THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, November 22, 1995 TAG: 9511220485
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: RALEIGH LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines
Highway speed limits won't change immediately in North Carolina, even if President Clinton signs a bill ending the national 55 mph speed limit.
First, state officials plan to determine where higher speed limits would be safe.
``We would not do anything without looking at safety,'' Transportation Department spokesman Bill Jones told The Charlotte Observer.
A spokesman for AAA Carolinas said limits probably can be safely increased as high as 75 mph on stretches of interstate highway that are in good condition, that are designed for faster traffic and that have low accident records.
Among the first possibilities are Interstate 40/85 near Burlington and I-85 near Gastonia.
About 600 miles of North Carolina interstates now have a 65 mph speed limit.
Limits also could go from 55 mph to 65 mph on rural highways that meet interstate standards, such as U.S. 74 between Charlotte and Asheville and U.S. 64 between Raleigh and Rocky Mount.
Higher speed limits would make travel easier for harried business people and leisure travelers alike, said state Rep. Cary Allred, R-Alamance, an advocate for raising speed limits.
``Life's getting shorter no matter who you are,'' he said. ``People who want to go to the beach for the weekend, they ought to be able to fly down there, fly on I-40.''
North Carolina transportation officials can raise interstate speed limits up to 70 mph. To raise them higher, or to raise limits on non-interstate highways, they need permission from state legislators.
Higher speed limits need to go hand-in-hand with better enforcement, said AAA Carolinas, which has 711,000 members, about 75 percent in North Carolina.
``If the limit is 75, we need to give tickets at 76,'' said Tom Crosby, an AAA vice president. ``The system will self-destruct if it's 75, and people are allowed to go 80 or 85.''
The AAA opposes raising speed limits on rural highways that aren't up to interstate standards.
``That would be a tragedy,'' Crosby said. ``Those roads are our killing grounds.''
In North Carolina, there were 340 speed-related traffic deaths on non-interstate roads with 55 mph limits, compared to only 61 on interstates in 1993, the last year for which figures are available.
The 552 speed-related fatalities that year made up about 40 percent of all traffic deaths, according to the North Carolina Governor's Highway Safety Program.
Safety officials fear that higher speeds will lead to more highway deaths, more than wiping out gains from crackdowns on drunken drivers and seat-belt use.
``We're already going too fast,'' said Joe Parker, the safety program's director. ``This raises the hurdle that much higher in terms of trying to combat the carnage.''
North Carolina traffic fatalities dropped from nearly 2,000 in 1973 to fewer than 1,400 in 1974 when the national 55 mph speed limit started. The death toll has hovered somewhere around that mark since, totaling 1,429 last year.
Allred doesn't believe the predictions.
``They drive me up a wall,'' he said. ``They make me mad as hell.''
He argues that better-built cars, not lower speed limits, have cut traffic fatality rates.
So it would be safe, he said, to raise the limit to 75 mph on several stretches of interstate and to 65 mph on many rural four-lane roads.
The repeal of the national limit is part of a highway bill passed by Congress this past weekend and sent to Clinton. The bill allows states to set any speed they want or no limit at all.
Congress first set the 55 mph national limit in 1974 to save gasoline during the Arab oil embargo and also to save lives. Congress agreed in 1987 to allow 65 mph on rural portions of interstate. by CNB