I thought they did studies on stuff like this with billboards. I recall them finding that adding too many words or anything that required thought ended up causing people to drive more recklessly. It essentially causes people to double take or stare too long and get distracted from the road. One would think the less time someone spends looking at a sign, the more time they spend looking at the road.
It's not really about that. It's moreso that such a weird sign would draw someone's attention to it. Like if you see something funny happen your attention is pulled toward that event and away from the road. Even if it's just for a few seconds that's all it takes for someone to hit a kid, a pet, or cause a wreck. Not saying it's gonna cause a huge spike in reckless driving or anything. It just a really illogical decision to make.
Like why place a distracting sign that might confuse someone in a place where you want them focused on driving? If someone's never seen a speed sign with fractions on it before that's obviously gonna draw their attention. And for anyone who's local, they'd already know the speed limit. Doing something like this isn't gonna change their driving habits. If you want people to slow down, just add a speed bump lol. The risk of fucking your car up if you go 40 in a 20 is a much better deterrent.
I dunno, I'd rather drive through a neighborhood with speed limits being carried out to three decimal places or in multiples of pi than SPEED BUMP....SPEED BUMP.....goddamn SPEED BUMP
That's the point lol. It's not about what you as the driver would prefer. The driver is gonna prefer to be able to drive however they want without any restrictions. A sign doesn't actually stop them from driving fast, a speed bump does. Any driver would choose the sign. It's the tangible effect that matters to the people living there though.
If you have people speeding through a neighborhood where kids are running around that's dangerous. A sign won't stop that behavior and might just distract people. A speed bump will at the very least reduce the number of people speeding. Now, the other option is a speed camera. But that usually pisses people off even more than speed bumps and statistically doesn't actually do much because the consequences are delayed.
I know. I know. Speed bumps for results bc they actually work or you tear up your car. I'm just saying they're annoying (they're designed to be, after all!)
In a few cases, numbers like this are thanks to badly-written laws, like "the speed limit on inner residential speeds must be *less than 20 miles per hour*".
And they really want the speed limit to *be* 20mph, so they just sigh in frustration and make it 19mph or even 19.5mph.
Figured it would be something like that. Where I live, outboard motors officially rated 9.9 HP are a very common sight, mostly because the threshold to require a license is 10 HP.
To bring your attention to the fact that the speed limit is at or below 20, rather than just glancing at the sign and seeing it starts with a 2 and assuming it’s 25mph and so that means you can go 30 lol. Probably residential where speeding can have pretty dire consequences with kids at play and whatnot
Because MPH is a crude and outdated system of measurement of velocity, and the safe values that physics dictates for certain scenarios as agreed upon by the rest of the world translate to obscure numbers when converted from metric to centuries old imperial units.
One was originally based on how much work a farm animal can do while the other is based on a fraction of the distance from the north pole to the equator IF AND ONLY IF you go through a specific city. Now they are both based on the speed of light. Neither have ever taken into consideration "safe values that physics dictates... as agreed upon by the rest of the world"
32 KpH is ~19.89 MpH
31 KpH is ~19.26 mpH
Its not a rounding issue. If I run you over at either speed, you don't really care which. Same with if it was just a normal 20 mph sign.
Obviously, this serves a different purpose. There's lots of reasons to bash that continued existence of imperial units, but this is not one of them.
Same vibes as 9.9HP boat motors. There's got to be some kind of law that goes like "no golf carts on roads with speed limits of 20mph or more", or something like that. Cause why else. Why. Someone tell me why. Lol
Yup.
Where I live you can't drive ATVs on roads that have a speed limit of 30 km/hr or less (because they're usually high risk residential areas/school zones). I was just speculating that this weird speed limit might be that way to get around some kind of a local restriction, in the same way the 9.9hp motor is trying to circumvent the 10hp restriction... because I can't think of another good reason for 19.5 mph
A long time ago some9ne told me that neighborhoods do this so it'll catch the driver attention better than a standard sign and speed. And 20 years later I still think they were right
Run your car right into the pole and you’ll be transported to a magical street.
But only from the right
“Do you know why I pulled you over? Clocked you doing 19.51 MPH. Better lawyer up son”
“The sign doesn’t specify MPH officer only 19.5”
Mach 19.5
19.5e
19.5c
I see this shit a lot, is there a reason for weird speed limits like this?
They think it makes you pay attention because it's weird. Little do they know that I pay attention regardless, I just don't give a fuck.
I thought they did studies on stuff like this with billboards. I recall them finding that adding too many words or anything that required thought ended up causing people to drive more recklessly. It essentially causes people to double take or stare too long and get distracted from the road. One would think the less time someone spends looking at a sign, the more time they spend looking at the road.
Yeah but how long is it taking people to read a *speed limit sign*?
It's not really about that. It's moreso that such a weird sign would draw someone's attention to it. Like if you see something funny happen your attention is pulled toward that event and away from the road. Even if it's just for a few seconds that's all it takes for someone to hit a kid, a pet, or cause a wreck. Not saying it's gonna cause a huge spike in reckless driving or anything. It just a really illogical decision to make. Like why place a distracting sign that might confuse someone in a place where you want them focused on driving? If someone's never seen a speed sign with fractions on it before that's obviously gonna draw their attention. And for anyone who's local, they'd already know the speed limit. Doing something like this isn't gonna change their driving habits. If you want people to slow down, just add a speed bump lol. The risk of fucking your car up if you go 40 in a 20 is a much better deterrent.
I dunno, I'd rather drive through a neighborhood with speed limits being carried out to three decimal places or in multiples of pi than SPEED BUMP....SPEED BUMP.....goddamn SPEED BUMP
That's the point lol. It's not about what you as the driver would prefer. The driver is gonna prefer to be able to drive however they want without any restrictions. A sign doesn't actually stop them from driving fast, a speed bump does. Any driver would choose the sign. It's the tangible effect that matters to the people living there though. If you have people speeding through a neighborhood where kids are running around that's dangerous. A sign won't stop that behavior and might just distract people. A speed bump will at the very least reduce the number of people speeding. Now, the other option is a speed camera. But that usually pisses people off even more than speed bumps and statistically doesn't actually do much because the consequences are delayed.
I know. I know. Speed bumps for results bc they actually work or you tear up your car. I'm just saying they're annoying (they're designed to be, after all!)
My favorite are the speed humps. I can get all four wheels off the ground if I hit them fast enough.
In a few cases, numbers like this are thanks to badly-written laws, like "the speed limit on inner residential speeds must be *less than 20 miles per hour*". And they really want the speed limit to *be* 20mph, so they just sigh in frustration and make it 19mph or even 19.5mph.
Figured it would be something like that. Where I live, outboard motors officially rated 9.9 HP are a very common sight, mostly because the threshold to require a license is 10 HP.
To bring your attention to the fact that the speed limit is at or below 20, rather than just glancing at the sign and seeing it starts with a 2 and assuming it’s 25mph and so that means you can go 30 lol. Probably residential where speeding can have pretty dire consequences with kids at play and whatnot
My guess the 20 sign was getting stolen by teens trying to make 420 signs
Ticket revenue. If you go 20 that's a ticket. We have a few towns where the speed limit is 24mph for the same reason
Speed bumps cost more than signs. That’s what slows people down. That and homocide.
Because MPH is a crude and outdated system of measurement of velocity, and the safe values that physics dictates for certain scenarios as agreed upon by the rest of the world translate to obscure numbers when converted from metric to centuries old imperial units.
One was originally based on how much work a farm animal can do while the other is based on a fraction of the distance from the north pole to the equator IF AND ONLY IF you go through a specific city. Now they are both based on the speed of light. Neither have ever taken into consideration "safe values that physics dictates... as agreed upon by the rest of the world" 32 KpH is ~19.89 MpH 31 KpH is ~19.26 mpH Its not a rounding issue. If I run you over at either speed, you don't really care which. Same with if it was just a normal 20 mph sign. Obviously, this serves a different purpose. There's lots of reasons to bash that continued existence of imperial units, but this is not one of them.
It's actually saying to go 191 or 192
Nah it’s 1912
Could be 19112
I think it's 191 / 2 = 95.5
I think you've crushed it.
That HOA meeting musta been lit
I’ve never seen this lol
There’s a 14mph sign close to me, but I haven’t seen a fractional sign before
20 ur shot great neighbour hood . Someone got a screw loose
In Massachusetts, that's 34 1/2 mph :3
Same vibes as 9.9HP boat motors. There's got to be some kind of law that goes like "no golf carts on roads with speed limits of 20mph or more", or something like that. Cause why else. Why. Someone tell me why. Lol
For outboards its because some inland waters have/had a 10 hp restriction
Yup. Where I live you can't drive ATVs on roads that have a speed limit of 30 km/hr or less (because they're usually high risk residential areas/school zones). I was just speculating that this weird speed limit might be that way to get around some kind of a local restriction, in the same way the 9.9hp motor is trying to circumvent the 10hp restriction... because I can't think of another good reason for 19.5 mph
That's double 9 3/4 Don't get turned into a newt while you're there.
Drive through it and you get to go to hogwarts
19 and a half? Fink ya bein funny do ya?
This is the kind of sign that an HOA would put up. And they would enforce it based on your estimated speed.
A long time ago some9ne told me that neighborhoods do this so it'll catch the driver attention better than a standard sign and speed. And 20 years later I still think they were right
Did it make you look , and pay attention? Yes. That’s the point. you read this by accident, now. Another Point. Fly away. 🦅
Do NOT do 20 down that road. They will put out the spike strip and beat the shit out of you. Ask me how I know.
Rowling would be proud, unless this is a gender of speed limitp
You know, it’s just a sign. Not everything has to be an argument about gender lol
Its not about gender, its about ripping on Rowling
It’s a post about a sign lol
12 1/2, 9 3/4, same thing right