suicide though and it'd basically never happen. Just because you're legally allowed to use an NSL dual carriageway as a cyclist or other non-motorway user doesn't mean it's a good idea.
National highway speed limit in Poland is 140km/h. I've found out that the vast majority of traffic travels at speeds slower than that. When I put cruise control at 140km/h I constantly have to overtake passanger cars as well as trucks (or any heavier goods vehicle which are bound to 90km/h speed limit). And trucks really do love travelling in convoys of 2-5 in a row so once you commit to overtaking one you really have to spend a considerable amount of time in the passing lane. Combined with the fact that a minority of people speed considerably (in excess of 160km/h) you're constantly on the edge of overtaking someone without blocking another person blasting in the left lane. So I learned that setting cruise control speed speed to somewhere between 115-125km/h and speeding up to 140-150 only when overtaking large trucks makes for a much more pleasant and stress-free drive
In China, speed limit depends on road quality, design and locations. Highway speed limit ranges from 100 to 120kph. Urban roads at 40 to 70kph. Suburb/country roads at 50 to 90kph. Mountain roads are strictly limited at 40kph (not like you can reach that speed anyway because of the corners and inclines). Most of the traffic rules are enforced by cameras.
What's the split between Highways having 100 km/h and 120 km/h. Do majority of highways have 120 as speed limit? Are there special "expressways" different from highways? I am curious
Here in the UK, Motorways are either at 50mph, 60mph or 70mph speed limits and country (rural) roads they are either 30mph (inside towns and villages), 40mph (on most country roads), 50mph, 60mph (or it'll be marked with a "National Speed Limit" sign which is 60mph) and now rarely 70mph (most were cut down to 40mph-60mph due to several accidents) and in towns and cities, the roads are either 20mph or 30mph and sometimes 40mph but only on dual carriageways or on the rural-urban fringe or between areas on the Greater London Boundary or the boundary in any city such as between Banstead, Surrey (just outside the Suburb of Sutton, London) and Purley (near the former Croydon Airport) which is only just inside Greater London...
I moved from Finland to Canada some 5 years ago. I found it being almost uncanny how insecure I felt on the freeways even though I was driving slower in general. Here are my experiences if anyone is interested. - Roads are way too busy here for me to enjoy driving. Every road is packed as full as possible, traffic is often start-stop between Hamilton and Toronto. I've once sat in an afternoon traffic jam in Toronto for 5 hours because a police officer ordered me towards the city right before an on-ramp, after waiting in line to get to that said on-ramp for about an hour. Had to take a detour through part of the city to get to the next on-ramp. There are no shortcuts either, every road that leads anywhere is packed. I just think this could be done differently. - Weird and steep curves on roads, like sometimes a curve gradually gets steeper and steeper so you have to rotate your steering wheel more and more over a period of 5 seconds, then straighten out over a time of 3 seconds, then turn again but this time you turn your steering wheel into fixed position under a second... This is especially bad in Hamilton but I guess that's primarily because of the terrain. This caught me off guard the first time and I kept swaying in my lane. This also effects visibility as well, sometimes the traffic is stopped right behind a curve and you have to do some hard breaking. - Some parts of the roads are in terrible condition, I purposely drive under the speed limit in some areas because I'm afraid of damaging my car. Bumps are bumps but I've seen holes on a bridge and flying lumps of asphalt. - Car wrecking debris on major freeways. I've seen toppled over signs, buckets, ladders, large rocks, gravel, entire tires with rims attached on the road. Largest rock I saw was probably around 30cm tall and it blended into the road. - Undisciplined drivers. There are ways to enforce speeding Also everyone expects you to go 20 over the speed limit. Or rather you're "expected to keep up with traffic", leaves a lot to interpretation. I once was driving from Niagara towards Hamilton on a relatively quiet road before sunset. I was catching up to a wall of cars ahead of me so I slowed down from 120 to around 110. I managed to get past and saw people were slowing down because of a Police on the road. Once I was past I sped up again to around 120. The police car started following me but didn't put lights on, kinda what I was expecting really. I have a feeling that they just appreciated me going steady 120 instead of having to slow down to 110 for every car. Still... Making the rules fair, consistent and strict would make better driving experience for everyone in the end and calms traffic.
Great job. A couple of years ago, in Vienna, a lawyer has defeated a speeding ticket on a "section control" (avg. speed control) due to data protection laws. They had to skip the measurement for 2 months to amend the laws. The people of Vienna were grateful. Since then, as you say, no way to defeat speeding tickets from any camera based system.
In Germany are no speed limits on the autobahn and motorways. They are just restricted in some Areas. The 130 km/h is just an orrientation speed, "Richtgeschwindigkeit" on german. Even on the Bundesstraße is it possible to have a no limit zone. They have to be build as 4-lane motorways (autobahnähnlich).
Richtgeschwindigkeit also translates to a recommended safe speed limit. Should you be involved in a motor accident where you have exceeded the Richtgeschwindigkeit, the car insurance will reduce the amount of insurance money paid out due to you having exceeded this safe speed limit, even when the Autobahn had no speed limit. The Richtgeschwindigkeit as such is not displayed on any sign except when it is reduced to something less on a road depending on weather conditions e.g. wet road, wind exposure, snow or even daytime. I have such sign only on Bundesstrassen and it was worded as Empfohlene Geschwindigkeit or something like that.
The UK has loads of average speed check zones. The M4 around Port Talbot (50 mph), the A6 between the Capitol Centre and Preston city centre (30 mph), loads of motorway roadworks (usually 50 mph) plus others (e.g. the A465 Heads of the Valleys had one, I don't know if it still does). The UK system does have a tolerance. You might even get 10% plus 2 mph (the normal ACPO threshold for enforcement), but that is pushing it (that is the normal threshold but police forces can enforce lower). We also have automated enforcement via police vans. They will park, monitor people and tickets will be issued in due course
France is actually interesting because it has 130km/h speed limit for normal weather and 110km/h speed limit for bad weather. I always thought that was kinda smart.
In Finland we have 120, 100, or 80 depending on the weather. You would expect 80 during a snow storm for instance to cut the worst edge off the chain reaction crashes that they so typically facilitate.
In Canada, we have the opposite: too much traffic in clear weather to go fast - everyone's grandma is on the road When it snows, the roads are nearly empty and I can finally do the speed limit of 100 km/h
@@johannesmajamaki2626 Motorways in the UK are fairly similar the usual limit is 70 mph (110 km/h) but the matrix signs will enforce lower limits depending on road conditions, typically either 60 mph (96 km/h) or 50 mph (80 km/h). Severe heavy rain causing standing water by overwhelming drains might trigger the drop to 60, but 50 tends to be used for icy/snowy conditions. Of course, mist, fog, or other severely restricted visibility will also trigger speed restrictions this is basically calculated by taking into account the distance the rear fog lights of a roadworthy vehicle could be seen and rounding the speed a roadworthy vehicle could be going and expected to stop safely in that distance down to the nearest 10 mph (16 km/h). Of course, if there is a stationary obstruction without lights in front of you then all bets are probably still off at that point so I personally would be inclined to shave 20-25% off that legally imposed temporary limit if I were driving.
In Italy,generally,the limits are 130km\h on highway ,110 km\h country road/secondary road and 50 km\h city. We have too the average speed checking (it's called Tutor here),the problem it's in the secondary/country road,where in some short distance the limits change like 4-5 time and in some,big secondary road it's 50 km\h (too slow)
"How to Apply for a US Driving License Step 1: Get Your Documents Ready. Before you go to the local branch of Department of Motor Vehicles, make sure you have all the right documents on you. ... Step 2: Pay Your Fees. ... Step 3: Take Your Tests. ... Step 4: Get Your Vision Tested. ... Step 5: Get Your License." Wtf In Poland I had to pass 2 exams, theoretical and practical, do some health+mentality tests, and get throught 32 hours of driving school with my instructor in specialized car...at least, if not even few more things. Also I could only begin all of that 3 months before 18th birthday and after completion, drive by myself only once im 18. US license seems like a joke to me rn
Seems like in Poland it's more strict than in Germany. In Germany we have to visit 14 theoretical classes while nowadays checking quizzies in an Mobile-App which opens learner drivers the theoretical exam (it's just one) and so the student can begin with practical "hours" in a co-op drive with the driving teacher/instructor. After completing a certain amount of pratical hours, you apply for the pratical exam. And of course before you are allowed to move a vehicle in public, you have to complete an eye test, made a pass photo and taken apart in a first aid class. Edit: You can start with your drivers license whith age 17 and when you passed your driving and theory exam, before you're 18, you can legaly drive a vehicle in public, *but with* a registered elder person with atleast ~20 years of driving experience is always the co-driver.
With driver license lessons you get to learn the "roads" and "streets" so that you don't need traffic signs/boards to be able to know how hard you can/may drive somewhere. Very handy to have this information. As in Europe, the amount of times you switch speed, is just absurd.
Just a shame that these indications are different from country to country. But I do like the uniform style we have in NL now, apart from the motorway where you have to pay attention to see if it's 80, 100, 120 or 130 on all other roads you can simply tell by road design, lines and colors.
@@drwhominer With “Grüne:” he reffered to a German economic-left-liberal party wich is popular for their radical idears in fighting this climate change and many prohabitions they want to set up, like banning no speed limit zones and basically everything that produces a bit more carbondioxid than they want.
5:48 Regarding Germany: Federal Highways ("Autobahn") are generally unlimited. The posted "speed limit" of 130 km/h is a "Richtgeschwindigkeit", a recommended speed to drive. When you drive higher than recommended speed and get in a accident, there will be most likely partial blame assigned to you by default for the purposes of insurance claims; that's the only thing that reccomended speed limit does. Interesting tidbit: That unregulated speed limit isn't nailed down to the specification of the street beeing an Autobahn, but in how it's build - if the lanes a.) in each direction are separated from each other by middle divider; or b.) there are at least 2 lanes per direction, divided by a middle line; there is no general speed limit apart from signage. That's important for example on Schnellstraßen ("Fast Streets"), which sit in-between full highway and normal rural/federal streets. But all the Schnellstraßen I know of are all limited to 100km/h or lower with signage, with only one exception that I can think of going up to 120km/h (which is a connection between to Highways, only accesible via Highway). In any case, you'll never find a street where you could drive unlimited because of the way it's build that's NOT also limited by signage, so most German drivers don't know about that "loophole". Most rural and federal streets are single lane per direction, which is a big difference to the US with its up to 8-lane stroats even in urban areas.
Here in italy every highway has a 130kph limit, and they're generally well mantained too. "Tangenziali", or ring roads, generally have a 90kph (but up to 110) limit and are generally less well mantained but still not too bad. We do have the same average speed system (it's called "tutor" here, while speed cameras are called "autovelox"), but I don't really know what the margin is, and how much you can go over the limit... Generally people cruise at 140, but i remember my mum not watching the speedometer for a while and going at an average of 160 for a good stretch of road... She was convinced she would have gotten a ticket, she didn't. Anyways, they're always clearly marked, bright yellow or orange in cities or rural roads, or near a sign stating there's a camera there on motorways or ring roads.
If you like driving, and like a good adventure in your everyday car, then I would recommend you northern Scandinavia. Narrow roads, animals standing on the roads, just stunning scenery. I live in the far north and just love to cruise around in Norway. The scenery is just wonderful. For most roads there it's only 80 km/h, so it isn't so heavy on the wallet either 😅
@@tihomirrasperic It was actually a moose test (elgtest is both Swedish and Norwegian), but yeah, it was born out of neccesity. A full grown Scandinavian bull moose can easily weigh in excess of half a ton, and has a higher shoulder height than most horse races. I crashed with one once, allmost ten years ago. It was not fun(!). I was fortunately not hurt, but the moose died and the car was a write-off... Others have not been so lucky...
There are so many great drives up north(!). Vardø to Hamningberg, Lofoten and Vesterålen, Senja (especially out to yttersi'a), fylkesvei 17 along Helgeland... I could go on... It's beautiful! Vestlandet isn't to be sneesed at either... Gamle Strynefjellsvei, Atlaterhavsvegen, pretty much anywhere in the inner regions of the Hardangerfjord, Sognefjellsvegen, any approach to Geiranger (three of them, one being a ferry from Hellesylt, and all of them absolutely breathtaking)... We live in a beautiful country, that's for sure!
@@tihomirrasperic That test ? That was a pure maneuvrability and control test. SAAB's elk test were some thing else : A cable drum hanging high enough to clear the bonnet - that was their elk test. That cable drum test took of most cars roof....
Come to the East of the Netherlands. From Deventer to Enschede the A1 highway recently has been renovated and it's a superb road now. Also we kinda ignore the daytime 100km limit and unless it's heavy traffic people drive 130km/h which is indeed a very nice comfortable speed in modern cars. For some reason they never seem to have any speed cameras here as well, I must admit I always drive too fast here because it's such a nice and safe road and I never have been fined in 4 years. When I return home late at night from the Randstad , with most empty roads, I turn up the radio, put om some nice trance classics (Stephano Marino ftw) and off I go..... It's one of the nicest roads in the Netherlands.
Oh yes, I drove that part of the A1 coming back from Prague a few weeks ago, and it was amazing. I think I was doing 140 and getting passed by some others (around 18:00). The 100 limit is a shame!
What illustrates the difference between European and American drivers is quite visible in Poland. Here in Poland we have the highest speed limits in Europe, some of the weakest enforcement, some of the lowest fines and some of the highest rates of car ownership, and likewise, for European standards, Polish roads are outright carnage. And yet, when one sees comparisons off accident rates and death rates in traffic, Poland, being like the fourth of fifth worst country in the EU, has similar levels of accidents and traffic deaths as some of the safer states in the US, like Minnesota, Washington or Massachusetts, and if it were a US state, it would be like the 7th or 8th *safest* - with places like Alabama, Mississippi or Montana being three times worse in these metrics and approaching (or even exceeding) Russian levels of pandemonium on the highways.
well although there's a 140 kph LIMIT on highways, it's only 10 kph higher than the recommended speed on the German highways, while two thirds of the German highway system don't have any posted speed limit and you may as well go much faster than that
I think 100 km/h speed limit is an okay speed. In Sweden it's normally 110 km/h on the motorway and personally I think this is a good speed. I get that people want to drive faster and that people do so in Sweden also, but gas costs a lot and keeping a lower and consistent speed is definitely worth it in the long run if you drive a lot. Driving in the USA drove me nuts :) Sometimes the roads would flow and you could drive fast and then suddenly there would just be queue building for a short stretch where you had to break and go down to super slow speeds and suddenly, it would be gone and you could start speeding again. Really inefficient way to drive and definitely a reason I think many more people get road rage in the States. Thanks for the video. It was interesting to listen to!
In Spain they have just lowered all speed limits to as little as 20 km per hour but they have not signposted the new limits. They expect drivers to know without signage, sheer lunacy.
That wouldn't work in the Netherlands. The actual situation, thus the signs or the matrix displays (the things above the road), are leading. I would find it odd if they just expect you to know.
@Robert Butler That's false. Those limits are only for urban zones and also, the limit is not always 20. The new rules say: - 20 km / h on roads with a single carriageway and sidewalk platform. - 30 km / h on single lane roads in each direction of traffic. - 50 km / h on roads with two or more lanes in each direction and crossings.
There is a small addition regarding Germany I am willing to make: If you are driving on a road with two ore more lanes per direction and a barrier between the lanes, that lead to opposite directions , outside of a city and it has a blue sign with a car on it (Kraftfahrtstraße), there is no general speed limit. The Government proposes a speed of 130 kph, so if you are going faster and you have an accident, you are always at least partially giulty. This rule does apply to all Autobahns and most Bundesstraßen ("federal roads" = roads maintained by the federal government that have priority over other roads regarding to cleaning and are well maintained over a long distance) and maybe even some other roads, that i dont know a specific example of right now. I hope I could help somebody trying to understand German road law (or confuse them more ;-) )
I've crossed Europe so many times from Paris to Romania :)). Although almost every country has 130 kph on the motorway, each is very different in enforcing it. France for example is quite strict, it is better to stick to 140 max. Germany same thing, where it's applicable. Austria at night is empty and using Waze you can keep to higher speed. Hungary I never drive under 170 :)). Romania is the most lenient with low police presence on motorways. I have crossed in the mid 200s when I was in great hurry.
@@Kerleem I love to drive fast :)). I work in Canada more than half the year and as you probably know you cannot drive there. So coming back to Romania is a beautiful treat for me.
What surprises me in Germany is many of the unrestricted speed sections of the autobahn are only 2 lane. I am from the UK and motorway lane discipline is reasonably good here.
In Austria you can find on some motorways speed limit with "IG-L" description, which means that this limit does not apply to electric vehicles. For example, general speed limit on motorway is 130km/h, but for not electric cars max speed is limited to 100km/h (if you're driving Tesla, you can drive 130km/h)
Yes, I live in such an area, and I hate it. It creates tons of conflict between the different "tiers" of vehicles. And really, it doesn't do anything for the environment. Luckily, I cycle to work, so it doesn't bother me too much.
That's the dumbest shit I have ever heard. Electric cars become less efficient at higher speeds so they will pollute more. Yes electric cars pollute since the european energy grid does not consist of 100% renewable energy.
I think that driving in Germany at speed is relatively safe, because Germans learn to drive at speeds that are safe, not to always drive at the speed limit. I found that to be a key difference between my lessons in The Netherlands, where you are tought that it is safe to drive at the limit, because the road maintainer has thought about the speed limit. In NL, there are a lot of different speed limits. The limit of 100 km/h may not live for long, it has been a rule set for emissions, but a lot of complaints have been issued. And we should have a new government soon. It is a real maze right now, with 4 signs above each other. From top to bottom: limit 100 km/h, only from 6-19h, then limit 120 km/h, only from 19-6h. And then there are "spitsstroken", lanes that can be opened during the day or night when there is a lot of traffic. The dynamic speed limit there is mostly 100 km/h (or even 80) when the spitsstrook is open, and 120 km/h when it is closed. Unless it is daytime, then it is always 100... I once drove through Poland, where 140 km/h is the limit. I think that is a bit too high, as motorways are not really wide (2-3 lanes) and a lot of people are not as disciplined as Germans. I think that roads and discipline is generally better in western European countries, compared to eastern European countries. Eastern Europe (Ukraine, Belarus, Romania, Bulgaria, etc.) has had a lot of suffering between World War II and the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989, road quality has not caught up everywhere.
For those who doesn't understand how the speed limit will reduce carbon emissions, it is connected with the amount of wear and tear on the roads. With higher speed limits comes more wear and tear on the asphalt which gives off more particles that is considered carbon emissions. Those hybrid and electric vehicles contribute to this as much as other vehicles.
I think it is so much more, diesel engines aren't pushed as much, and the lower speed limit extends electric car ranges making them more enticing (plus makes electric cars more efficient), plus the lower speed limit pushes some drivers towards taking the train... all of these changes reduce emissions
And that's why the reduced speed limit in NL is bs. It's completly arbitrary anyway. Why not 90? why not 110? why not stay with 130? Nobody will tell you, because there is no clear answer to this. And if the argument is, that the current gen of ecars is best fit for driving 100km/h - you give up freedom to drive faster and it will be obsolete anyway with the next gen of ecars in a couple of years?
I live in the rural part of the Netherlands and driving the 100 km/h speedlimit is torture to me. On dual carriageways and motorways I generally drive 20 km/h over the limit as long as its save.
Here in Finland on the few motorways we have there normally is a 120km/h speed limit, and during winter months it is reduced to 100 km/h. On larger country roads it’s usually between 80-100 and in the winter strictly 80
I live quite near Amsterdam and I think the speed limit of 100km/h makes little or no sense. It might, after limiting air traffic and making ships in the harbours emit less and agricultural vehicles, and two stroke engines. Then there is the industry, like Tata Steel, which emits enormous amounts. In general cars emit just a small percentage of that. I should also point out that even though electric cars themselves don't emit, the production of the electrical energy in the Netherlands definitely does, since it is still a lot of coal and bio mass burning plants producing it. The energy of the windmills is largely given away to companies such as Google to provide green energy for their digital storage facilities. Where it was promised to provide households, it in fact doesn't. It may look like there is a lot of green energy, and according to the statistics it should be 6%, but research has shown the bulk of that is from burning bio mass (wood shreds) making the net production of true green energy lower than 2% of the total. We still have a long way to go...
It would be better if we could get more clean/green electricity, though the electricity made from coal and/or bio mass plants is more efficient and might even still be considered cleaner to get your Electric car running than a car with a petrol/diesel engine. Mostly because a car with a petrol/diesel engine only makes 1 car run (usually only 1 person in it, moving an empty chair and a sofa) while a powerplant makes your Electric car go and at the same time everything else that needs electricity.
@@DarkDutch007 Electric motors can be almost 100% efficient, so there is a bonus there that I think might already be greater. That said if you simply look at the percentage that personal vehicles pollute compared to industry and transportation of goods, it is almost futile to start with making personal vehicles cleaner. Especially making them go only that little less fast, you are talking a tiny margin within what was already a very small percentage. The policy mainly seems to focus on policies that people notice on a personal level, so they feel like there is something done for a cleaner environment. The measured effects however, I keep reading that they never reach the targets that were expected. Rotterdam even measured no single effect in air pollution from going to 100kmh, neither did they from banning old vehicles from the city centre. Not surprising if you see what the ships in the harbour pollute, even from engines running at idle. it is immense. We're talking engines running on almost crude oil, with cylinders the size of a living room.
Areas with the much higher road speeds, very few actually drive that speed for any distance as the fuel required to drive that speed adds up quickly compared to driving slower.
I heard you talking about the speedlimit in Germany. From a formal point of view. In Germany there is no speedlimit in effect on motorways. Only limitations on different parts of the "autobahn".
@@Vengir police don't stop you and ask why you were not driving within recommendations :D so you can go 300km/h if you want. It gets a bit tricky if you cause/take part in a crash while driving faster than 130. You might be given part of the blame if someone cuts in front of you for example, but in reality it's much more complex. :)
Noted 80 mph speed limits in South Dakota and Wyoming while traveling on I-90. But you’re correct in your assessment of some of the higher speed zones in the US.
The "pollution"/"emissions" speed limitations are in place in several European countries: I will name Austria and France. A speeding fine in one of these areas (where pollution is the reason for the speed limitation) is a very expensive experience.
I'm from the Netherlands and I don't enjoy driving (as in: I won't go drive because I like it, I don't mind if I have to go somewhere). I really don't mind the 100km/h and if that's what allows more houses being build then I'm really glad they did it. The most annoying thing before it was set to 100km/h was that in some areas you had just reached the 130km/h speed and then you had to go back to 100km/h. Also the signs weren't always consistent. The hectometer markers (similar to mile markers) sometimes said "100" while the road was 130km/h or the other way around. Because of this confusion I did often drive 100km/h (unless there was other traffic, in which case I would follow their speed).
This is just a hoax of the government, it's mainly to test self-driving cars in the future and to think they can reduce traffic deaths, Many countries signed the ''Stockholm Declaration'' which lowers the speed to 30 km/h in cities just for this for example. I think 110 km/h would be better in the day and trucks should've a speed limit of 100 km/h (62 mph) which would be much better for the traffic flow. Problem now is that there are some (usually old) people cutting you off with 95-100 km/h just to get past a truck. There's a positive thing of driving in the US that cars and trucks have the same speed limit which is usually 65-70 mph (105-113 km/h) on the east coast and the flow of traffic is much better than here in Europe on busy roads in the day.
In the Netherlands in my experience you should be carefull with speed near the randstand and outside of highways, on highways outside of the randstad you can pretty much disregard speedlimits up until the +30 limit where you get points on your license so you can do 160 in a 130 without pretty much any problems.
@@Kerleem ye pretty much, it can happen which is why u wanna keep it in the limit speedlimit+30ish so it doesn't go to the ''officier van justitie'' which means its gets recorded and you will have problems if that happens to much, but the fines are light enough and you will pretty much never get them so if you keep to that rule Ur fine (again on highways outside the randstad, u shouldn't try this below a traject control that would be a terrible idea :) ).
@@Kerleem I personally have only ever gotten 3 tickets in my lifetime (5+ years of driving now) all of which where within city limits 2 in delft and 1 in Amersfoort, and I have always been a bit of a fast driver but after the changes in speed limits I made this rule for myself which really ment I didn't really slow down during the day I now just drive a lot faster after 7pm.
you will only lose your licence if you drive 50km/h above the speedlimit. Usually the police ignores you when they are patrolling if you drive below 30 km above the speedlimit, so i will not go above 20 km/h above the speedlimit. I do have to watch out for camera cars, because those will send you a ticket like they do with speed traps/ average speed zones.
@@someoneyoudontknow4920 True but anything above a 30+ ticket gets send through to the officier van justitie, so you might not lose your license instantly but it gets put on your record so you don't want to get tickets for more then 30 over the limit. They also take your record into account if you get 30+ tickets which means that if you get a 50 or 60 or some other absurd speed infraction and you already have a bunch of stuff on your record you are much more likely to lose your license and get more punishment so you want your record as clean as possible so that if you make a mistake and do go much to fast somewhere you don't lose your license or have to have some insane punishment.
'trajectcontrole' is a check between 2 points (sometimes chained). The time it takes is measured and an average speed is calculated. I've had a ticket for doing 104 on average where 100 was allowed. What happened was this: a long queue of trucks were going 90+ on the right side and i don't consider it to be safe to merge between them. It's also added risk to take a long time overtaking. My driving instructor explicitly taught me to speed up to overtake. (this was however when the limit was 130) so what do i do? I speed up a bit to not impede traffic and to not have the speed difference become too big for traffic going even faster. Can't do right under such conditions other than to just not overtake in such stretches of road and that's boring, taking more time and therefor also risky.
I personally come from Poland and I can say from experience that many Polish roads have a higher maximum speed than the "safe speed" that can be achieved. Mainly due to poor road maintenance in some regions. Even in medium-sized cities (according to the Polish standard), such as Bydgoszcz or Toruń, there are many streets where, despite the speed limit of 50 km / h, the maximum safe speed is around 30 km / h. Still on national roads (90 km / h), expressways (100-120 km / h depending on the number of lanes) and highways (most often 140 km / h, but there are zones as in the connections between the highway and the expressway with lower speed limit), the main speed limit is set accordingly. Even with these relatively high speed limits, there are many people who "ignore it" and are driving about 20-40 km / h above the legal limit.
One of the biggest things to get into my head while learning was just because I could go the limit doesn’t mean I have to! Going 10 or even 20mph under the limit can be totally appropriate depending on terrain, weather, traffic etc. It helped me a lot to not feel like I had to do it just because the sign said I could.
Oh yes. Always adapt. Speed limits are generic, but every bit of road is different and every car is different. I've been on twisty country roads that despite posting a reduced limit of 50kmh (instead of 80 or 90), doing anything over 30 in a regular car felt unsafe and excessive due to the number of sharp narrow blind turns.
@@KimonFrousios in the UK those country roads usually don’t have a speed limit 😆 (which means the limit is 60mph, the national limit). But yeah lots of times ppl will take them at 20 or 30mph instead. Though some will “hoon” it, going at 50 or 60 but quickly slowing before the blind corners etc. Since the highway code says to use your judgment about speed limits, so long as you stay under 60 and don’t cause an accident I don’t think you could get into trouble for it? Obviously it’s not exactly recommended tho lol
@@kaitlyn__L Good UK then, in Indonesia many people just decided to overtake others on a blind corner. When it turned out to be a frontal crash, those who did the overtake don’t admit their faults and just saying like “People who hit me should slow down when they see me overtaking someone”, or more embarrassingly, “Only God knows about when an accident will happen so we can’t do anything to stop it from happening.”
@@lucky360pride that last one sounds like a platitude my grandmother would say to a friend who was going “oh I should’ve stopped Ralph from walking under that ladder today” (bad omen) when they suffered a tragedy. Not an excuse for overtaking on a blind corner… Explicitly, you can only overtake on a stretch of road with visibility to the point where you’d merge back in, and enough power available to do it promptly and safely. According to the rules at least. People are taught it so it’s still fresh in my mind from a few years ago, but there are lots of jerks abound who do those dangerous things anyway. I’d like to think I’ll never be so needlessly reckless for the sake of a few seconds of my time, but only time will tell I suppose.
@@kaitlyn__L exactly, but the problem is that there are so many people in Indonesia who do that. Not to add that we've a very judgmental society. There was an accident between a new Mercedes GLE (which costs around £95k in Indonesia) with an old Honda City (a smaller sibling of Civic, which the new ones only costs around £15k). Everyone just blamed the Mercedes and sued him even though it was Honda's fault (the Honda were driven on the opposite direction of the lane) just because there's a stigma which said that luxury cars are only owned by those who are arrogant and corrupt 🙄. Talking about speed limit, 95% of the people just ignored it and even some hooligans just decided to drive around 50mph on an intracity roads (non highway!), and they all goes up to 100mph on the highway (even when the limit said 60mph). When a crash occurred they just said those only God know things or even worse they just blamed the road itself (like “The road is too curvy, this is our government’s fault to make it this way”!) 🙄. And most of them do that with a car that is very poorly built, I bet those cars can’t pass UK’s regulations (there are many of them that don’t even have an airbag!)
I remember in my childhood my parents drove in Denmark. The speedlimmits changed down or upwards 5kmh (3,1mph) every few 100 metres untill the drivers where at the speed required. 90, 85, 70, 65, 60 and so on. Ontop of that, Denmark is the only country I know of in Europe that has level crossings on their motorways and force their motorwaydrivers to stop for a red light. All other European countries I've seen don't do the 5kmh changes in speeds. If you are driving at 90 and are about to enter a 50 zone you see the 50 sign in distance and have to slow down from 90 to 50 before the 50 sign. Also no other European countries makes their motorwaydrivers stop for a red light to enter a levelcrossing. Crossings are at diffrent levels, so no need for red lights.
How do you see the roadsafety when a diesel goes 70, a gasoline travels 110 and A hybrid (that are bad for the environment in a different way) at 140? The 100 km limit makes my commute longer. Like i travel 260 km oneway. I AM really bored traveling at that speed. I could travel trough germany, cover 60 additonal kms and be home earlier.
I think on well maintained highways the speed limit could go up to 160km/h but I think in city centers and in densely populated areas there should be a separate zone limit from the regular city limit that's lower, something like 40 or 30 km/h and the regular one could go up to something like 60 km/h. I find that there are a lot of areas where the speed limit is caped at 50 where the roads could easily support more (and many people go over the speed limit in those places) and there aren't many houses around or generally any infrastructure. I think the speed limits should be updated more often and more accordingly to the surrounding area.
One way to avoid the average speed check: get a car older than 1978 with the old style blue plates and drive at night. The old blue plates aren't reflective like the yellow ones and the cameras can't make them out at night. They can during they day though, as well as on classic speed cameras and obviously if the police catches you, but it's still fun to know that there is a way out.
@@Kerleem Oh trust me, there are plenty tasty classic sports cars that do that just fine. And quite honestly, on a big-engined old Volvo, Mercedes, Jaguar or BMW it doesn't even feel that fast or that different from a modern car.
I don't own a car so I don't drive a lot, but when I do I'm annoyed at the 100km/h limit. It seems very slow when you're on those long stretches of highway. And as you've pointed out, the cars and roads are more than capable of sustaining higher speeds so that makes it even more annoying.
I didn't know how slow 130 was until i started driving a Beetle 74' as my first car. If a Beetle can do 130 in wonky brazilian roads, 99% of the cars on the street are safe to go faster.
Hi may i advise you to the huge bike road network (this the mains reason why car is used sometimes by the people). The Netherlands has made a real investment into bike infrastructure. They are building if it not yet made bikeways . This a real difference in terms of local mobility. Maybe also give more information to your fellow americans about the law protection of bikers. The new version of rondabouts. The dutch people are really creative, like building a huge tunnel higway under the sea with some open air moments when you will the sea moving over your head on a bridge.
The highest uniform speed limit for highways is 140 kph in Poland. Almost all of the highways are two-lane, you can generally drive 10 kph above the limit without getting a ticket (it's tolerated) and yet the highways are the safest roads in - not really the safest in`Europe - road network of Poland.
Yeah, can't wait until they expand the network even further. If anyone gets the bright idea to post speed cameras on them I vote to extradite them to North Korea next election cycle.
Can confirm Dutch drivers are amazing, especially their parking. uwu I'm Irish and our driving is pretty alright, our parking may as well be a free-for-all Mad Max apocalypse though.
There is a trend towards lower speed limits on urban multilane roads in Ireland due to local concerns regarding traffic noise as well as air pollution. The trick in driving these roads is to keep up with the prevailing traffic which often goes 10 or 20 kph ABOVE the posted speed limit. Especially when merging onto such roads it is wiser to enter at a high speed and merge into the traffic stream rather than enter at a slow speed and speed up later. Bad planning on one of these roads has put junctions less than 1km apart on a 3 lane system. This necessitates three lane changes in as many seconds for some routes. A crazy system but local drivers are aware of it and do not take umbrage to sudden lane changes for people needing to get to the appropriate lane on time. It is my experience that both untypically slow drivers and untypically fast drivers are the cause of any accidents on this route. Another cause of near misses is when drivers spot a speed van and slam on their brakes in panic. This causes a chain reaction down the line of cars but also frustrates the vans intention of nabbing speeders since everyone now is jammed at a low speed. Rubber necking, the practice of slowing down too much on viewing something unusual on the road is also very common on Irish motorways, while annoying on smaller roads it can be fatal at motorway speeds.
Driving in Europe and driving in NL or DE or IT or FR are not the same thing at all. I have lived in Amsterdam for the better part of 17 years. I can confirm, it is just plain easy to drive, in the sense that people pay attention, are sober, driving maintained cars on incredible roads. Drivers don't even know how the subtle influences of level sidewalks and the offset bicycle paths which my friend at @notjustbikes covers in detail, make their life easier. Hit the German border and the stress level increases immensely, due to seemingly unlimited speeds, especially on 2 lane stretches with a lot of truck traffic. Looking at you Osnabruck to Bremen. Go to Belgium and the road quality seems like ... well, rural Michigan in the early spring, in comparison. One of the things this RUclipsr did not mention is the lack of truck traffic away from the port of Rotterdam and its feeder highways. It plays a huge role in the different experience. In the Alps another skill set is needed and the Dutch vacationers seem, .... less well prepared. Go to central Italy or Spain and its another world of speed and recklessness. I too struggle with the 100 kmh speeds at moments, but I prefer that to G wagons blowing by at 180, TBH.
It's ironic that we still have speed limits implemented in 1960s... when cars had bad tires, brakes, suspensions, stopping distance was over 200m, car handling was terrible, cars had no "crumple zone", etc... There are couple of videos on TopGear where they test just that... The enormous difference between new cars and the old ones...
@@Kefford666 I did... And besides, by 2024, all cars manufactured in Europe will have automatic speed limiter and automated braking... Yet, the speed limit is being reduced... Spain is now implementing 30km/h in cities...
Here in Sweden the fines for speeding are quite high (IMO). I've been caught doing 65 kph in a 50 kph zone a total of 3 times having to pay 2400 SEK (around $285) each time. Also if you get caught doing more than 30 kph over the posted speed limit (or 20 kph in a 30 kph zone) you WILL lose your license for at least 3 months. This can also happen if you get caught more than 3 times in around a year. If you lose your license for less than 1 year you will automatically get it back after the time has elapsed, but if it's for 1 year or more you will have to retake your license all over again, including all steps.
As a belgian, I think a lot of our roads have reasonable speedlimits. The problem is that slapping a sign on a road doesn't slow down drivers. If you want someone to drive 50 in a 50, design the road so people can't drive faster than 50.
In Hungary, if the speed limit is below 100 km/h, you won't get a ticket for doing +15, if it's over 100, then +20 km/h is allowed by traffic cams. Plus you get 3 or 5 km/h for measuring tolerance. Plus if you use your GPS to check your speed, it'll be more accurate, so you can go a bit faster than what the in-built speedo shows. All in all, you really have to drive like a madman to get a ticket, or if you're unlucky, you get caught in like a 30 zone for doing 50. And if the police actually stops you, the above mentioned tolerances are not count, you'll probably get a fine. But I've never seen anyone getting pulled out of traffic because of speeding. On the contrary, I've been stopped once in the middle of the night, probably because it was too suspicious that I've been actually going 40 in a 40 zone. Of course, I've seen their car from a mile away...
![The Wrong Way to Set Speed Limits [ST06]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/bglWCuCMSWc/mqdefault.jpg)
I think one thing that I saw in the US that you'd never get away with in Europe is ping-ponging in the lane, boucing from lane edge to lane edge. In the US the lanes are so wide that a lot of drivers don't seem to be capable of staying in the center, of course every other driver being on their phone doesn't help either.
If you're bouncing around in the lane in Europe you may well get the police called on you as someone will think you're a drunk driver. :)
Oh wow, yeah, I'd immediately think the driver was either drunk or falling asleep, and if any police saw that they'd flag the person down immediately.
Traffic lanes are usually wider in the USA, so there's plenty of room to "ping pong" as you call it. On many European highways, it's not uncommon to be within arms reach or so of the vehicles beside you. Further, most states long ago banned cellphone use while driving, so it's certainly not "every other driver" doing so.
@@robinstewart6510 Exactly, I'd say this gives European's better lane discipline. :)
We have a lot of narrow back roads too where you're folding in mirrors to pass each other whilst millimeters from a hedge on the other side. Obviously not everyone is good at knowing how wide their vehicle is, but at least 'most' are.
@@VoxelLoop .. Most Americans stay within their wider lanes, so there is sufficient "lane discipline."
@@robinstewart6510 Yeah, I think it's... Fine...
I'm not sure lane discipline is the issue in the US, it's more-so people being on phones so they swerve around quite a bit or brake super late.
Driving nearly 300 and getting overtaken is the true German way
300mph of course
cool
@@hexgraphica 480km/h?!😂
@@parkjimin-standkb-62 it's not uncommon to witness 2.0 TDI Audi A4s doing half the speed of sound in Germany
i drive home from work sometimes with 230kmh... a short part on autobahn... had to go smoothly right because others drive 350kmh...(logic, sight and 2 free lanes) that happens and it is no problem... like other people let me go also... YOU HAVE TO CONCENTRATE or just go right and chill at 140kmh
Being a french expat in north america the lack of discipline from american drivers is highly disturbing.
and here we are in the Netherlands, and probably also Germany, criticizing French drivers.
@@qlum And here we are in France, vomitting insults at all the camping cars with dutch plates clogging our highways.
German drivers in France are also frankly dangerous.
As a Swede who has driven A LOT all over Europe, I have to say French roads are my favorites. That's perhaps related to the traffic rhythm in France fitting my personality, but whatever the reason I really prefer French traffic. Calm and relaxed on the highways, a bit more spirited in the cities. It's pretty dramatic driving into France from Germany and seeing the traffic changing as you pass the (invisible) border, as if by magic. Go in the other direction and when Porsches and Mercs start to whoosh by to the left at insane speeds, well, you know you're in Germany.
@@seybertooth9282 Yeah German, French and Dutch roads are very smooth but as soon as you drive through the Belgium border, it's over😂
@@seybertooth9282 You mean driving into Germany from France right?
There's an additional reason for higher speed limits in general in Europe: the cars' road ability. In Europe, cars are built for narrow, curvy roads and high speeds on motorways. In the US, cars are built for long, wide, straight roads and medium speed on freeways. I have driven several US makes of cars both on US roads and European roads. In a US car on a European road, I've always felt a bit uncomfortable and have driven at a lower speed than when driving a European car on the same roads.
Greatly explained💪🏻
Us cars setups are generally worse.
@@hexgraphica depends on the Car you drive
@@prev241 sportscars are maybe slightly worse, passenger cars are generally much worse. At least this was true still 5 years ago.
@@hexgraphica some of my friends have like Z06 Corvette, Hellcat Widebody Challenger and that stuff. Honestly the Corvette feels like an Amg Gtr or everything else compairable on that pricepoint. The Challi, yea its for the straight line, but drives very good on the German Highways. We could argue about the baseline Dodge and Chevi V6 models or eco boost mustangs, they are garbage compaired to equal German cars
5:45 I have to complain about that. The Autobahn IS the motorway. It's just the German word for motorway. About ⅔ of the motorway in Germany doesn't have any speed restrictions.
it´s more like 50%
I want to file a complaint 😂
and then...... BAUSTELLE!
@@ukrje It might just feel like there's less since you pass it so quickly as opposed to the speed restricted stretches.
@@dwerg1 And also they tend to be in rural areas and not in urban areas where most people live thus people giving it perception that it’s less cause people drive on it less often(eg only on long distance trips)
I live in Germany quite close to the Netherlands. The local Autobahn, the A31 has average speeds of between 160-180 km/h on Sundays when there are no lorries. It also has two lanes.
Tag auch an die bryants aus haselünne :D
160? Rechte spur Ab 200 darf man dann mal dran denken auf die Linke zu gehen, es sei denn die Nordrheinwestfalen blockieren wieder alles.
@@peterhilbers3041 Ich liebe das Emsland 😂 Liebe Grüße XD
Motorway 🛣
@@denisschneider6395 nur 200? Ab auf die rechte Spur mit dir, du Geringbeschleuniger :D
I'd like to add something:
Watch dashcam footage from USA, Russia, Europe, Indonesia, China.
You can mark the differences very well.
AUSTRALIA:-
ruclips.net/user/DashCamOwnersAustral
Well as an Indonesian all I can say is that 90% of the people who’re driving don’t even know the rules. Even using a seatbelt is seen as not a mandatory thing when driving 🙄. Many people called me a nerd when I enforced them to wear the seat belt onboard my car.
Do crash compilation videos count? I know its weird but for some reason I watch many dashcam footage from different countries but they are all crashes....
@@lucky360pride so you won't get a fine if you don't wear it? Where i live if you're not wearing a seatbelt means a fine if the police caught you
@@TBMFan yea most of the people just use it when there's a police/camera. When there isn't any of those things they'll just unfasten the seatbelts
Honestly I can't find a good channel that talking about driving in Europe from an American perspective, well done, and keep going!
NotJustBikes
@@KungFuShadowHe talks about infrastructure in general, whilst this is more about driving. Both great channels though
I suggest watching Not just Bikes. You'll become really passionate about urban infrastructure lol
@@tieman3790 I do :)
In Poland you have 140km/h + 10km/h leeway (but the speed is almost never enforced on motorways so lets say that if you drive on the limit you will be overtaken constantly :D).
I'm surprised to hear that Poland doesn't enforce speed limits. What about cities?
@@artemkatelnytskyi they enforce speed limits, but people still speeding a lot, not much in towns and cities, but country roads and motorways, yeah
@@StraightOuttaPaddock Ukraine has a speed limit of 50 in cities, but you can only legally get fined when you go 20 kmh above the speed limit. So you can technically go 69 kmh I'm cities without being punished, and that's pretty bad imo. By the way, hi, neighbor!
I would say, the reason for not enforcing speed limit on motorways as much lies in lack of average speed counting on most of roads, thus relying only on traffic police cars, which cannot be everywhere.
@@MilvenTheDwarf By average speed counting, do you mean speed cameras? That'd definitely be a reason, but I don't see why there wouldn't be speed cams on motorways in Poland. Maybe only dangerous stretches of roads are monitored, and the rest is just very safe and thus not worth it?
1:50
Yes, over here in Poland we have wayyy too much time to spare, so we have 21 separate speed limits to memorise.
I makes sense for me. Not all roads are created equally so inclusion of express road is fine, and when there are multiple lanes you can overtake trucks safely, so different limit there also make sense for me.
It's just most of those signs in compilation are simplified so none of them include heavy vehicles, and some countries have their own weird rules like France has a set limits when there is rain, where as here in Poland everyone just drives 30 over on express roads *unless* there is rain.
Well It makes me dizzy so I stick with others in Poland and hope they know the limit :-D
@@martincerveny2284 speed limit only applies when you see cop in your field of view
@@marcelhit Yeah, I saw a lot of Polskie Drogi (Poland on drugs) videos and I know that. Polish drivers are my second strongest fear.
@@martincerveny2284 hahahah
In Netherlands the Speed limit is 100 km/h.
Me, a Czech: * laughs in going 160 and listening to the "beautiful" sound of a 25 years old engine *
130 after the bussy times, in the netherlands.
Thats why for long drives to the south I (a Dutchie) always uses the German autobahn
@@jbholland1987 i tought 120
It's 130km/h unless posted otherwise.
140km/h in Poland.
I'm not sure if it is already mentioned, but the "autobahn" is just the German word for "highway" or "motorway". There is no difference between "the autobahn" and "the highway" in Germany as there is between "snelweg" and "autoweg" in the Netherlands. So saying "Germany has 130kph speed limit on the motorways, except for the autobahn" doesn't make any sense. Germany has an advisory speed limit of 130kph unless otherwise indicated (as shown in the road sign you display on 1:45). On some places they limit the speed to 130, 120 or even 80 (when the road is wet for example).
We have that distinction here in DE, too. We have the "Autobahn" which can only be reached via connectors and the "Kraftfahrstraße" which can also have intersections and junctions. Both have the advisory speed limit of 130 km/h unless explicitly stated otherwise. Besides, even if it isn't an explicit highway here in DE (you don't see any of the telltale signs when entering said road), it still can have the advisory speed limit, however, it has to be constructed like a highway (that is, you can only reach it via connectors, thelanes must have a certain width, there must be emergency lanes present, and both directions must be separated by a median).
However, in contrast to the "Autobahn" the "Kraftfahrtstraße" can be constructed like an ordinary country road.
Another limitation (I don't know how this is handled in NL, though): If it's an "Autobahn" or "Kraftfahrtstraße", you may only enter it with vehicles that are capable of traveling at least 60 km/h.
@@Robidu1973 The "Kraftfahrtstraße" is what we in Belgium and the Netherlands call "autoweg" and "Autobahn" would be what we call "autosnelweg". In the Netherlands, speed on the "autoweg" is limited to 50 (= minimum) within city limits and 100 outside. In Belgium, there are no specific rules. It can be 50, 70 (in Flanders, 90 in Wallonia) or 120 in case of a dual carriage way. I didn't know the "Kraftfahrtstraße" did not have a maximum speed either, unless otherwise indicated. But I guess they're almost always limited to 80, 100 or 130 due to being constructed near city limits.
@@MaartensTravels Some "Kraftfahrstraßen" are even called "Schnellweg" like the "Messeschnellweg" in Hannover but as far as I know the speed on there is limited to 100 kmh since it goes directly through the city area.
@@Robidu1973 actually 130 on kraftfahrstrasse only applies if the is a built barricade between lanes in different directions.
if only lines its only 100
In Austria this is called Schnellstraße. The difference to Autobahn is the standard of building and securing it. That's more or less the biggest difference. Some Schnellstrassen can appear as Autobahn, but for some construction reasons they are not.
Another confusion is also the difference how older highways and some newer highways are built. A new gen. of a highway, 200 kmh is absolutely not a problem.
The funny thing about the speed change depending on the daytime is how it's the complete opposite in Germany: many stretches of Autobahn close to cities or houses have a limit of 80 km/h starting at 10 pm for noise abatement.
Some Autobahns were built way too close to existing residential areas - or (even worse) some scrooges bought land surrounding the Autobahn cheaply, developed new suburbs there and then sued their state for a tighter speed limit and a noise buffer.
@@Exodon2020 Yep. Same story with people living near airports. Smh.
@lucas actually it isnt too much different. In lot of places where the cities hug the highway so to say, the speedlimits were already lowered explicitly (to 100 or 80) and are not depending on the generic limit. As a result they are not affected by the generic speed limit change in daytime.
Towns built along the railroads in the US have been getting these complaints, too, hence the 'quiet zone'. While in towns, it makes sense...it's not like a roving gang of railroad builders came through after you moved there - you knew that there were 40 freight trains going by every day, or at least, you should have
It looks like that's one of the few things we did right with our motorways. We built all ours to deliberately avoid large settlements (apart from the M6 in Birmingham; that's a complete mess) and abandoned most of our plans to build urban motorways in London, and the few we did build all got downgraded to A roads. Here there has to be very good reason to impose a permanent lowered speed limit on a motorway. It does happen, like with the start of the M11 and the M27x mini-motorways in Hampshire, but it's rare. We're not like most European countries where you get speed limits sprinkled in on certain sections. It's not exactly a law of motorways but it's an unwritten rule that motorways essentially can't have permanent lower speed limits throughout and to get any at all there has to be exceptional circumstance. I can't think of a single motorway that has any section of lower speed limits throughout in the entire country. The only ones I can think of are at the beginning and ends of motorways as they reach a roundabout or urban junction, or the previously mentioned M27x motorways.
Me as a German going at 160+ on the Autobahn here be like: *chuckles* "This speed limit thing in these countries these days..."
(hope the irony is conveyed in this)
what irony?
@@Flying_Spaghetti_Monster A lot of the autobahn is slowly being converted to limited sections.
Unfortunately a national speed limit, or restrictions almost everywhere will come about sure enough, sooner or later.
I know all that and it's really sad, but you can still do that at the moment.
@Yarne Verminnen tbf so long as everyone is following the rules, driving predictably, with appropriate distances between vehicles and not cutting anyone off or squeezing in etc - then it can be perfectly safe. That’s why the non speed limiter sections work okay, since the predictability and consistency has to be in the road as well (straight enough, good enough surface, etc). Speed is really only a danger when people act unpredictably, since you have reduced reaction time and increased stopping time. Of course even the most disciplined country will sometimes have someone being unpredictable and that’s why you get more places getting speed limits. But that’s why also people propose no speed limit once driving is fully automated, since the computers should be able to act perfectly in accordance with the rules and communicate intentions with each other. It’s basically the same reason trains can be safe going so fast, because there’s predictability and rules-following (no sharing a signal block, not having to deal with turns, etc).
In Germany on an autobahn, a foreigner not used to it need to be careful and recalibrate your rear view mirror use. When at home you look and see some lights and think to yourself, “yeah I got plenty of room to pull out”.. in Germany, take a proper look and watch to see how fast they are moving or you are about to seriously piss someone off and have lights flashing in your rear view mirror. Pulling out in front of a high powered BMW or Porsche doing 180mph is bad manners. They will have seen you and they will be watching you and typically they can react quick enough, but it is annoying when someone just pulls out late. Especially as I will be by in a blink of the eye.
it's not just bad manners, it's fucking dangerous. Sometimes you have rich people taking their Porsche for a spin going 300+km/h - if you pull to the left lane at 80km/h to get rid of a slow, overtaking truck, that can get really dangerous. Of course, the Porsche driver is also to blame if he doesn't anticipate that, but that's not gonna be much help to you.
@@pixelmaster98 The blame is always in the car behind. Anticipating is always necessary. I really don't understand the autobahn concept of having no speed limit as too many variables have to align: no relatively slow car in front on the left lane and not suicidal driver behind that car. In the case of somebody overtaking a slow truck or slower diver in the middle lane with no time to check the reckless Porsche behind... you see the picture. Besides, the kinetic energy goes with the square of speed, so an increase of speed from 120 km/h to 140 km/h is not the same than from 160 km/h to 180 km/h, the risk of death is exponential.
Some German drivers are arrogant even out of their country. In Spain we have a speed limit of 120 km/h, although you always have speed radar signals in advance (mandatory by law) and you can speed up easily when you know there is no one (does not work when the radars check your average speed for a concrete section or you get caught by a traffic helicopter). Nevertheless, I hate Germans in my own country flashing me the lights when I take the left lane to let other cars join the road from the right, especially if I am not over 120 km/h and the guy is coming full speed from far behind. Buddy, this is my country, so respect me and our traffic rules! I am not going to brake because you come at 160 km/h, slow down! BTW, my bull icon is a well-known signal on the sides of the Spanish roads.
@@jabato9779 I'm not saying the car behind isn't to blame.
But that doesn't matter to the driver of the car in the front if he's dead.
Thus, not checking for cars in your rear view mirror is both dumb and dangerous.
Rule of thumb: always drive as if everyone else is an idiot, because they probably are.
In Germany the driving lessons include the autobahn and the final drive test includes autobahn driving where you're specifically tested on how you enter and exit the autobahn. At least this was the law when i got my license back in 1992. Regarding the electric cars: yes, they do not have emissions but we must not forget that electricity is not produced without emissions.
Well, if you electrify anything you can do like cars and use nuclear energy or other renewable energies and such, you do reduce the CO2 emissions by like almost 0
@@Kuro-UWU Problem is most of the electricity we produced is through burning. So we gotta change that.
@@kevinji7285 That's what i said
That's not the case anymore. You have mandatory driving lessons on the Autobahn but it's not a mandatory part of the test anymore. It can be though. Basically everything you learn can be tested but it's the TÜV tester's decision what they're going to test you on. I didn't have to do parking or Autobahn, for example. But I did Landstraße and 30 km/h zones. The TÜV in my city is also conveniently placed right next to a Autobahn exit so the tester had the choice to test me on Autobahn driving.
There's still a huge focus on proper discipline though. 3rd gear until you're on the Autobahn so you have the torque to quickly speed up, blinking way before you change lanes, no breaking on the main lanes if you leave the highway, no breaking in general if not necessary and so on.
@@Kuro-UWU since when is nuclear energy renewable? XD
The roads look so nice, smooth, wide lanes, gentle curves, long merge zones. Seems so pleasant.
Also note that not even the motorways have long straight stretches around here. Not only because there's so much old stuff to wind around but also to keep drivers' minds occupied. Boredom is a major factor of road accidents.
@@albertlugosi I didn’t know that but now I can appreciate that when driving.
@@albertlugosi Not only because of boredom but mainly because of the known phenomena called speed blindness. After a while at a certain speed, your mind gets used to that speed and this could be very dangerous in situations where you have to slow down at an intersection or in any other place where the circumstances make it too dangerous to drive at the speed you were just driving at. If you at this point are affected by speed blindness, it is very easy to think you have slowed down enough, because in comparison to the speed you just were at, you are driving much slower, but in reality it might not be slow enough at all.
What causes this is straight, wide and open highways. Mainly because of the lack of different reference points like trees, buildings, pedestrians, curves etc that normally give you an idea of how fast you are going.
@@albertlugosi If I remember right, the interstate system in the US was intentionally designed with curves every five miles (8km) or so, as a means of keeping people at least a bit more attentive. They tried...
Not to mention the discipline most drivers have when it comes to merging in traffic. One car from the left lane, a second car from the right lane, alternating to ensure smooth flow of traffic
In Belgium we have alot of ''trashbincamera's'' which are basically speed camera's put in and disguised as a trash bin, they are always watched by either a marked or unmarked police car nearby, sometimes easy to spot, other times impossible, like on days where the trash is being collected, they are put everywhere in urban to suburban area's
You forgot to mention the Facebook group where people post the location of the bin.
@@boetkir Or just use the Waze app :P Love how the community on that app updates everything they see.
Imagine the trash collecting truck collecting the camera bin xD
In Italy our speed cameras are bright orange or yellow, I believe that here they must be well visible and can't be disguised .-.
The aim of a speed camera should be to reduce the speed in a given location. Therefore every speed camera in a country with safety in its mind should be well visible so the less fines it produces, the more effective it is. Unfortunately they are also a good source of revenue, so many countries will resort to these tragicomic forms of selective taxation and that's a disgrace.
The way it works here is that highway speed limits are 130, this changes to 110 when you reach something like a city limit. So highways near or around cities are limited to 110. The stretch between cities is where the limit is higher. I believe Germany is the same.
Another difference some might notice is that EU highways tend to curve more. It's not that we can't make straight lines, the issue is your brain gets bored with straight lines. By slightly curving the road left and right, your brain is more engaged as you have to provide input to the steering wheel, even if it's just slightly. This creates safer roads.
Dutch guy living in Spain. The automated speed checking in the Netherlands is obviously fairly new. Speed used to be enforced by a branch of the police force that would hide unmarked vehicles behind bridges and other constructions.
The speed camera they used (a Dutch invention btw) could also be hidden inside grey metal boxes sitting along side the road. But these were dangerous cause drivers would know where to expect them and hit the brakes once they got close. Not very safe if you've got someone unfamiliar with the road driving behind you.
Now in Spain, or rather the province I live, that old system is still in use today. You will still see the fixed camera positions in grey boxes, although most of these boxes are clearly recognizable by the fact they look like (and indeed are) recently set on fire.
Don't let that fool you though, set on fire or not, they may work just fine.
Also Police sometimes will have speed checks, mainly in built up areas from what I've noticed. There will be an unmarked vehicle parked near a bus stop or something like that and once you pass that too fast, you'll find yourself being pulled over by a police welcoming committee not much further down the road.
Having said that, in comparison with the Netherlands I find most Spanish drivers to abide to road regulations better than the Dutch. (in general of course). This is immediately apparent when you see pedestrians crossing the road on a marked passing where cars will actually notice and stop whereas in France I've noticed crossing the road is more of a suicide mission.
What I really don't like about Spanish roads compared to the Dutch is that there barely are any clear bicycle lanes. Especially during milder whether you'll see bicyclists on the roads where traffic is allowed to do 50 and up and its really dangerous because they're even less visible than a motorcycle is, they're doing half the speed, and in stead of showing themselves by claiming the lane, they'll stay to the right which just invites cars to pass them at mirror to elbow distance. Usually unintended, but it often leads to dangerous situations and accidents of cours.
Burning speed cameras? Stone age solution. Use polyurethane foam applied into the housing. Of course, this was a joke. Don't do it. Although proven successfull, this method is so barbaric, that it is not used even in Poland.
I'm Spanish and recently they started adding the radars that measure your speed over a certain distance, they call it "radar tram" where I'm from v
I just did a video on driving in Basque Country. I like how the speed cameras there were bright yellow and had the speed limit on them 😂
In Czechia, radar must be marked by traffick sign before so everyone will slow down and nobody get fined. :-D Police uses mostly Octavia RS or Passats, people are used to looking for such cars, if there is some suspicious blue Octavia RS, everyone will slow down. :-D
Most of my life I lived in NL and in 2015 I moved to the US because of my US wife. Despite the roads being as big as an average airstrip, in my first 6 months in the US I have seen more accidents than in all of my 15 years of driving experience in NL and other parts in Europe. The accidents in the US are a lot more violent too due to higher speeds in urban and suburban areas and bigger cars. Driving culture in the US is just horrible, speeding, unnecessary driving in the left lane, passing left and right, road rage, being on your phone, not knowing how to use a roundabout, tailgating, unsecured cargo on pickups and/or trailers, not using their rear view mirror. In Europe drivers will see you coming and will actually move to the right and will not impede traffic or change lanes when you are passing them which is why on the German Autobahn driving fast actually isn't unsafe. On top of that, the roads in the US are poorly maintained, all sort of debris on the shoulder lines (regularly I see things like chairs, ladders, seats, truck tires). Also, many vehicles are simply not safe to be on the road, and general there is a lack of traffic information. In NL there is constant feed of traffic information to warn you about traffic jams for example, it will let you know to reduce speed in time instead of hitting the traffic jam at full speed. There is no way telling an American that there could possibly be anything better outside the US but driving absolutely is one of those things.
Well in the netherlands they drive unnecessary on the left lane, being on the phone, tailgating, not using the mirrors and of course speeding. We got a lot of tv programs that shows how people react on the roads.
Not sure about belgium and germany cause i haven't been there for awhile
@@TBMFan Nothing compared with the US lol. Nothing.
@@eacamo2986 I get it. Living in Australia is the same. You quite literally cannot 'drive' because everyone is doing something stupidly unexpected. All you can do is operate your motorvehicle and hope for the best
@@TBMFan in my years in NL, I have never sat behind a car overtaking for 18 mins while a policecar was sitting behind it with lights and sirens. Now I live in Australia and witnessed it a few times
Which isn't so much driving culture as it all being symptoms of car-dependent hellscape infrastructure, that requires driving on even small trips.
I drove the whole Europe.
In Sweden there is speed limit change every few km, which drove me mad.
In Italy they are mere suggestion.
Yeah it does my head in too and i have to live here haha, but mostly it's due to intersections but then there are those loooong boring stretches that is 80km only while there is nothing wrong with the road itself and it is divided with a centre wire barrier
on for example motorways E6 in sweden its pretty much either 110 or 120 the whole way from denmark to norway.. cant say for other roads as i rarely go elsewhere
I'm from sweden and yee, it is kinda wierd but most ppl drive 120 even if it is 100
In from Italy, and from my experience, at least on the motorway speed limit is respect (also because with the Autovelox, if they catch you, the resulting fine will be a good reason for respect the speed limit 😂).
Although on country road... Yeah they are not so respect
Anyway I'm from northern Italy, so I don't know about south 😂.
@@francescoboselli6033 Well, I went down to Amalfi and avoided Autostrada due to high road tolls. Starting from about Rome, traffic got worse. Yes, north is more civilized. Traffic in Balkans is much better than South Italy.
Here in Austria, we have automatic 100kph speed limits, which turn on when emissions get to high in the area (IG-L). However, in some stretches electric cars don't have to stick to 100kph, in order to test the traffic flow and check if it is feasible to implement nationwide.
Actually I don't think it's a good idea to specify different maximum speeds for different vehicles on the same stretch. There's a good reason why trams and inter-city trains don't share the same track, if you give it a though. As for trucks, which have lower speed limits outside of residential areas, it is a big problem which is a major cause of incidents.
Actually, whenever the IG-L is on, you don't have to follow that limit as an electric car at all, no matter where you are. In Salzburg there are 100km/h speed limits at every on-ramp so that if IG-L 80 is on, you are only allowed to drive 100 instead of 130.
@@alexnefi Years ago I remember reading how the suggestion to implement an exemption to IG-L for electric vehicles was rejected because it's dangerous to have too much difference in speeds on the road. Is this not the case anymore?
@@albertlugosi There is no reason to blame trucks. Any car could be driving slower than the limit for any reason. Drivers are supposed to adjust their speed according to the road, weather and traffic. The alternative would be for the slower limit to be applied to all vehicles, because allowing heavy large vehicles to go faster would be more dangerous than having different speed limits.
However, on motorways visibility is generally good. If large speed differences work on the Autobahn with vehicles doing anything between 120 and 200kmh, 30kmh difference shouldn't be that dangerous if people stay alert before changing lanes.
@@noxis93 It was passed about 2 years ago I think. I regularly "ignore" the IG-L restrictions. They put up some green, barely readable signs with way too much text on every motorway entrance in the IG-L zones. www.fuerboeck.at/verkehrsrecht/verkehrszeichen/zusatztafeln/immissionsschutzgesetz-luft/
Being an American, my times driving in the Netherlands I am always amazed on how disciplined the truck drivers are by staying in the right lanes. In America you could be driving over the speed limit and there would be a big truck on your tail wanting to go even faster - scary. Also, in America police sit on the side of the road with their radar. Finding someone going too fast means they have to race out and flag you down. This is so very dangerous. Plus, how many cars can they stop in an hour? Maybe four, while a camera can take hundreds of pictures without causing a dangerous situation.
No that's not true, trucks pass each other (even when it's not allowed on some stretches) with a small difference, clogging up our roads and don't forget the people who are overtaking them with 95 kmh during the 100 kmh daytime speed limit.
One thing I like about the US is that cars and trucks are allowed to go the same speed, I mean it don't have to be 75 mph for trucks here but 65 mph (105 kmh) would be much better than this stupid 90 kmh (56 mph) limit for trucks and that's also the speed they're speed limited at.
In Europe the level of the average driver is way higher than in the USA. It is way harder to get your driving licence in the Netherlands than in the USA. The level of the USA is more like, drive forward without hitting anything and congratulations, you are passed!
Also every car in the States is automatic, and in Europe you need to take your exams in manual car
@@Kolket1389 not really - but if you take in automatic your driving licence will be marked that you are authorised to only drive automatics. Since its a big commitment to get a licence everyone learns and takes exams on manual even if they are planning of buying an automatic.
@@TheDancing0wind In my country for example, you can only take exams in a manual car, that grants you the ability to drive automatics also...
@@Kolket1389 same in my country. This is also true for 2-wheelers too. You can ride a gearless scooter with a geared bike license.
@@Kolket1389 ''you need to take your exams in manual car''
Not necessary. You can decide to take your exams in an automatic but you won't be allowed to drive in a manual car.
I like the times when there was a speed limit of 130km/h. The only downside was that there were too many speed limit changes. On the A4, where the video was taken, there used to be so many speed limit changes that I only drove 100km/h. Just in case I missed a speed sign, all to avoid a ticket. Between Amsterdam and The Hague there was almost every 5km a different speed limit, the range was from 90km/hr to 130km/h. And those two cities are maybe 60km apart. It was ridiculous. Bye the way, you should know that a speeding camera at a crossing with traffic lights, is almost always a red light camera also. So don’t take the risk and hit the gas pedal in order to hopefully drive through an orange traffic light. You will get two fines. One for speeding and one for driving a red light. And fines are higher if you speed alongside road construction, when they temporary reduce the speed limit. And the overhead matrix signs on highways go over the road signs. So if a road sign says 100km/h and the matrix sign says 70km/h, the speed limit is 70km/h. Also when the matrix sign displays a red cross above a lane, that lane is closed. Driving on it will bet you a very high fine. The matrix signs are also use to indicate if the emergency lane becomes a rush-hour lane. In that case there is a green arrow pointing downwards at every lane that can be used. If that is the case, you may also cross the continuous line on the road and drive over a ‘verdrijvingsvlak’ (Google translate says it is called an expulsion plane, but I don’t think that is the correct translation). It is the white triangle shaped form (or wide oblique white stripes) on the road to indicate a separation between a highway lane and a diverting exit lane.
Yes, all of this is explained in the theory booklet they give you when you attend any European driving school. Most American highways don't even have a matrix panel lol. An average speed camera is like witchcraft.
And thats why most people in the Netherlands drive with a navigation it aways says what the speed limit is
@@alfrredd Yes, America is way behind in this subject. As is their infrastructure. Both are needed to have safe roads.
Yeah...
I'm worried about the ever increasing prevalence of speed cameras. Recently google maps has been routing me through obscure small village roads instead of more main roads because (and I'm not exactly proud of this, but eh) you can maintain higher speeds for longer stretches.
It is just a tad absurd when some unmarked little road through fields gets you somewhere faster than that lovely lit and renovated road running parallel a ways over.
Speed cameras are a-okay in residential areas, I get it. People.
But they keep touching long distance driving and that's a big no-no.
@@angelogto I find that it's quite often wrong though.
Good vid! Love seeing that the road conditions, speed limits and driver capabilities in Europe are recognised. I lived in Germany and The Netherlands and after reading most of the comments there are a couple of things which are worth mentioning. First, the speed difference between vehicles is always a issue for safety which is why most highways in Germany for example have 3-lane highways going uphill to separate fast vehicles from lorries with different speeds uphill. However, it is not always the speed difference but also the routine of driving in certain situations. Especially in Germany where the advised speedlimit of 130 km/h is often seen as sign for "pedal-to-the-metal" foreigners are most often involved in accidents because they are not used to fast driving cars on the left lane. This means that the overtaking procedure for a lorry needs to start way earlier than you would on a Dutch highway with a low speed difference. I live close to a stretch of Autobahn which is frequently used by Dutch people to just drive fast. A friend of mine is a rescue worker and gets called at least once a week because people with sporty cars, often from The Netherlands, drive fast and miss the signs stating that there are damages to the tarmac and lose control of their vehicle.
Second, yes, the Autobahn has in general no speedlimit. But most people do forget that above 130 km/h you as a driver are by law a "careless-driver" and thus responsible for anything that happens. This is mainly for the insurance company which in case of an accident, even if you were not at fault, states that this accident could only occur due to the high speed you were driving. So driving fast on the Autobahn also means that your insurance of the insurance of others in case of an accident is not obliged to pay a dime in some cases or makes you as a driver partially responsible and you will have to cover some of the costs. The same applies to the "adviessnelheid" you see at interchanges in The Netherlands from one to the other highway.
And last but not least, Dutch highways, pre covid-19, were way to full anyways during rush hours to actually drive the 130km/h and it in many cases lead to more capacity on the highways which benefited the commuters in the time spent on the highway. Especially in the evening or during the night the 130km/h makes a lot of sense to me because of the empty highways and the herewith connected comfort of driving.
"But most people do forget that above 130 km/h you as a driver are by law a "careless-driver" and thus responsible for anything that happens" I actually like that system. "You're allowed to go faster than we say you should, but if anything happens it's your fault". I like how the German government treats it's population like adults.
There's no speed limit in the US if you're fleeing from the Police.
🤣🤣
Only the limits of physics, which many seem to underestimate.
@@bailey125 Yeah, even the cops from what I have seen on RUclips.
great, now you only need a car that can outrun a .50 cal ^^
@@pixelmaster98 Now that the police have shoulder launched missiles, it's not a problem.
Some roads in the UAE have a speed limit of 160 km/h, for instance between Abu Dhabi and Al Ain.
well its all desert, and straight?
Now let's find someone who is eager to go there to try. With their own car.
No, thanks.
@@f.meyer_cr7 Wait do camels actually enter the road/highway? At 160 km/h it could lead to really bad crash..
I think it has more to do with how you got your drivers licence.
Here in the netherlands you have to drive with a instructor and you wont get your licence unles you pass the exam with litle to no mistakes.
In the U.S. most people learn from their parents or family member.
And then just get a simple test to show you can handle the car a bit.
So it has more to do with how you are instructed than dicipline.
Exactly, you have to proof you know everything
In Bulgaria the speed limit on a 2 lane motorway in not so good condition is 140km/h. Keep in mind the cameras don't catch you at 140 but rather somewhere at 180 so I can imagine how crazy this sounds to an american.
There’s no cameras in States or Canada. And I always drive 100mph with no problem 😉
so to make money they just add random 90km signs and camp out with a camera
Very nice video but can I complain about traffic annoyance number 1. In Dutch we call it ‘onnodig links rijden’ which means ‘driving on the left unnecessarily’ you can even get a fine of €210 (or $252) (2021).
Sometimes I see you’re hogging in the middle lane. You need to drive in the most right lane and yes most dutch people do this, it’s very annoying (see 6.50 the white Volvo V40). For example if I’m in the most right lane and I want to overtake you, I have to switch to the middle one, then to the third one and then switch two lanes back to the most right one. Can people please just drive in the right one, and only drive in the second lane or third or even the fourth, only use the fast lanes when overtaking. Stop using the argument ‘there’s a truck ahead I have to switch again’ thats the rule. Please let other drivers who want to drive faster pass by. German drivers are much more generous in this (check the white number plate’s they are more often on the right lane, and make room for faster moving vehicles). The Germans even have a funny joke of the Dutch numberplate (NL) Nür Links, which means that they only drive left. Check your rearview mirror before moving to the fast lane, and check it twice, so you can make sure someone isn’t moving faster than you thought. This is what Germans do and what makes an unristricted Autobahn of 220 km/h+ (or 135 mph+) easily possible.
I’m not a fast driver in cities or small villages but on highways it’s easy to drive 160 km/h (100 mph) and not dangerous.
We used to have lots of radar speed traps on the highway, people used to suddenly break hard and this caused accidents and traffic jams. They are very rare nowadays, just enough that the idea still deter people from speeding care free outside the average speed zones.
Imagine overtaking a queue of trucks when on a 'trajectcontrole' area. You are now going to have to overtake trucks with a maximum of 5 to 10km/h or walking/running speed. I've gotten a fine for doing 104 on average where 100 was allowed. All i did was overtake a long row of trucks that day... It's my only speeding ticket to this day and it really feels unjustified, especially given that the roads are safe enough to drive 130 on.
@@AwoudeX Except trucks have a speed limit of 80 km/h
Now not all abide by that completely but they will be doing 90 at best usually and 85 at most in a ticket area
In Poland, we have 140 kmph speed limit on 2 lanes motorways, furthermore there is few speed cameras on these road, so there is a lot of drivers driving on 160-200 kmph
Just be sure to check the insurance stuff about driving on the autobahn in Germany ;)
You are insured...just realise that if you go past the recommended speed limit you might be financially held accountable for a portion of damages (in case of a crash/accident), that you yourself will have to pay, and will not be paid by the insurance company (20-30 percent I believe, but it has been a while since I drove in Germany...so a bit rusty with the knowledge).
Solution: just always drive 250 kph, you will never have to pay anything in case of a crash
@@thorodinson5034 that's genius 😂
Just remember how much it costs (time and money) to get a DL in places like Germany, and how well you have to maintain your vehicle there (no rust spots, etc). Those costs would be considered "Discriminatory" here in the USA. That's one reason why your average driver in Germany is better than one in the USA.
The way germans maintain their vehicles does pay back once they sell them as used cars from Germany are quite sought after in most of Europe.
So the nazi like germans wont let you drive with a rust spot or mismatched part on the car, seems like class and thus race warfare, something the nazis germanys are good at. Maybe I can put a yellow star over my rust spot! will that make the nazis happy?
@@dave8599 A rust spot is fine actually. Signs of significant corrosion at any of the structural parts is not.
We have to pass technical inspection every 2 years to stay road worthy and they inspect every critical component(they really don't care if your engine makes weird noises and stuff but they do care a lot about everything that makes your wheels attached to the car, they religiously check and test all the components, wheel alignment etc.) I've once failed technical inspection because one of the break lines were showing what I would call micro-tears on the outer rubber and I wasn't even mad about it(those tears were really micro, they weren't deep but still it signals that this break line is already aging and needs to be replaced asap and they won't let you drive with it). I quickly went to service and got it replaced in 20min and got back to complete my technical inspection.
@Arwiiss Here in the USA, inspection laws vary depending on which state the vehicle is registered in. Some states require an annual safety and emissions test, others only require the safety inspection, while some states have no inspection requirements at all.
Me, a Pole: "Oh, fuck... I forgot that limit changed from 110 to 100 on 1 lane express road... but it's not like it matters... in good weather everyone just drives 20 over anyway."
Only 20 over? 😂
One of the roads i drive every morning to work has 100kmh limit... if u go 120 there you will be overtaken by everyone exept trucks and busses...
i may have been driving 130-140 myself there and i was still getting overtaken by litterally everyone😂
U forget about when express road become city/urban and get a 3 month ban.....
Here in Czechia, limit is 130, but when you are slower than 180, cars are blinking to you becuase you are pretending. When you are in left line, you must drive at least 160 or 170 or someone will hit you from behind. :-D
Heh, Poland... if you're not going 20 over you're probably a green fresh-off-the-exam-line driver.
Here in Australia (sorry if this is long-winded, but our speed limits are quite complex, & vary from State to State!)...
Urban areas:
50 km/h for un-signed residential roads and some built up areas (60 km/h in Northern Territory); 60 km/h for major roads; 70 & 80 km/h limits are occasionally used for major arterial roads which have more than one lane in each direction.
Common speed zones below the default built up area 50 km/h limit are:
-Shared zones (signposted areas where pedestrians and motorized traffic share the same space) are 10 km/h.
-School zones are variable speed zones, with a 40 km/h limit applying during gazetted school terms (which may include pupil-free days) & at specific times of the day when children are expected to be present. In South Australia, the limit is 25 km/h. Some school zones have flashing lights to indicate when the lower speed limit applies. In Victoria & Western Australia, most school zones have a flashing speed zone sign, most of which are solar powered.
-Some local governments have introduced special speed limits (usually 40 km/h), mostly in shopping precincts or other areas with high amounts of pedestrian activity
Rural areas:
Cars & motorcycles (single carriageway): Generally 80-110 km/h depending on the conditions for that road. In remote parts of Australia, such as outback Northern Territory, Queensland, New South Wales, South Australia & Western Australia, 110-130 km/h speed limits are used. For learner drivers & probationary drivers in certain states, speed limits of 80 to 100 km/h apply as a maximum along all roads where the posted limit is equal or higher.
Cars & motorcycles (urban/rural motorway/freeway): 100-110 km/h.
Trucks, road-trains: 80-100 km/h.
Enforcement tolerance: in Victoria = 3 km/h (strictly enforced by fixed speed camera & at the discretion of Victoria Police), in Western Australia = 7 km/h. Generally 10% over speed limit in other states/territories, but a ticket will be given for less when detected by fixed speed camera. However, new laws may see drivers issued with a ticket for exceeding 2 km/h over the posted speed limit. Heavy penalties apply for speeding in Australia.
Despite introduction of uniform national road rules by the states in 1999, Western Australia & the Northern Territory retain different default speed limits.
Yes I'm finished now! ;)
What you forgot to mention is we have third world roads outside the capital cities and that’s why we have to drive 4x4s to combat the crap roads.
Our roads are crap distances are great, serious and fatal accidents are unfortunately to common.
As a former truckdriver I like the 100 km/h speed limit. The reason is that there is les 'conflict' with trucks and trailers, and therefore better flow of traffic. In time gain or loss is makes almost no difference it only feels that way and I've done lots of experiments on this.
Conflict with trucks and trailers on highways? Don't trailers and trucks basically always drive on the right lane? How faster vehicles affect traffic at 130 km/h?
@@Z3t487 Nope, there are stretches where trucks can (and will) overtake each other. As on a two lane motorway this will result in small traffic jams when the speed differences are high reducing the limit during the day actually often creates a faster total traffic flow overall.
@@michiellombaers3198 they also do it on stretches where they're not allowed to overtake. Their speed limit of 80 ( which they hardly ever abide to) compared to 130 is dangerous. Also their overtaking can take for ever. Its not uncommon that the truck that gets over taken speeds up to frustrate the other truck driver.
The maker of this video complains he can't drive 130 during the day anymore, but in reality on most roads we couldn't anyhow because of trucks behaving like this.
My opinion is that trucks should get a 100 km/h speedlimit and be limited to 105 km/h but these bureaucratic monsters in the EU probably won't change it.
Cars and trucks got the same speed in the US, usually between 65-70 mph (105-113 km/h) and the traffic flow is much better.
In Hungary, motorways have a general limit of 130 km/h (90 for vehicles over 3500 kilograms), except for M0 (110 km/h (70 for heavies)), which is a speedway ring around the capital weaving in and out of residential areas, but its construction allows for speeds well over 130. Most speed cameras are on fixed spots, but our new system (basically a set of camera gates everywhere around the country) can actually double as an average speed camera depending on its position in relation to the next camera on the same section of road. It also functions as a driver cam (mentioned in your Why European drivers are better than Americans video), checks whether you're distracted while driving, your seatbelts, your MOT and insurance info based on your license plate, and it even checks your road tax and road toll status. They also have a very generous tolerance of 18 km/h over, so if you're in a hurry, you can actually squeeze some more speed out of your car without getting an expensive letter two weeks later.
Also, even basic bidirectional "country" roads have a general limit of 90 km/h, but they're usually quite shit, so about 70 is the recommended speed if you're happy with your suspension being attached to your car.
I drive 160 to 170 kmh in Poland, the same speed that I drive with in Germany. Highways in Poland are usually very suitable for speed, more suitable than most highways in Germany, and its normal to go with the flow of the traffic. Its actually very pleasant except that many people keep no distance (I mean like 5 or 10 metres at 140 kmh), and that you have to pay for the highways.
Yeah, tailgating is annoying as shit.
And there are people who try and overtake you if you yourself dont tailgate, despite moving at the pace of the lane.
It could just be hungary, or the fact that two lanes a side is really not enough for a proper highway, but its needlessly dangerous.
There is a reason for the design of those Polish highways. Poland once was Prussia. The reason for the autobahn to exist was the preparation for invading Poland, in 1939 they used it...
Glad I found this channel. I love these kind of videos since I love driving aswel. Greets from the Netherlands 😂
Thanks!
@@Kerleem hey am American in NYC. I have a question about European driving Etiquette. Should I apply those same skills here in NYC? Now knowing the error of my old driving habits?
@@bonda_racing3579 Be the change you want to see!
Nice videos! I am a Dutchy, but I love the Autobahn too. Most of the time I set my cruisecontrol to 160/180kmh(depending on the road and business) as it feel just a bit faster than the recommended speed
(//)
Kerleem, they researched it a while back. In the Netherlands the difference between 100 a 130 from 1 end to the other end only takes a couple min travel more.
And as you know with all the traffic jams, busy roads driving 130 for long stretches was hard to do anyway
Implementing a different speed limit for the different types of vehicles would cause more traffic and increase the emissions even if only the electric vehicles have an exception.
@@noefillon1749 and an increase of electricity consumption (like 20-30%) form the electric cars ONLY and gas/diesel usage will also increase for the other cars.
So you're implying that the Netherlands is a teeny-weeny jewel box? 😀
It's also interesting that Europe doesn't only have motorways but also expressways (the semi motorways with the car sign) which tend to be more common near smaller cities which tend to be a bit easier to build and generally have a speed limit of 100 or 110 km/h
Or 80 km/h also. Depends on where it is build and how it is build. We have a lot of these roads with tree alligning them, or even dual lane oncoming.
Yeah, its a lot safer then having those awful US roads
Here in sweden : the expressways has the same type of crossings and so on as the motorway ie divided BUT no dividing stretch or railing between the lanes so we had a lot of head on collisions - now most of thoose sections is rebuilt into motorways with separated directions and railings between.
And those roads could have a speed limit of 110 km/h --- head on at 110 km ie 220 km/h OR MORE.
We don't do that in the UK. You'll find the word 'expressway' being thrown around to describe new 'smart' motorways, but that's not really what it is. The only legal classification we have in this country is the motorway - anything else is just an All-Purpose (A) road or a B road. Dual carriageway A roads in suburban areas tend to have lowered speed limits, so I suppose they could be classed as expressways, but in the UK the word has no real meaning and no road in the UK has ever been officially called an expressway. The closest things I can think of that could be considered to be 'semi-motorways', 'sub-motorways' or 'expressways' in the UK are the M271 and M275, short motorways in the Southampton and Portsmouth areas respectively that have a hard shoulder and motorway restrictions, but have a 50mph limit. I'm not entirely sure why they were built as motorways when they could just as easily have been built as dual carriageway A roads considering both ends have an escape route from the M27 for non-motorway traffic. Non-motorway traffic using roads like that would be suicide though and it'd basically never happen. Just because you're legally allowed to use an NSL dual carriageway as a cyclist or other non-motorway user doesn't mean it's a good idea.
@@cryoraptora303tm2 from what I know dual carriageways are the expressway equivalent in the UK
National highway speed limit in Poland is 140km/h. I've found out that the vast majority of traffic travels at speeds slower than that.
When I put cruise control at 140km/h I constantly have to overtake passanger cars as well as trucks (or any heavier goods vehicle which are bound to 90km/h speed limit). And trucks really do love travelling in convoys of 2-5 in a row so once you commit to overtaking one you really have to spend a considerable amount of time in the passing lane.
Combined with the fact that a minority of people speed considerably (in excess of 160km/h) you're constantly on the edge of overtaking someone without blocking another person blasting in the left lane.
So I learned that setting cruise control speed speed to somewhere between 115-125km/h and speeding up to 140-150 only when overtaking large trucks makes for a much more pleasant and stress-free drive
In China, speed limit depends on road quality, design and locations. Highway speed limit ranges from 100 to 120kph. Urban roads at 40 to 70kph. Suburb/country roads at 50 to 90kph. Mountain roads are strictly limited at 40kph (not like you can reach that speed anyway because of the corners and inclines). Most of the traffic rules are enforced by cameras.
What's the split between Highways having 100 km/h and 120 km/h. Do majority of highways have 120 as speed limit? Are there special "expressways" different from highways? I am curious
Here in the UK, Motorways are either at 50mph, 60mph or 70mph speed limits and country (rural) roads they are either 30mph (inside towns and villages), 40mph (on most country roads), 50mph, 60mph (or it'll be marked with a "National Speed Limit" sign which is 60mph) and now rarely 70mph (most were cut down to 40mph-60mph due to several accidents) and in towns and cities, the roads are either 20mph or 30mph and sometimes 40mph but only on dual carriageways or on the rural-urban fringe or between areas on the Greater London Boundary or the boundary in any city such as between Banstead, Surrey (just outside the Suburb of Sutton, London) and Purley (near the former Croydon Airport) which is only just inside Greater London...
I moved from Finland to Canada some 5 years ago. I found it being almost uncanny how insecure I felt on the freeways even though I was driving slower in general.
Here are my experiences if anyone is interested.
- Roads are way too busy here for me to enjoy driving. Every road is packed as full as possible, traffic is often start-stop between Hamilton and Toronto. I've once sat in an afternoon traffic jam in Toronto for 5 hours because a police officer ordered me towards the city right before an on-ramp, after waiting in line to get to that said on-ramp for about an hour. Had to take a detour through part of the city to get to the next on-ramp. There are no shortcuts either, every road that leads anywhere is packed. I just think this could be done differently.
- Weird and steep curves on roads, like sometimes a curve gradually gets steeper and steeper so you have to rotate your steering wheel more and more over a period of 5 seconds, then straighten out over a time of 3 seconds, then turn again but this time you turn your steering wheel into fixed position under a second... This is especially bad in Hamilton but I guess that's primarily because of the terrain. This caught me off guard the first time and I kept swaying in my lane. This also effects visibility as well, sometimes the traffic is stopped right behind a curve and you have to do some hard breaking.
- Some parts of the roads are in terrible condition, I purposely drive under the speed limit in some areas because I'm afraid of damaging my car. Bumps are bumps but I've seen holes on a bridge and flying lumps of asphalt.
- Car wrecking debris on major freeways. I've seen toppled over signs, buckets, ladders, large rocks, gravel, entire tires with rims attached on the road. Largest rock I saw was probably around 30cm tall and it blended into the road.
- Undisciplined drivers. There are ways to enforce speeding Also everyone expects you to go 20 over the speed limit. Or rather you're "expected to keep up with traffic", leaves a lot to interpretation. I once was driving from Niagara towards Hamilton on a relatively quiet road before sunset. I was catching up to a wall of cars ahead of me so I slowed down from 120 to around 110. I managed to get past and saw people were slowing down because of a Police on the road. Once I was past I sped up again to around 120. The police car started following me but didn't put lights on, kinda what I was expecting really. I have a feeling that they just appreciated me going steady 120 instead of having to slow down to 110 for every car. Still... Making the rules fair, consistent and strict would make better driving experience for everyone in the end and calms traffic.
Thanks for this! The GTA is awful for drivers! You should comment this on my other video!!
Great job. A couple of years ago, in Vienna, a lawyer has defeated a speeding ticket on a "section control" (avg. speed control) due to data protection laws. They had to skip the measurement for 2 months to amend the laws. The people of Vienna were grateful. Since then, as you say, no way to defeat speeding tickets from any camera based system.
oh man! I wish that would happen here. I doubt it.
In Germany are no speed limits on the autobahn and motorways. They are just restricted in some Areas. The 130 km/h is just an orrientation speed, "Richtgeschwindigkeit" on german. Even on the Bundesstraße is it possible to have a no limit zone. They have to be build as 4-lane motorways (autobahnähnlich).
Then what's the difference between an Autobahn and a Bundesstraße?
@@SirBlade666 The Bundesstraße can be build as a normal road or as a 4-lane motorway. The Autobahn is always 4-, 6-, or 8-lane highway.
Richtgeschwindigkeit also translates to a recommended safe speed limit. Should you be involved in a motor accident where you have exceeded the Richtgeschwindigkeit, the car insurance will reduce the amount of insurance money paid out due to you having exceeded this safe speed limit, even when the Autobahn had no speed limit. The Richtgeschwindigkeit as such is not displayed on any sign except when it is reduced to something less on a road depending on weather conditions e.g. wet road, wind exposure, snow or even daytime. I have such sign only on Bundesstrassen and it was worded as Empfohlene Geschwindigkeit or something like that.
The UK has loads of average speed check zones. The M4 around Port Talbot (50 mph), the A6 between the Capitol Centre and Preston city centre (30 mph), loads of motorway roadworks (usually 50 mph) plus others (e.g. the A465 Heads of the Valleys had one, I don't know if it still does).
The UK system does have a tolerance. You might even get 10% plus 2 mph (the normal ACPO threshold for enforcement), but that is pushing it (that is the normal threshold but police forces can enforce lower).
We also have automated enforcement via police vans. They will park, monitor people and tickets will be issued in due course
France is actually interesting because it has 130km/h speed limit for normal weather and 110km/h speed limit for bad weather. I always thought that was kinda smart.
In Finland we have 120, 100, or 80 depending on the weather. You would expect 80 during a snow storm for instance to cut the worst edge off the chain reaction crashes that they so typically facilitate.
In Canada, we have the opposite: too much traffic in clear weather to go fast - everyone's grandma is on the road
When it snows, the roads are nearly empty and I can finally do the speed limit of 100 km/h
@@johannesmajamaki2626 Motorways in the UK are fairly similar the usual limit is 70 mph (110 km/h) but the matrix signs will enforce lower limits depending on road conditions, typically either 60 mph (96 km/h) or 50 mph (80 km/h). Severe heavy rain causing standing water by overwhelming drains might trigger the drop to 60, but 50 tends to be used for icy/snowy conditions. Of course, mist, fog, or other severely restricted visibility will also trigger speed restrictions this is basically calculated by taking into account the distance the rear fog lights of a roadworthy vehicle could be seen and rounding the speed a roadworthy vehicle could be going and expected to stop safely in that distance down to the nearest 10 mph (16 km/h). Of course, if there is a stationary obstruction without lights in front of you then all bets are probably still off at that point so I personally would be inclined to shave 20-25% off that legally imposed temporary limit if I were driving.
In my area we got a Autobahn with as fast as you want but as soon as the road is wet it's 80...
It's actually 90, 110, and 130 depending on the highway. When it rains, 130 drops to 110, 110 drops to 100, and 90 drops to 80.
In Italy,generally,the limits are 130km\h on highway ,110 km\h country road/secondary road and 50 km\h city.
We have too the average speed checking (it's called Tutor here),the problem it's in the secondary/country road,where in some short distance the limits change like 4-5 time and in some,big secondary road it's 50 km\h (too slow)
"How to Apply for a US Driving License
Step 1: Get Your Documents Ready. Before you go to the local branch of Department of Motor Vehicles, make sure you have all the right documents on you. ...
Step 2: Pay Your Fees. ...
Step 3: Take Your Tests. ...
Step 4: Get Your Vision Tested. ...
Step 5: Get Your License."
Wtf
In Poland I had to pass 2 exams, theoretical and practical, do some health+mentality tests, and get throught 32 hours of driving school with my instructor in specialized car...at least, if not even few more things. Also I could only begin all of that 3 months before 18th birthday and after completion, drive by myself only once im 18. US license seems like a joke to me rn
Seems like in Poland it's more strict than in Germany.
In Germany we have to visit 14 theoretical classes while nowadays checking quizzies in an Mobile-App which opens learner drivers the theoretical exam (it's just one) and so the student can begin with practical "hours" in a co-op drive with the driving teacher/instructor.
After completing a certain amount of pratical hours, you apply for the pratical exam.
And of course before you are allowed to move a vehicle in public, you have to complete an eye test, made a pass photo and taken apart in a first aid class.
Edit:
You can start with your drivers license whith age 17 and when you passed your driving and theory exam, before you're 18, you can legaly drive a vehicle in public, *but with* a registered elder person with atleast ~20 years of driving experience is always the co-driver.
With driver license lessons you get to learn the "roads" and "streets" so that you don't need traffic signs/boards to be able to know how hard you can/may drive somewhere.
Very handy to have this information. As in Europe, the amount of times you switch speed, is just absurd.
Just a shame that these indications are different from country to country. But I do like the uniform style we have in NL now, apart from the motorway where you have to pay attention to see if it's 80, 100, 120 or 130 on all other roads you can simply tell by road design, lines and colors.
In Germany: I paid for all of the speedometer, I’m damn well going to use all of the speedometer.
@white criminal truly depends 2004 Ford Ka speedometer goes to 200kmh cruising at 160 is fine, short stretches 190 is fine
@@drwhominer
With “Grüne:” he reffered to a German economic-left-liberal party wich is popular for their radical idears in fighting this climate change and many prohabitions they want to set up, like banning no speed limit zones and basically everything that produces a bit more carbondioxid than they want.
In Italy, on the motorway sometimes the limit is 150km/h or 93mp/h
Mamma Mia!
5:48 Regarding Germany: Federal Highways ("Autobahn") are generally unlimited. The posted "speed limit" of 130 km/h is a "Richtgeschwindigkeit", a recommended speed to drive. When you drive higher than recommended speed and get in a accident, there will be most likely partial blame assigned to you by default for the purposes of insurance claims; that's the only thing that reccomended speed limit does.
Interesting tidbit: That unregulated speed limit isn't nailed down to the specification of the street beeing an Autobahn, but in how it's build - if the lanes a.) in each direction are separated from each other by middle divider; or b.) there are at least 2 lanes per direction, divided by a middle line; there is no general speed limit apart from signage. That's important for example on Schnellstraßen ("Fast Streets"), which sit in-between full highway and normal rural/federal streets. But all the Schnellstraßen I know of are all limited to 100km/h or lower with signage, with only one exception that I can think of going up to 120km/h (which is a connection between to Highways, only accesible via Highway).
In any case, you'll never find a street where you could drive unlimited because of the way it's build that's NOT also limited by signage, so most German drivers don't know about that "loophole". Most rural and federal streets are single lane per direction, which is a big difference to the US with its up to 8-lane stroats even in urban areas.
As German i'm a little bit triggered by the lonely case in the middle lan in your footage :-)
those Mittelspurschleicher!
Haha
You mean triggered like the guy at 4:18? XD
@@uncletyrone overtaking on the right could be me but I always switch lane by lane. How could I elsewise react to a 200+ driver.
Here in italy every highway has a 130kph limit, and they're generally well mantained too. "Tangenziali", or ring roads, generally have a 90kph (but up to 110) limit and are generally less well mantained but still not too bad.
We do have the same average speed system (it's called "tutor" here, while speed cameras are called "autovelox"), but I don't really know what the margin is, and how much you can go over the limit... Generally people cruise at 140, but i remember my mum not watching the speedometer for a while and going at an average of 160 for a good stretch of road... She was convinced she would have gotten a ticket, she didn't. Anyways, they're always clearly marked, bright yellow or orange in cities or rural roads, or near a sign stating there's a camera there on motorways or ring roads.
If you like driving, and like a good adventure in your everyday car, then I would recommend you northern Scandinavia. Narrow roads, animals standing on the roads, just stunning scenery. I live in the far north and just love to cruise around in Norway. The scenery is just wonderful. For most roads there it's only 80 km/h, so it isn't so heavy on the wallet either 😅
because of you, the car "reindeer" test was invented 😁
@@tihomirrasperic It was actually a moose test (elgtest is both Swedish and Norwegian), but yeah, it was born out of neccesity. A full grown Scandinavian bull moose can easily weigh in excess of half a ton, and has a higher shoulder height than most horse races. I crashed with one once, allmost ten years ago. It was not fun(!). I was fortunately not hurt, but the moose died and the car was a write-off...
Others have not been so lucky...
There are so many great drives up north(!). Vardø to Hamningberg, Lofoten and Vesterålen, Senja (especially out to yttersi'a), fylkesvei 17 along Helgeland... I could go on... It's beautiful! Vestlandet isn't to be sneesed at either... Gamle Strynefjellsvei, Atlaterhavsvegen, pretty much anywhere in the inner regions of the Hardangerfjord, Sognefjellsvegen, any approach to Geiranger (three of them, one being a ferry from Hellesylt, and all of them absolutely breathtaking)...
We live in a beautiful country, that's for sure!
@@tihomirrasperic That test ? That was a pure maneuvrability and control test. SAAB's elk test were some thing else :
A cable drum hanging high enough to clear the bonnet - that was their elk test.
That cable drum test took of most cars roof....
Come to the East of the Netherlands. From Deventer to Enschede the A1 highway recently has been renovated and it's a superb road now. Also we kinda ignore the daytime 100km limit and unless it's heavy traffic people drive 130km/h which is indeed a very nice comfortable speed in modern cars. For some reason they never seem to have any speed cameras here as well, I must admit I always drive too fast here because it's such a nice and safe road and I never have been fined in 4 years. When I return home late at night from the Randstad , with most empty roads, I turn up the radio, put om some nice trance classics (Stephano Marino ftw) and off I go..... It's one of the nicest roads in the Netherlands.
Oh yes, I drove that part of the A1 coming back from Prague a few weeks ago, and it was amazing. I think I was doing 140 and getting passed by some others (around 18:00).
The 100 limit is a shame!
What illustrates the difference between European and American drivers is quite visible in Poland. Here in Poland we have the highest speed limits in Europe, some of the weakest enforcement, some of the lowest fines and some of the highest rates of car ownership, and likewise, for European standards, Polish roads are outright carnage.
And yet, when one sees comparisons off accident rates and death rates in traffic, Poland, being like the fourth of fifth worst country in the EU, has similar levels of accidents and traffic deaths as some of the safer states in the US, like Minnesota, Washington or Massachusetts, and if it were a US state, it would be like the 7th or 8th *safest* - with places like Alabama, Mississippi or Montana being three times worse in these metrics and approaching (or even exceeding) Russian levels of pandemonium on the highways.
THIS! 💯💯
well although there's a 140 kph LIMIT on highways, it's only 10 kph higher than the recommended speed on the German highways, while two thirds of the German highway system don't have any posted speed limit and you may as well go much faster than that
I think 100 km/h speed limit is an okay speed. In Sweden it's normally 110 km/h on the motorway and personally I think this is a good speed. I get that people want to drive faster and that people do so in Sweden also, but gas costs a lot and keeping a lower and consistent speed is definitely worth it in the long run if you drive a lot.
Driving in the USA drove me nuts :) Sometimes the roads would flow and you could drive fast and then suddenly there would just be queue building for a short stretch where you had to break and go down to super slow speeds and suddenly, it would be gone and you could start speeding again. Really inefficient way to drive and definitely a reason I think many more people get road rage in the States.
Thanks for the video. It was interesting to listen to!
In Spain they have just lowered all speed limits to as little as 20 km per hour but they have not signposted the new limits. They expect drivers to know without signage, sheer lunacy.
That wouldn't work in the Netherlands. The actual situation, thus the signs or the matrix displays (the things above the road), are leading. I would find it odd if they just expect you to know.
@Robert Butler That's false. Those limits are only for urban zones and also, the limit is not always 20.
The new rules say:
- 20 km / h on roads with a single carriageway and sidewalk platform.
- 30 km / h on single lane roads in each direction of traffic.
- 50 km / h on roads with two or more lanes in each direction and crossings.
@@jos7821 If there's a lower speed limits (on variable speed limit or normal signs) then it's that speed that's always leading here.
There is a small addition regarding Germany I am willing to make:
If you are driving on a road with two ore more lanes per direction and a barrier between the lanes, that lead to opposite directions , outside of a city and it has a blue sign with a car on it (Kraftfahrtstraße), there is no general speed limit. The Government proposes a speed of 130 kph, so if you are going faster and you have an accident, you are always at least partially giulty. This rule does apply to all Autobahns and most Bundesstraßen ("federal roads" = roads maintained by the federal government that have priority over other roads regarding to cleaning and are well maintained over a long distance) and maybe even some other roads, that i dont know a specific example of right now.
I hope I could help somebody trying to understand German road law (or confuse them more ;-) )
I've crossed Europe so many times from Paris to Romania :)). Although almost every country has 130 kph on the motorway, each is very different in enforcing it. France for example is quite strict, it is better to stick to 140 max. Germany same thing, where it's applicable. Austria at night is empty and using Waze you can keep to higher speed. Hungary I never drive under 170 :)). Romania is the most lenient with low police presence on motorways. I have crossed in the mid 200s when I was in great hurry.
170 in Hungary!
@@Kerleem I love to drive fast :)). I work in Canada more than half the year and as you probably know you cannot drive there. So coming back to Romania is a beautiful treat for me.
@@cosminmihu9963 Why u cannot drive in Canada, just get a international driver license (Romania is part if EU) and insurance
What surprises me in Germany is many of the unrestricted speed sections of the autobahn are only 2 lane. I am from the UK and motorway lane discipline is reasonably good here.
In Austria you can find on some motorways speed limit with "IG-L" description, which means that this limit does not apply to electric vehicles. For example, general speed limit on motorway is 130km/h, but for not electric cars max speed is limited to 100km/h (if you're driving Tesla, you can drive 130km/h)
Let's show poor people who can't afford EV their place.
Yes, I live in such an area, and I hate it. It creates tons of conflict between the different "tiers" of vehicles. And really, it doesn't do anything for the environment. Luckily, I cycle to work, so it doesn't bother me too much.
That's the dumbest shit I have ever heard. Electric cars become less efficient at higher speeds so they will pollute more. Yes electric cars pollute since the european energy grid does not consist of 100% renewable energy.
I think that driving in Germany at speed is relatively safe, because Germans learn to drive at speeds that are safe, not to always drive at the speed limit. I found that to be a key difference between my lessons in The Netherlands, where you are tought that it is safe to drive at the limit, because the road maintainer has thought about the speed limit. In NL, there are a lot of different speed limits. The limit of 100 km/h may not live for long, it has been a rule set for emissions, but a lot of complaints have been issued. And we should have a new government soon. It is a real maze right now, with 4 signs above each other. From top to bottom: limit 100 km/h, only from 6-19h, then limit 120 km/h, only from 19-6h. And then there are "spitsstroken", lanes that can be opened during the day or night when there is a lot of traffic. The dynamic speed limit there is mostly 100 km/h (or even 80) when the spitsstrook is open, and 120 km/h when it is closed. Unless it is daytime, then it is always 100...
I once drove through Poland, where 140 km/h is the limit. I think that is a bit too high, as motorways are not really wide (2-3 lanes) and a lot of people are not as disciplined as Germans. I think that roads and discipline is generally better in western European countries, compared to eastern European countries. Eastern Europe (Ukraine, Belarus, Romania, Bulgaria, etc.) has had a lot of suffering between World War II and the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989, road quality has not caught up everywhere.
For those who doesn't understand how the speed limit will reduce carbon emissions, it is connected with the amount of wear and tear on the roads. With higher speed limits comes more wear and tear on the asphalt which gives off more particles that is considered carbon emissions. Those hybrid and electric vehicles contribute to this as much as other vehicles.
I think it is so much more, diesel engines aren't pushed as much, and the lower speed limit extends electric car ranges making them more enticing (plus makes electric cars more efficient), plus the lower speed limit pushes some drivers towards taking the train... all of these changes reduce emissions
If that's the case, it wasn't explained that way from all of the news articles about this topic...
And that's why the reduced speed limit in NL is bs. It's completly arbitrary anyway. Why not 90? why not 110? why not stay with 130? Nobody will tell you, because there is no clear answer to this. And if the argument is, that the current gen of ecars is best fit for driving 100km/h - you give up freedom to drive faster and it will be obsolete anyway with the next gen of ecars in a couple of years?
Wow. I live in the Netherlands. I appreciate the research u have done for the video.
Thanks, and Thanks for watching!
I live in the rural part of the Netherlands and driving the 100 km/h speedlimit is torture to me. On dual carriageways and motorways I generally drive 20 km/h over the limit as long as its save.
Here in Finland on the few motorways we have there normally is a 120km/h speed limit, and during winter months it is reduced to 100 km/h. On larger country roads it’s usually between 80-100 and in the winter strictly 80
I live quite near Amsterdam and I think the speed limit of 100km/h makes little or no sense. It might, after limiting air traffic and making ships in the harbours emit less and agricultural vehicles, and two stroke engines. Then there is the industry, like Tata Steel, which emits enormous amounts. In general cars emit just a small percentage of that. I should also point out that even though electric cars themselves don't emit, the production of the electrical energy in the Netherlands definitely does, since it is still a lot of coal and bio mass burning plants producing it. The energy of the windmills is largely given away to companies such as Google to provide green energy for their digital storage facilities. Where it was promised to provide households, it in fact doesn't. It may look like there is a lot of green energy, and according to the statistics it should be 6%, but research has shown the bulk of that is from burning bio mass (wood shreds) making the net production of true green energy lower than 2% of the total. We still have a long way to go...
It would be better if we could get more clean/green electricity, though the electricity made from coal and/or bio mass plants is more efficient and might even still be considered cleaner to get your Electric car running than a car with a petrol/diesel engine.
Mostly because a car with a petrol/diesel engine only makes 1 car run (usually only 1 person in it, moving an empty chair and a sofa) while a powerplant makes your Electric car go and at the same time everything else that needs electricity.
@@DarkDutch007 Electric motors can be almost 100% efficient, so there is a bonus there that I think might already be greater. That said if you simply look at the percentage that personal vehicles pollute compared to industry and transportation of goods, it is almost futile to start with making personal vehicles cleaner. Especially making them go only that little less fast, you are talking a tiny margin within what was already a very small percentage. The policy mainly seems to focus on policies that people notice on a personal level, so they feel like there is something done for a cleaner environment. The measured effects however, I keep reading that they never reach the targets that were expected. Rotterdam even measured no single effect in air pollution from going to 100kmh, neither did they from banning old vehicles from the city centre. Not surprising if you see what the ships in the harbour pollute, even from engines running at idle. it is immense. We're talking engines running on almost crude oil, with cylinders the size of a living room.
Areas with the much higher road speeds, very few actually drive that speed for any distance as the fuel required to drive that speed adds up quickly compared to driving slower.
I heard you talking about the speedlimit in Germany. From a formal point of view. In Germany there is no speedlimit in effect on motorways. Only limitations on different parts of the "autobahn".
Isn't 130 a kind of "recommended speed" even where there are no formal speed limits?
@@Vengir police don't stop you and ask why you were not driving within recommendations :D so you can go 300km/h if you want. It gets a bit tricky if you cause/take part in a crash while driving faster than 130. You might be given part of the blame if someone cuts in front of you for example, but in reality it's much more complex. :)
Noted 80 mph speed limits in South Dakota and Wyoming while traveling on I-90. But you’re correct in your assessment of some of the higher speed zones in the US.
The "pollution"/"emissions" speed limitations are in place in several European countries: I will name Austria and France. A speeding fine in one of these areas (where pollution is the reason for the speed limitation) is a very expensive experience.
I'm from the Netherlands and I don't enjoy driving (as in: I won't go drive because I like it, I don't mind if I have to go somewhere). I really don't mind the 100km/h and if that's what allows more houses being build then I'm really glad they did it.
The most annoying thing before it was set to 100km/h was that in some areas you had just reached the 130km/h speed and then you had to go back to 100km/h. Also the signs weren't always consistent. The hectometer markers (similar to mile markers) sometimes said "100" while the road was 130km/h or the other way around. Because of this confusion I did often drive 100km/h (unless there was other traffic, in which case I would follow their speed).
This is just a hoax of the government, it's mainly to test self-driving cars in the future and to think they can reduce traffic deaths, Many countries signed the ''Stockholm Declaration'' which lowers the speed to 30 km/h in cities just for this for example.
I think 110 km/h would be better in the day and trucks should've a speed limit of 100 km/h (62 mph) which would be much better for the traffic flow. Problem now is that there are some (usually old) people cutting you off with 95-100 km/h just to get past a truck. There's a positive thing of driving in the US that cars and trucks have the same speed limit which is usually 65-70 mph (105-113 km/h) on the east coast and the flow of traffic is much better than here in Europe on busy roads in the day.
In the Netherlands in my experience you should be carefull with speed near the randstand and outside of highways, on highways outside of the randstad you can pretty much disregard speedlimits up until the +30 limit where you get points on your license so you can do 160 in a 130 without pretty much any problems.
There’s hardly speed enforcement outside of the randstad right? I rarely see it when I’m driving in other areas
@@Kerleem ye pretty much, it can happen which is why u wanna keep it in the limit speedlimit+30ish so it doesn't go to the ''officier van justitie'' which means its gets recorded and you will have problems if that happens to much, but the fines are light enough and you will pretty much never get them so if you keep to that rule Ur fine (again on highways outside the randstad, u shouldn't try this below a traject control that would be a terrible idea :) ).
@@Kerleem I personally have only ever gotten 3 tickets in my lifetime (5+ years of driving now) all of which where within city limits 2 in delft and 1 in Amersfoort, and I have always been a bit of a fast driver but after the changes in speed limits I made this rule for myself which really ment I didn't really slow down during the day I now just drive a lot faster after 7pm.
you will only lose your licence if you drive 50km/h above the speedlimit.
Usually the police ignores you when they are patrolling if you drive below 30 km above the speedlimit, so i will not go above 20 km/h above the speedlimit.
I do have to watch out for camera cars, because those will send you a ticket like they do with speed traps/ average speed zones.
@@someoneyoudontknow4920 True but anything above a 30+ ticket gets send through to the officier van justitie, so you might not lose your license instantly but it gets put on your record so you don't want to get tickets for more then 30 over the limit. They also take your record into account if you get 30+ tickets which means that if you get a 50 or 60 or some other absurd speed infraction and you already have a bunch of stuff on your record you are much more likely to lose your license and get more punishment so you want your record as clean as possible so that if you make a mistake and do go much to fast somewhere you don't lose your license or have to have some insane punishment.
'trajectcontrole' is a check between 2 points (sometimes chained). The time it takes is measured and an average speed is calculated. I've had a ticket for doing 104 on average where 100 was allowed. What happened was this: a long queue of trucks were going 90+ on the right side and i don't consider it to be safe to merge between them. It's also added risk to take a long time overtaking. My driving instructor explicitly taught me to speed up to overtake. (this was however when the limit was 130) so what do i do? I speed up a bit to not impede traffic and to not have the speed difference become too big for traffic going even faster. Can't do right under such conditions other than to just not overtake in such stretches of road and that's boring, taking more time and therefor also risky.
'can't defeat the system' - to elaborate: You also can't keep it safe in a reasonable manner either.
I personally come from Poland and I can say from experience that many Polish roads have a higher maximum speed than the "safe speed" that can be achieved. Mainly due to poor road maintenance in some regions. Even in medium-sized cities (according to the Polish standard), such as Bydgoszcz or Toruń, there are many streets where, despite the speed limit of 50 km / h, the maximum safe speed is around 30 km / h. Still on national roads (90 km / h), expressways (100-120 km / h depending on the number of lanes) and highways (most often 140 km / h, but there are zones as in the connections between the highway and the expressway with lower speed limit), the main speed limit is set accordingly. Even with these relatively high speed limits, there are many people who "ignore it" and are driving about 20-40 km / h above the legal limit.
One of the biggest things to get into my head while learning was just because I could go the limit doesn’t mean I have to! Going 10 or even 20mph under the limit can be totally appropriate depending on terrain, weather, traffic etc. It helped me a lot to not feel like I had to do it just because the sign said I could.
Oh yes. Always adapt. Speed limits are generic, but every bit of road is different and every car is different. I've been on twisty country roads that despite posting a reduced limit of 50kmh (instead of 80 or 90), doing anything over 30 in a regular car felt unsafe and excessive due to the number of sharp narrow blind turns.
@@KimonFrousios in the UK those country roads usually don’t have a speed limit 😆 (which means the limit is 60mph, the national limit). But yeah lots of times ppl will take them at 20 or 30mph instead. Though some will “hoon” it, going at 50 or 60 but quickly slowing before the blind corners etc. Since the highway code says to use your judgment about speed limits, so long as you stay under 60 and don’t cause an accident I don’t think you could get into trouble for it? Obviously it’s not exactly recommended tho lol
@@kaitlyn__L Good UK then, in Indonesia many people just decided to overtake others on a blind corner. When it turned out to be a frontal crash, those who did the overtake don’t admit their faults and just saying like “People who hit me should slow down when they see me overtaking someone”, or more embarrassingly, “Only God knows about when an accident will happen so we can’t do anything to stop it from happening.”
@@lucky360pride that last one sounds like a platitude my grandmother would say to a friend who was going “oh I should’ve stopped Ralph from walking under that ladder today” (bad omen) when they suffered a tragedy. Not an excuse for overtaking on a blind corner…
Explicitly, you can only overtake on a stretch of road with visibility to the point where you’d merge back in, and enough power available to do it promptly and safely. According to the rules at least. People are taught it so it’s still fresh in my mind from a few years ago, but there are lots of jerks abound who do those dangerous things anyway. I’d like to think I’ll never be so needlessly reckless for the sake of a few seconds of my time, but only time will tell I suppose.
@@kaitlyn__L exactly, but the problem is that there are so many people in Indonesia who do that. Not to add that we've a very judgmental society. There was an accident between a new Mercedes GLE (which costs around £95k in Indonesia) with an old Honda City (a smaller sibling of Civic, which the new ones only costs around £15k). Everyone just blamed the Mercedes and sued him even though it was Honda's fault (the Honda were driven on the opposite direction of the lane) just because there's a stigma which said that luxury cars are only owned by those who are arrogant and corrupt 🙄.
Talking about speed limit, 95% of the people just ignored it and even some hooligans just decided to drive around 50mph on an intracity roads (non highway!), and they all goes up to 100mph on the highway (even when the limit said 60mph). When a crash occurred they just said those only God know things or even worse they just blamed the road itself (like “The road is too curvy, this is our government’s fault to make it this way”!) 🙄. And most of them do that with a car that is very poorly built, I bet those cars can’t pass UK’s regulations (there are many of them that don’t even have an airbag!)
I remember in my childhood my parents drove in Denmark. The speedlimmits changed down or upwards 5kmh (3,1mph) every few 100 metres untill the drivers where at the speed required. 90, 85, 70, 65, 60 and so on. Ontop of that, Denmark is the only country I know of in Europe that has level crossings on their motorways and force their motorwaydrivers to stop for a red light.
All other European countries I've seen don't do the 5kmh changes in speeds. If you are driving at 90 and are about to enter a 50 zone you see the 50 sign in distance and have to slow down from 90 to 50 before the 50 sign. Also no other European countries makes their motorwaydrivers stop for a red light to enter a levelcrossing. Crossings are at diffrent levels, so no need for red lights.
Yes I haven't seen any 5 km/h interval of speed limits here in NL, it's drastic changes only (90 to 50 as you say).
They do it in germany in 10kmh steps (130-120-110-100-90-80). But it's only mostly used for construction sites on the Autobahn afaik.
How do you see the roadsafety when a diesel goes 70, a gasoline travels 110 and A hybrid (that are bad for the environment in a different way) at 140?
The 100 km limit makes my commute longer. Like i travel 260 km oneway. I AM really bored traveling at that speed. I could travel trough germany, cover 60 additonal kms and be home earlier.
I think on well maintained highways the speed limit could go up to 160km/h but I think in city centers and in densely populated areas there should be a separate zone limit from the regular city limit that's lower, something like 40 or 30 km/h and the regular one could go up to something like 60 km/h. I find that there are a lot of areas where the speed limit is caped at 50 where the roads could easily support more (and many people go over the speed limit in those places) and there aren't many houses around or generally any infrastructure. I think the speed limits should be updated more often and more accordingly to the surrounding area.
One way to avoid the average speed check: get a car older than 1978 with the old style blue plates and drive at night. The old blue plates aren't reflective like the yellow ones and the cameras can't make them out at night. They can during they day though, as well as on classic speed cameras and obviously if the police catches you, but it's still fun to know that there is a way out.
I don’t think I would want to go faster than 130 in a car older than 1978 🤣
@@Kerleem Oh trust me, there are plenty tasty classic sports cars that do that just fine. And quite honestly, on a big-engined old Volvo, Mercedes, Jaguar or BMW it doesn't even feel that fast or that different from a modern car.
@@Kerleem But I will admit, doing over 200km/h on the autobahn in a 1975 MGB GT V8 was pretty scary. 160 was fine though.
@@Kerleem "I don’t think I would want to go faster than 130 in a car older than 1978 🤣"
w wud dat b den?
I don't own a car so I don't drive a lot, but when I do I'm annoyed at the 100km/h limit. It seems very slow when you're on those long stretches of highway. And as you've pointed out, the cars and roads are more than capable of sustaining higher speeds so that makes it even more annoying.
I didn't know how slow 130 was until i started driving a Beetle 74' as my first car. If a Beetle can do 130 in wonky brazilian roads, 99% of the cars on the street are safe to go faster.
Hi may i advise you to the huge bike road network (this the mains reason why car is used sometimes by the people). The Netherlands has made a real investment into bike infrastructure. They are building if it not yet made bikeways . This a real difference in terms of local mobility. Maybe also give more information to your fellow americans about the law protection of bikers. The new version of rondabouts. The dutch people are really creative, like building a huge tunnel higway under the sea with some open air moments when you will the sea moving over your head on a bridge.
The highest uniform speed limit for highways is 140 kph in Poland. Almost all of the highways are two-lane, you can generally drive 10 kph above the limit without getting a ticket (it's tolerated) and yet the highways are the safest roads in - not really the safest in`Europe - road network of Poland.
Yeah, can't wait until they expand the network even further.
If anyone gets the bright idea to post speed cameras on them I vote to extradite them to North Korea next election cycle.
Can confirm Dutch drivers are amazing, especially their parking. uwu
I'm Irish and our driving is pretty alright, our parking may as well be a free-for-all Mad Max apocalypse though.
4:17 Who cuts across two or three lanes of traffic like that in a VW? That's a privilege to Audi drivers only ;P
No. Bmw-owners drives terribly.
@@swededude1992 difficult decision who's worse.
VW and Audi is the same corporation group so why not behave the same way?
There is a trend towards lower speed limits on urban multilane roads in Ireland due to local concerns regarding traffic noise as well as air pollution. The trick in driving these roads is to keep up with the prevailing traffic which often goes 10 or 20 kph ABOVE the posted speed limit. Especially when merging onto such roads it is wiser to enter at a high speed and merge into the traffic stream rather than enter at a slow speed and speed up later. Bad planning on one of these roads has put junctions less than 1km apart on a 3 lane system. This necessitates three lane changes in as many seconds for some routes. A crazy system but local drivers are aware of it and do not take umbrage to sudden lane changes for people needing to get to the appropriate lane on time.
It is my experience that both untypically slow drivers and untypically fast drivers are the cause of any accidents on this route. Another cause of near misses is when drivers spot a speed van and slam on their brakes in panic. This causes a chain reaction down the line of cars but also frustrates the vans intention of nabbing speeders since everyone now is jammed at a low speed. Rubber necking, the practice of slowing down too much on viewing something unusual on the road is also very common on Irish motorways, while annoying on smaller roads it can be fatal at motorway speeds.
Finally someone made video about Europe's superior sign design.
Driving in Europe and driving in NL or DE or IT or FR are not the same thing at all. I have lived in Amsterdam for the better part of 17 years. I can confirm, it is just plain easy to drive, in the sense that people pay attention, are sober, driving maintained cars on incredible roads. Drivers don't even know how the subtle influences of level sidewalks and the offset bicycle paths which my friend at @notjustbikes covers in detail, make their life easier. Hit the German border and the stress level increases immensely, due to seemingly unlimited speeds, especially on 2 lane stretches with a lot of truck traffic. Looking at you Osnabruck to Bremen. Go to Belgium and the road quality seems like ... well, rural Michigan in the early spring, in comparison. One of the things this RUclipsr did not mention is the lack of truck traffic away from the port of Rotterdam and its feeder highways. It plays a huge role in the different experience. In the Alps another skill set is needed and the Dutch vacationers seem, .... less well prepared. Go to central Italy or Spain and its another world of speed and recklessness. I too struggle with the 100 kmh speeds at moments, but I prefer that to G wagons blowing by at 180, TBH.
It's ironic that we still have speed limits implemented in 1960s...
when cars had bad tires, brakes, suspensions, stopping distance was over 200m, car handling was terrible, cars had no "crumple zone", etc...
There are couple of videos on TopGear where they test just that... The enormous difference between new cars and the old ones...
I agree!
I guess you need to take into account reaction time too though, at high speeds you’d cover a certain distance before even applying the brakes
@@Kefford666 I did... And besides, by 2024, all cars manufactured in Europe will have automatic speed limiter and automated braking... Yet, the speed limit is being reduced...
Spain is now implementing 30km/h in cities...
Here in Sweden the fines for speeding are quite high (IMO). I've been caught doing 65 kph in a 50 kph zone a total of 3 times having to pay 2400 SEK (around $285) each time. Also if you get caught doing more than 30 kph over the posted speed limit (or 20 kph in a 30 kph zone) you WILL lose your license for at least 3 months. This can also happen if you get caught more than 3 times in around a year. If you lose your license for less than 1 year you will automatically get it back after the time has elapsed, but if it's for 1 year or more you will have to retake your license all over again, including all steps.
Wasn't there also some system where if you have more money you pay more? Or was that from Norway?
@@Dionysus4776 IRC that was Sweden when ticket price is connected to how much money u make in previous year
As a belgian, I think a lot of our roads have reasonable speedlimits. The problem is that slapping a sign on a road doesn't slow down drivers. If you want someone to drive 50 in a 50, design the road so people can't drive faster than 50.
In Hungary, if the speed limit is below 100 km/h, you won't get a ticket for doing +15, if it's over 100, then +20 km/h is allowed by traffic cams. Plus you get 3 or 5 km/h for measuring tolerance. Plus if you use your GPS to check your speed, it'll be more accurate, so you can go a bit faster than what the in-built speedo shows.
All in all, you really have to drive like a madman to get a ticket, or if you're unlucky, you get caught in like a 30 zone for doing 50. And if the police actually stops you, the above mentioned tolerances are not count, you'll probably get a fine. But I've never seen anyone getting pulled out of traffic because of speeding.
On the contrary, I've been stopped once in the middle of the night, probably because it was too suspicious that I've been actually going 40 in a 40 zone. Of course, I've seen their car from a mile away...