Lower speed limits could be actually endangering lives....

[Gadget]

Commercial Aircraft have had TCAS (Total Collision Avoidance System) for a couple of decades. It tells one plane on the same altitude and crossing paths with another plane to climb and it tells the other to drive until they are clear of each other.

With GPS/GLONASS and WIFI we could have vehicles deliberately avoiding each other.

[atoyot]

Commercial Aircraft have had TCAS (Total Collision Avoidance System) for a couple of decades. It tells one plane on the same altitude and crossing paths with another plane to climb and it tells the other to drive until they are clear of each other.

With GPS/GLONASS and WIFI we could have vehicles deliberately avoiding each other.

and look how fast they fly! It must feel strange with these new fangled cars that can park themselves, and I saw the other week some guy hacked a jeep and managed to steer it, but how weird would that be on a bike! I had a pillion sit up through a 100 corner once (mph), and when we stopped, I gave him an uppercut for doing that. Imagine what it would feel like if all of a sudden, your bike counter steered to get you out of trouble!

Seriously though, technology will come up with more aids to make driving and hopefully riding more safe, so we really need to keep open minds. I've got an app on my phone that alerts me to "squarks" from planes all over the world, and it is interesting to see how many occur and how many actually result in emergency landings. I just watch the vapour trails in the sky above our place and marvel that there are'nt any headon's in the sky, touch wood.

Just imagine that it was as easy to get a pilots licence as it is to get a drivers licence....what sort of carnage would we then have in the air!

[STeveo]

Wouldn't be in the air, it would be a crumpled mess on the ground.
Don't forget that the air has traffic controllers who are (hopefully) watching every move and directing any who wander off course. Just wouldn't be practicable on the ground with the amount of vehicles, but a nice thought.

[atoyot]

But in terms of speed, I wonder if it's in the realms of possibility of systems that would give the green light to sit on a higher speed, assuming things like weather, road conditions, other traffic detected, etc. The techs probably not too far away for it to be a possibility...

[Gadget]

TCAS tech is decades old. So with modern processors and wifi systems it would be easy. I Iike the addition of weather conditions.

[Sicman]

My work covers 3 NSW highways intersecting at West Wyalong - Newell, Mid Western & Goldfields Way. We get a lot of motor vehicle crashes in this area due to fatigue, driving with poor health, loss of concentration, and occasionally drivers speeding. The drivers leave Melbourne, Adelaide, Sydney & Brisbane and get to around about here, and crash due to the above factors.
About 3 years ago the NSW gubberment reduced the speed on the Newell Hwy to 100 from 110kms/hour. The net result was no crashes for our area but Narrandera area to the South, and Dubbo area to the North, seeing an increase in their motor vehicle crash workload.
Then 2 years ago the gubberment decided they would put the speed limits back to 110kms/hour again in 90% of the Newell Hwy.

The Result -    Narrandera and Dubbo's motor vehicle crash workload dropped off and our workload increase again. 
110kms/hr allows drivers on big trips to push further along their journey meaning they get to West Wyalong area before crashing.
Reduction of the speed limit to 100kms meant they only got to Narrandera or Dubbo areas before crashing.
  The motor vehicle crash rate didn't reduce with the lowering of the speed limit - It just changed the place where the motor vehicle crash was going to happen 
 

[atoyot]

The pollies are so stupid when it comes to rules like these! When the answer is so obvious; they just need to move Melbourne, Adelaide, Sydney and Brisbane closer together, so that the "sweet spot" for few accidents is in the middle! Dumbarses!

Maybe a tiered speed limit system would actually work, say the biggest have the slowest max, but the smallest the highest, with cars in the middle. Wouldn't be hard to enforce methinks half seriously!

[Brock]

Raise the speed to 130, then the problem will move the other side.
 

[atoyot]

TCAS tech is decades old. So with modern processors and wifi systems it would be easy. I Iike the addition of weather conditions.

When you really think about it, infrared, radar etc might be possible as well, but the convergence of these technologies are a great potential. Driverless cars, riderless bikes... :oyikes, maybe going a bit far there...

but when you look at the tech used now by Subaru et al for collision avoidance, it wouldn't be that hard to extend the tech to actually work for us