What is the legal speed limit in a Seattle arterial?

Is it Safe to Drive the Speed Limit?

• To make amens for my recent speeding violations, I decided to actually drive at or below the posted speed limit on my 50 mile route to an appointment. What happened? Exactly what I expected. In fact, I even responsibly recorded from dashboard via my digital camera, and wonder if it is admissible evidence in court, because the speed limit is supposed to reflect the 85th percentile speed, and it blatantly DOES NOT, not to mention the following: -NO other vehicle traveled at or below the speed limit, as in 0% of all drivers. -I estimated that at a given speed limit, the prevailing speed was greater than or equal to 10 mph, EXCEPT on the interstate where it probably around 7-8 mph. -I experienced unsafe following distances from ALL other drivers, even lorries or trucks on the highway when at a slight decline. -My speed was so excessively low (@ the speed limit) that in some instances other drivers were unsure what I was going to do. -Changing lanes on the highway was dangerous without accelerating to an appropriate speed of at least 75 mph, when it is a posted 65. -I was markedly less-interested in the task of driving, and found that I altogether was much more easily distracted. -It is an incredibly difficult and at times a dangerous proposition to not exceed the speed limit at any given time. Having to constantly accelerate, decelerate, apply the breaks, and check the speedometer while driving are all things that are unsafe while operating a vehicle. -Traveling remarkably slower than other drivers is unsafe, regardless of whether they are traveling at "perilous" speeds because of the speed differential that is created. If 10 divers are in proximity of one another, and 9 going one speed and 1 going slower, that 1 driver is creating a hazard.

• Answer:

  It takes some getting used to but it is really quite safe. I made the change about 30 years ago, mostly because I was tired of watching for police cars (I was driving a Lotus at the time), and after a couple years of sticking with it I would never go back to driving carelessly. One of the things I learned first (after a few months anyway) was to be unfazed by tailgaters. Driving the limit has one of two effects on them - they either figure out how to go around or they eventually back off. In 30 years I have never been "run over" or hit because I was driving the speed limit - although I have been hit twice when waiting at a traffic light and a stop sign. If you think about the logic of it, no action will improve your standing with tailgaters. Slowing down aggravates them and speeding up encourages them to "push" you harder. When you are going the posted speed most of them catch on (they are careless, not stupid) and accept that you are going the speed you will go. If you are already speeding they want to see how fast you will go. Sometimes in rowdy traffic I have had to accelerate to change lanes, but I had to do that when I was driving random speeds, too. It seems to be a fact of life on congested roads - you have to fit ahead or behind *somebody*. The big change, although it took about half a year of obeying the limit, was that I began hearing the little voice of intuition again... the one that says "watch out for that over there." It has saved me from a few nasty situations (one involved another vehicle spinning out a couple seconds after I slowed to get out of its buffer space) that I would simply have blundered into before. Once you get used to it you will be much more attentive, not distracted, because traffic patterns will finally make more sense. In all, the other drivers are creating the speed differential hazard, not you. You would not say you were creating the hazard if a bozo came along at 110 mph, would you?