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Contact Jim: jdipeso@rep.org (253) 740-2066 / 2008 Archive / 2007 Archive / 2006 Archive / 2005 Archive
Ready for Return of the Double Nickel?
August 6, 2008
Go on and write me up for 125
Post my face, wanted dead or alive
Take my license and all that jive
I can't drive ... 55!
-From "I Can't Drive 55," Sammy Hagar, 1984
From its birth during the grim days of mood rings and the OPEC oil
embargo, the 55-mph national speed limit experienced an unhappy
existence -- reviled by drivers and ignored more often than obeyed.
Fighting 55 was an easy sell for state politicians, especially Western
governors presiding over rural states where long drives through empty
country are part of everyday life. In 1987, when Congress allowed
states to raise the limit on rural interstate highways to 65 mph,
several did. In front of motorists egging him on, Nevada's
then-Governor Richard Bryan personally switched out the hated double
nickel on an I-80 speed limit sign outside Reno. Bryan, a Democrat,
topped off the photo op with imprecations against what he called East
Coast speed limits. And a good time was had by all.
Eight years later, the national speed limit was euthanized by the 104th
Congress and 55 vanished from the nation's consciousness. Twenty
somethings who hear Hagar's song on the radio today may be excused for
wondering what the old rocker was screaming about.
But maybe not anymore. With high gasoline prices, the old idea has been
dusted off. Senator John Warner, R-VA, has asked the Department of
Energy to study whether reimposing a national speed limit would make
sense as a way to bring short-term relief from high fuel prices.
Warner's letter to Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman quoted a
Congressional Research Service study estimating that the double nickel
cut national petroleum consumption by about 2 percent.
Warner's letter said that once a car's speed increases beyond 60 mph,
every 5 mph above 60 amounts to an extra 30 cents per gallon in fuel
costs.
Warner asked Bodman to figure out what speed would be the most
fuel-efficient in today's cars, estimate the total fuel savings that
lower speeds would yield, and determine whether the savings would bring
price reductions.
The retiring senator emphasized that he is looking for short-term
relief. More domestic oil production and development of alternative
fuels are long-term fixes that won't do much to bring prices down
anytime soon, he pointed out.
"We must be straight with the American public and not raise hopes that
these (long-term) efforts will provide immediate solutions and possible
relief," Warner wrote. The overheated partisan rhetoric coming out of
DC shows, however, that Warner's more verbose colleagues are not
heeding his cautionary advice.
But back to the main point of his letter ... would reinstating a
national speed limit lower demand for oil? There is evidence that
drivers are responding to high prices already by cutting back on
driving and packing themselves onto transit for the daily commute.
Thirsty SUVs are sitting unwanted on dealer lots, a '90s fashion
statement done in by practical economics.
Warner's questions to Bodman are straightforward inquiries about
physics, auto engineering, and economics. Getting answers to them would
be useful. But dicier social questions unmentioned in Warner's letter
bear examination. Would a national speed limit be welcomed by drivers
stressed by high fuel costs? Or would it stir up the old resentments
expressed in that '80s rock song and foster a culture of evasion? Those
questions are worth pondering too.
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