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Tragedy of the Commons: PCH Edition

Those wonderfully scenic, empty drives you see in car commercials? Don’t forget the small words at the bottom: “Closed course.” The reality, as described by an auto journo out in search of a good stretch to unwind a Porsche, is more often like this.

(thanks Ed)

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010 at 6:28 am and is filed under Etc.. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

7 Responses to “Tragedy of the Commons: PCH Edition”

  1. Dave in KY Says:
    June 2nd, 2010 at 7:47 am

    Recreational motorist doesn’t approve of the way other recreational motorists motor. News at 11.

  2. Brent Says:
    June 2nd, 2010 at 8:33 am

    I love how congestion enforces speed limits better than the police. I’m sure the man would have speeded the whole way down had the road been clear. I know the temptation, I’ve driven it too many times.

  3. Jonathan Says:
    June 2nd, 2010 at 8:53 am

    Good thing he had a radar detector.

  4. Paul Souders Says:
    June 2nd, 2010 at 10:48 am

    This would make an AWESOME bike ride. Passing Porsches stuck behind RVs would be icing on the cake.

  5. Josh R Says:
    June 2nd, 2010 at 2:28 pm

    I often refer to people who tailgate and pass unsafely on county roads as “Trying to chase down all those car commercials.”

    “If I can just get past this slowpoke, I’ll be in the clear!”

    “OK, if I can get past THIS guy I’m in the clear”

    “This one for sure, open road here I come…”

  6. Dbratland Says:
    June 2nd, 2010 at 4:57 pm

    When I lived in Germany, I found out the authobahn to be like that in most places: in theory you could go any speed. In reality the only time traffic was clear enough to go fast was in the wee hours before dawn.

  7. Adam Says:
    June 4th, 2010 at 12:59 am

    You don’t need to be a discourse analyst to see that to this guy ’speed limit’ means ‘ideal speed’. Pretty disgraceful from a supposedly responsible and knowledgeable auto journalist.

    Agree with Brent and Dbratland: congestion is an efficient enforcer of speed limits. It also nudges drivers onto other viable transport modes.

    Here in Seoul over the past year the city government has been narrowing a number of inner city streets, creating more traffic in order to create less traffic. It’s the sensible opposite of building more roads only to induce more traffic.

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Traffic Tom Vanderbilt

How We Drive is the companion blog to Tom Vanderbilt’s New York Times bestselling book, Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us), published by Alfred A. Knopf in the U.S. and Canada, Penguin in the U.K, and in languages other than English by a number of other fine publishers worldwide.

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