A Modest Proposal III: Lower the Speed Limit

During a road trip years ago, I discovered an unsurprising fact: my gas mileage went up by 25% when I drove somewhere between 45 and 55 miles per hour instead of 65 or 75. The implications for climate change are pretty obvious: the marginal cost of driving faster is far greater than the gain. We can reduce emissions through nothing fancier than agreeing to drive at a still rapid pace of 55 mph. This isn’t the so-called “war on cars” (if it’s a war, the cars are still winning by a wide margin) — you still get to have your dinosaur juice-burning speed machine in this imaginary scenario. You just agree you can drive 55.

Every car has a bell curve of efficiency. Going very slow is inefficient, because of the ratio between the minimum burn of gasoline and the distance traveled. Going very fast is inefficient both because of the drag coefficient of the car and the excessive amount of gasoline required to turn the driveshaft at very high RPMs. Somewhere in the middle ranges of 35–55 mph is a sweet spot of maximum efficiency. Let’s all agree to drive that speed.

Yes, yes, I know — we’re all very busy. How on earth can we be expected to drive at such a glacial speed?

Well, let’s put the choice into simple terms. Which is more important — getting to happy hour two minutes sooner or buying every living thing on the planet an extra two minutes of life? That’s what is at stake. Most of the reasons we are impatient to get places are self-imposed and frivolous. There are better strategies for solving the problems that driving 10 mph faster solves, the simplest being: declutter our lives, fight the sense of dissatisfaction and anxiety at the source instead of giving in to its symptoms.

Excess speed has a more direct cost as well. For every extra 10 mph added to the speed limit, the number and severity of crashes increases. It’s worth a few thousand extra deaths a year. As with individual actions during the pandemic, we don’t draw a connection between my driving faster — after all I’m a safe driver — and people dying, but the connection is there. We could all choose to inconvenience ourselves imperceptibly and save some lives.

We just don’t want to.

Picture it, though, for just a second. Picture the person who was just crushed to death in a head-on collision with a Ford F-350 whose owner lost control when they swerved to avoid an unexpected slowdown in the road ahead of them. Picture that same person with their face full of life, instead of pressed motionless and bloody against their steering wheel. They’ve made it home that night, they’re greeting a loved one.

Now multiply that warmth and affection by billions and imagine the fate of every last one of the people in the world rested on your decision whether to peg the speedometer at 75 or 55. In some sense, they do.

Wouldn’t it be worth it to go 55? Wouldn’t it feel good?

We need to find joy in that instead of in the trivial pursuit of maximal transitory pleasures. Who’s with me?