A Thing of the Past

Reading through the last article about print news being part of history it reminded me of something else that has recently changed. Varying speed limits on highway 270 is something that has appeared within the last year. What happened to regular signs that just say "60" on them. How annoying to see the digital signs that are always changing. For me, it seems to be a major scheme put in place by the police department. Seeing that the economy is the way that it is, everyone, even cops, need more money. By putting these varying speed limits in place it was supposed to improve traffic flow during high volume times. It seems to me that it's just more of an opportunity to catch the average driver who has no idea the speed limit has dropped instantly from 60 to 45. Apparently in other cities this idea has been a success. Needless to say, St. Louisans are in a hurry and couldn't care less about the drop in speed limit. I find amusing the game that us drivers play during morning and evening rush hour. As I make my way to school in the morning and see the first lit up sign reading "55" I know that the battle has begun. It almost seems as though when drivers see those signs they want nothing to do with slowing down and in fact they speed up. It is quite obvious that no one is truly obeying these variable limits. It's almost as if, as drivers, we have made a pact to ignore the change. We have decided that we will all continue to drive 60, 65, 70 or whatever we want. We know that the cops cannot pull over the entire highway so really what are they going to do if we are all speeding? Keep this in mind the next time you are on 270. See how many people actually abide by the changing speed limits. I can assure there are not many that do. Here is an article put out by MODOT that is attempting to explain why these signs were put up. Variable Speed Limits on 270
Here is a link to a picture of the infamous changing speed limit sign