We calm down all the more since this measure will not be adopted. In any case, not under this five-year term and probably not under the following one.
I don’t know why, but in France, unlike many other countries, you can’t touch speed limits without creating a riot or burning up radars.
As in 2018 for the 80 km / h, a good three quarters of the French declare themselves hostile to measurement. And even a good majority among those who vote green! Instead of Yannick Jadot, I would drop the job to find a well-paid job at Total.
So the 110 would not pass the bar of a referendum and it is hard to imagine this government still traumatized by the yellow vests going to tickle them with a decree and signs. Even the 150 members of the CCC (citizen convention for climate) only adopted this proposal at 60%, compared to 90% for the others.
Last shovel of land on the coffin of 110 km / h, this measure would create no jobs, would not stimulate the economy – it would even slow it down – and cost the state between a quarter and a half billion a year shortfall in fuel taxes.
Exactly the opposite, a measure like the energy renovation of buildings would give work to tens of thousands of people, would generate billions of VAT and would revive the construction and public works like industry.
In addition, the proposal did not spark any outcry or petition.
Is 130 km / h well defended?
Let me be surprised: a real thermal renovation, whether it is an apartment building or an old house, costs the price of a new car per household if one is not satisfied to blow a little rock wool under the eaves. And it takes 10 to 20 years to amortize this expense on your energy bills. Not to mention the aesthetic horror that is the formwork of a pavilion in millstone, stone or brick.
However, this proposed obligation does not seem to make anyone cough.
Whereas losing 6 minutes per 100 km (and saving 1.50 to 2 euros per 100 km) is “with citizen arms, train your battalions”.
Surprising, isn’t it?
Apart from any personal opinion on the question, when I hear the arguments of opponents to 110, I tell myself that 130 km / h is very badly defended.
Let’s take a good look at it.
110 km / h in France, free speed in Germany, look for the error…
First, I hear everywhere that it would be useless.
Certainly not much: 20% less consumption over 20% of the kilometers traveled, it’s a 4% reduction in C02 released by our cars. However, these represent 53% of the C02 emitted by the transport sector which weighs – do you follow? – 30% of total emissions from France. If my calculator is correct, this gives a reduction of 0.6% in the total emissions of C02 rejected by our country.
You will say to me that it is a drop of water in a fire if we compare to air transport. Well, not at all: the plane in France, including Dom Tom and excluding international flights, represents 0.8% of the C02 emitted in France.
In other words, driving at 110 would be equivalent to eliminating three-quarters of our domestic flights.
But on the other hand, considering that France thanks to its nuclear power weighs only a small 1% of global emissions, two and a half times less than Germany and its coal-fired power plants, this 0.6% is a droplet, a spray on a global scale.
And to that of Europe, it would be really delusional to have to ease up with us to save one or two liters per cent when our neighbors across the Rhine would be free to consume five too many with free speed on their highways.
A carnage on the departmental?
Then comes the time lost. In real traffic conditions, we are talking about 4 to 8 minutes more per 100 km. Not negligible on a Paris-Lyon but not enough to ruin the economy or suffocate businesses.
And above all, I do not believe in the risk of a large shift towards the national and departmental and the carnage that would ensue. Admittedly, the time saved / cost ratio of the motorway would decrease a little, but we would remain far from the average 60 km / h which is painfully held when it is necessary to drive at 70, 80, 90 km / h, to hang around behind tractors and cross patelins whose center is more and more often limited to 30 km / h. When I skip the highway to satisfy my desires for landscapes, I know that I almost double my journey time.
In short, the postponement, I do not believe it. And we would certainly avoid it by imposing on concessionary companies a reduction in tolls proportional to that of speed on the grounds … of the least wear of bitumen and the sovereignty of the French people.
Do we fall asleep at 110 km / h?
Another argument raised against the 110, the aggravation of the risk of drowsiness which became nothing less than the first cause of fatal accident on highway.
It seems universally accepted that one falls asleep more easily at 110 than at 130 and that one is more concentrated when driving fast. If it were true, it would be the slaughter on the 4 Breton roads and motorways of most European countries where we circulate more or less at this speed. And the “free” portions of German motorways would not be three times more dangerous than those where speed is limited.
In fact, all the studies show that speed tires because of the increase in noise and vibrations, the running of the road and the management of the speed differential with heavy goods vehicles. All of this increases nervous fatigue, which makes you sleep with your eyes wide open.
The super concentration of which those who put the needle of the counter in the glove box boast, we keep it for an hour at the maximum before being seized by hypnosis of high speed then perfectly stupid.
Speed is a sensation, therefore by relative definition. Any Breton leaving Rennes behind him in the west experiences a strange sensation when he hangs 130 on the meter after weeks at 110. I even know some of those who hit the slings.
Still, the argument of better safety at 110 km / h does not weigh very heavy: 150 or 160 deaths on the concessioned network, or barely 4% of the road safety record.
The 110 because of the SUV?
After the treasures of diplomacy and objectivity deployed on these six paragraphs, allow me to give my opinion and with it, the opportunity to unleash you in the comments, like last time where you were particularly uh … demonstrative.
The 110 km / h on highway does not excite me, but if I had to vote, I would put a “yes” ballot.
Firstly, because no measure would allow such low costs – no costs in fact, and even savings at the pump – to obtain such a reduction in CO2 overnight. While we are talking about reducing the number of domestic flights, 110 km / h would be equivalent, I remind you, to immediately remove three quarters of them.
To be as effective, it will be necessary to form buildings and pavilions and then no longer eat melons north of the Loire or oysters 50 km from the sea.
Secondly, because this reduction is not absurd when 40% of the new cars sold in this country – the SUVs – have a club armchair sCx which is worth their overconsumption closer to the liter and a half than the liter between 110 and 130. When you pretend to drive fast – apart from German, almost no European hits 130 – you have the decency of a minimum of aerodynamics.
And finally, to put an end to the point of view that 110 or 130 horses – what the first 205 GTIs spat – is a minimum union to move decently in a Renault Clio or a Peugeot 208. When people ask me my opinion on a car purchase, I often hear that “all the same, only 90 horses, it will wind up on the highway and then we will have to downshift in the climbs”.
Slow down, no, never! Speed bumps, yes, again!
To conclude and further aggravate my case, I would add that I find it difficult to take seriously the refusal to slow down and the thirst for freedom of a people who accept without protest or break everything to have their vertebrae and shock absorbers smashed with foul speed bumps scattered even in the smallest residential area, the smallest street in the smallest village, most of them out of the ordinary, and almost all hatched at the request of the populo.
By the way, replacing these retarders with baffles would be another good way to reduce consumption and pollution.
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