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-   -   Overspeeding ticket for 60 kmph speed on a highway! (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/street-experiences/235087-overspeeding-ticket-60-kmph-speed-highway-3.html)

The Authorities, unfortunately, have the final discretion regarding enforcement of speed limits in their respective jurisdictions, be it 60 kmph or 40 kmph or even 30 kmph. And until and unless you are absolutely sure of seeing a speed sign board ( of what you maintain) within 100m , do not argue with them , as speed limits change even after 100m distance. And if you are not sure, do not argue as it is a futile exercise.

Unfortunately, unless you have your own muscle to pull, the Indian Police have punitive powers and are one of the least rational bunch ( which makes a nasty combination) and so do not waste your time . Pay the fine and buy the mental peace.

Since the highways regularly pass through settlements, one cannot contend the rationale of the low and varying speed limits.

It doesn't seem to be illogical for me.

Given the infrastructure here, we do have highways passing through villages, schools, or high people movement areas. For e.g. As others pointed out, the speed near toll booths is restricted to 20kmph or the Speed Limit on most flyovers (single flyover in Mysore) is 40kmph.

I do travel the Bangalore-Mysore-Madikeri stretch quite often. What I have observed is that there are signs to show the speed limits. It's just that we often don't take note of it due to its place/position/font (I have seen screen-printed banners showing the speed limits in some areas).

Don't know what you mean by "Highway"! Is basically a normal road by most standards, with dozens of small towns, villages etc and no known bypass or access control. I'm pretty sure there are speed limits all along except in long stretches of relatively unpopulated areas. Which is reducing by the day. Earlier you could cross Bylakuppe before you can bat eyelid. Now it's not.

Of course given our govt standards those boards may be worn off, poster covered or simply gone.

On top of that it's a hilly area.

Chances are cop is right.

This reminds me of an incident happened to me at the end of last year. I sold my old car and the guy who purchased the car told me that upon checking with RTO website, I had to pay an over speeding fine of RS 1500. I have checked that and it was true.

I was 100% sure that I was not over speeding in that location as it was a very narrow two line road but a so called National Highway in Kerala. NH 17, people from Kerala will know that.

I have enquired about it and to my surprise they told me that it was a 35kmph speed zone and I was doing 52kmph. How cool was that? That too on a national highway.:Frustrati

At the end I paid that.

Ever since, whenever I pass that stretch I drive at 30kmph and people used to look at me with that weird look when they overtake me.lol:

I think I know the place, its jus before Madikeri Town. Traffic police have been issuing speeding tickets here since ages. Its a known place. There is board just before the straight section which mentions at 40. Even after travelling so many times, I realize this just in time but if you are first time traveler or travelling once in a while you are sure to get caught. These are illogical, but then thats where the city limit starts, so unless they create a bypass it tough for both party.

I think here in India we people should start looking out for road signs. I would encourage the authorities to put up all signages where required besides the speed limits. I'll draw comparison with the west as they well organized about road safety & infrastructure.

In developed countries there are signages at every point where it is required and people follow the sign as applicable. This especially saves the headache of deciding who is allowed to go first and who has to stop and wait. Without proper signage and road rule awareness here, we just sneak our bonnet into the tight space at a congested intersection despite knowing or not knowing the fact that we are blocking the oncoming traffic and that bring everything to a stand-still.

Coming to your point, there can be speed limit signs on the highway, for many good reasons, eg. accident prone area, wild life, near construction area, sharp curve and many other good reasons unknown. The good thing about speed limit in west is that it also provides a signage for where the speed limit area ends so you can go back to normal highway speed limit of that province.
Here in India since we have highways passing through residential and commercial areas it is apparent that there could be speed limit signage and 60 Kmph speed limt area is understandable. Unfortunately even if there is a speed limit sign, there is no sign of where the speed limit ends.

It all boils down to HABIT. In the west there is very good infrastructure of road and signage at every possible point and people follow it religiously else they end up with a ticket or could lead to an accident because they follow the signs blindly (Yes they do and it scares me a bit too but seems everyone follows the signage so no need to worry). Let’s say they are habituated to look out for road signs. But here road infrastructure is poor and there are barely any signage and very few of them placed are without any logical sense. (I saw some a few GIVE WAY sign placed in Delhi near Gurgaon border at a straight road with no intersection or any place for people crossing). I wonder how many of us has even noticed one GIVE way symbol around town. So with not much signage around, people are habituated to not look for signage and miss the one that might pop up out of blue.

So answering your three questions:
1. Yes 40 kmph Speed limit on highway is a valid one for many good reasons. Especially in India where the highway passes though towns and villages.
2. Yes there are deviation to speed limit. Near school and children play area, the speed limit could go down to 20 kmph or 30 kmph. You have to literally STOP if there are children getting in or out a school bus in front of you or across the road it it’s a two way lane. That’s the international law.
3. I can’t help you here much and don’t see any productive outcome given how the authorities work, but I don’t want to discourage you as it would be very good if something good comes out of it and it only improves and creates awareness about road safety.

Salute you for taking the ticket for the correct offence. We need many more people like you to make this country developed.

In Canada the road infrastructure is very good but the highway speed limit is capped at 100kmph. Only a vey few stretches have 120 kmph if I am not wrong. Most highways in US too is 60 mph. So we shouldn't be asking for much given the erratic condition of the road quality, as it will be compromising with road safety.

Unfortunately there should have been a speed limit sign irrespective of a flyover or not, if there is a change of speed required then the authorities have to place a signage. This can be challenged and this could probably pass on a message to authorities that the signages are a must.

Unfortunately the authorities themselves don't have much knowledge about road safety so nothing much will improve. Education is important and some of the authorities should be sent abroad to study road safety and they should start teaching within the institution first in a structured way and then implemented on the ground and to the public, but there is nothing much happening on this front so there isn't going to be much change in future.

Actually I think most of us already understand the problem but are virtually helpless to do anything about it. There is absolutely nothing wrong about enforcing a proper speed limit, but why are we so poor at implementing it?

This just shows that the police is only interested in making money. It reminds me of 2008 when I was living in Bangalore and had a Bajaj Discover. The cop at Jeevan Bima Nagar Police Station made me stop and pay a fine for not wearing a helmet, which I had actually forgotten. But the game here was that armed with a traffic fine receipt now, I can roam around all of Bangalore without helmet..Safety eh?? rl:

I mean.. for a flyover slope of 300-400 metres or more, what sense does it make to slow down below 60 kmph? It seems as though here the best scenario would have been to not slow down by much, dodge them and vanish, lol:

How many cars can the cops really catch in one day below that flyover? Wouldn't they need help from NSG commandos if they had to attend to every car?

I'm all for speed regulations. Not only do they help reducing accidents, it also helps in fuel efficiency.
But there should be proper and sensible speed limits placed. There should be gradual drop in speed, not sudden. I've seen speed limit drop from 80 or 90 kmph, to 20/30 kmph on NH44 stretch. There is a downhill section on NH44 where it is pretty hard to maintain 45 kmph due to steep decline. And there is always a speed detection vehicle placed to check over speeding.
In a way its good, there is a change that I observed, people are driving within the range.

With expanding city limits and highways becoming city roads within city limits, drivers need to keep an eye on the speed limit boards. I had an experience when i was at 60 kmph and had to pay a fine as it was in city limits and after this checkpoint where I was stopped the speed is 80kmph.

The same thing happened with me two weeks back. While travelling from Himachal to Punjab, when I was covering the stretch between Una and Nangal, I was constantly maintaining a speed of 70-75 kmph as it was proper straight highway with very minimal traffic. The speed limit in highways as such is usually 80 kmph and I was maintaining a speed south of 80.

I was stopped by an interceptor for overspeeding and was told that the speed on this stretch is 60kmph. There was no mention of it on road side anywhere. Still paid a fine of Rs.400 and carried on with my journey.

After this I was left wondering-

How can we ascertain the speed limits of any particular stretch if there is no mention of it on any signs?

Is there anything in Google maps or any other related apps to provide this infor constantly during a drive?

On many highways I have seen one signboard will show the limit as 80 but barely after 500 mtrs there is another sign board with speed limit is 40 or even 30 may be, without any apparent reason (no population, no turns or intersections). In this scenario is it safe to reduce your speed when all other vehicles are going at 80-100?

Google Maps has pulled out Speed Camera alerts for a while now. On Android Auto, Google Maps doesn't even show the Speed Limit! Waze does and also alerts (at least a few months ago) you of speed cameras but then nothing really beats Google's database.

So here is my best solution so far - Radarbot. It is a paid app which auto-launches when my phone connects to the car's bluetooth. It runs in the background and play speed-camera alerts over the car speaker while I am navigating. Fairly accurate and updated database.

Greetings,
Expert opinions please.
E.g: On a highway if there is a speed limit of 40KMPH. Upto what distance we need to maintain the speed limit? Is it few meters or upto 1 KM? Or upto what distance?

Many a times I have seen the speed limit boards from 80, 60, 40, 20 within a few feet distance from each other.

And yes I do get stared upon or sometimes yelled at for maintaining the speed limit of 40KMPH especially in city limits.

Needless to the signboards are hap-hazardly placed or vandalized and we pay the price in the form of fine!!!

I'm not getting this feature on Google Maps even with an updated app. :unhappy

Pretty sure the govt would've asked Google to stop that service. It will reduce revenue if widely adopted.

Speed cameras are placed at locations which are relatively open and free and not in accident prone zones. The entire intention is for revenue generation and not for improving safety.

Just imagine if the cops installed these speed cameras at accident prone zones with Google covering their locations in maps. Pretty sure that accident rates will come down drastically.

We live in one of those countries where money > human life.

The speed limit for flyovers and bridges is valid. There have been numerous accidents of vehicles losing control at the curve. Many times it's the poor to pathetic design, in some cases the space constraints, end up with poor designs.

Wildlife, accident-prone spot or stretch of road are valid reasons to contain speed. I am against such sudden change of limits without clear, advance signage. If a tiny round speed board is sticking somewhere on a stretch of 5kms, that's BS. The sign should be as clear as how the Toll payment signage are, cannot miss them can we? Put up such boards and then fine those breaking the limit. Till then they have NO Business fining the motorists.