Pennsylvania lawmakers debate turnpike speed limit

PITTSBURGH — A state lawmaker should apply the brakes on his plan to raise the state's top speed limit on highways and the turnpike to 70 mph, some traffic safety and trucking industry experts said.

Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati, R-Jefferson, is seeking co-sponsors for a bill he wants to introduce that would raise the maximum speed limit from 65 to 70 mph on interstate highways and the Pennsylvania Turnpike, his spokesman, Casey Long, said on Friday.

"It's not a novel concept. Pennsylvania is one of the few states left in the country that has their maximum speed limit set at 65," Long said.

Raising the speed limit would improve traffic flow and delivery of goods throughout the state, Scarnati said in a prepared statement.

There are 37 states, including Ohio and West Virginia, that have speed limits of 70 mph or higher on some portion of their roadway systems, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety in Arlington, Va.

AAA East Central, which is based in East Liberty and covers five states, supports Scarnati's plan.

"When maximum speed limits are correctly set and applied, they improve motor safety, mobility and respect for the law," spokeswoman Theresa Podguski said.
Not everyone is on board.

Increasing driving speed increases fuel consumption and costs, said Frank Zbuckvich, general manager of McClymonds Supply & Transit, a Portersville-based company that transports scrap metal in 25 states.

"Plus, you have too many other distractions with people out there with cellphones, texting. It's going to make the accidents so much worse," said Zbuckvich, board secretary of the Camp Hill-based Pennsylvania Motor Truck Association's Southwest Chapter.

Congress withheld federal funding from states that did not enact a maximum speed limit of 55 mph in 1973 because of oil shortages, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. In 1995, Congress repealed the maximum speed limit.

That year, Pennsylvania raised its speed limit to 65 mph on the turnpike, interstate and noninterstate expressways, PennDOT spokesman Rich Kirkpatrick said.

No conclusive link was established between the higher speed limit and fatalities, he said.

A decline in crashes nationwide and car designs capable of handling higher speeds are reasons Scarnati cited for his proposal.

The number of vehicle crashes in Pennsylvania declined to 124,092 between 2003 and 2012, according to PennDOT data.

Crashes on interstates increased about 4 percent to 9,235.

The number of speed-related crashes in Pennsylvania declined by about 19 percent to 32,220 between 2003 and 2012, but fatalities in those speed-related crashes declined by just 4 percent, to 534.

Scarnati noted that his speed limit proposal would not require that speed limits be raised but would allow them to be changed based on traffic studies conducted by PennDOT and the turnpike commission.

Traffic safety experts said raising the limit won't cut down on the number of drivers who exceed speed limits.

"If you move (the speed limit) to 70, people will go 75. … People are still going to push those limits," said Louis Pesci, director of Indiana University of Pennsylvania's Highway Safety Center.

This article was written by Channel 11's news exchange partners at TribLIVE.

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