My personal experience with the non-existing speedlimit on the German Autobahn
There’s currently – and again – a discussion going on in Germany about whether to enforce a general speed limit (“Tempolimit”) on the German Autobahn. I’m not going to argue for or against that general limit here – I’m all for it, though – but wanted to share a personal anecdote where I experienced that no speed limit was dangerous.
The setting is a pretty empty two-lane Autobahn as it might be the case on a weekend morning. Now, I drive a camper van1 and usually drive at a speed around 100 to 110 kph. Occasionally there’s a truck or otherwise slow vehicle to overtake, even for me. On a two-lane highway, I always get nervous. I take great care not to overtake after a hill or a corner, but if someone’s approaching at 200+ kph I still might not notice him2 until it’s too late. Because even when I make sure it’s all clear before I start the overtaking manoeuvre it might take a while at 120 to 130 kph. I can remember two occasions where vehicles came very close at high speed. And the drivers were furious – middle finger and all. I’m not quite sure if the situation was indeed dangerous, or whether that person simply wanted to teach me a lesson. But from my point of view, I couldn’t anticipate his car.
On a three-lane highway I’m not nervous, because you can pretty much rely on that everyone that’s super-fast is on the left lane and everyone else is on the other lanes – the lanes that I stick to – at a maximum speed at around 140 kph I’d say. That makes overtaking easy to predict and stress free for me in my slow (for German standards) motorhome. But I dread that almost empty two-lane no-speedlimit stretch.