Your Speed Is. Perhaps you know what I’m speaking about? It is the little white speed/radar box that "the Man" puts by the side of the road to raise awareness with motorists to control their speed. Remember, the life you save may be your own."
I hate these little roadside public service announcement’s. Let me tell you why. I call it the HUBS factor. HUBS stands for Head Up Butt Syndrome and I think you’ll agree most people in traffic are acute sufferers.
Here is what happens to a HUBS sufferer when they see the Speed Awareness Device (SAD). They are doing 55 in a 50. The display reads 55 and they think, "that cant be right." So they remove their lead foot from the gas and check their speed. By now the car has decelerated due to the driver withdrawing their foot from the accelerator and the dial on the dash now reads 50, the speed they thought they were going. HAH! So they look back at the SAD to see that it now reads 48, due largely to the fact that they have not reapplied their foot to the accelerator yet.
This causes a cyclic response of checking the speedometer and the SAD while trying to reconcile the fact that there is a 2 to 5 MPH difference between the two, and will continue until the HUBS afflicted driver reaches a complete stop or has passed the SAD.
One single SAD can disrupt the flow of traffic for miles as HUBS afflicted drivers pass one by one never sure which is right the speedometer or the SAD.
Here is what I do… I know damn well that my car can slow down. I need not process the cycle that a HUBS driver would to find that out. It stops fine all day long. No need to test that. What I don’t often get the chance to do is haul ass. When I see a SAD, I forget about the speedometer on my dash, push the pedal to the metal and see how fast I can go before I pass the SAD. If you are good enough the yellow numbers will turn red and flash. Try it!
