American here, in practice no. They are generally only the upper bound for dense neighborhood streets, throughout most other roadways you will be considered a poor driver if you go lower than the speed limit.
To me, that seems like the city is entrapping its citizens to make up for a lack of revenue, when the data clearly shows the speed limit should probably be adjusted. But no, they move to develop a lottery system to send the infractions.
The only reason for the speed to trend downwards is the increasing threat of a ticket from an automated system that cannot be reasoned with. A real cop generally isn't going to ticket me for going 5, maybe even 10 over a posted 40MPH zone unless they fished me for something else during the the stop. Flow of traffic is everything.
The cameras in Ontario issued an order of magnitude fewer tickets than yours. The highest volume cameras issued about 100 a day.
The lottery system they're building to support the capacity issue is going to calculate weights based on the most egregious speeders, which I guess is nice...
The problem is a cultural one. Most people interpret a speed limit of N as "I should go N+10" (or something like that). If we remove speed limits, the majority of people would end up driving at unsafe speeds. People will always break speed limits unless they are set at that unsafe level.
[[citation needed]]
I would be totally fine fine with speed limits being actual, enforced, no wiggle room limits, IF the actual limits were reasonable in the first place. This would mean most interstates outside of built up areas being posted at 80-90mph, say .
(particularly section 2 "Limitations of the 85th Percentile Rule for Setting Speed Limits")
I'll admit that "the majority" could be an overstatement, perhaps I should have said "enough people to be dangerous"
I come from the position that on a dry, well-maintained, and straight road, with no traffic, I think even 100 mph is a safe speed. I assume people like you that even consider 80 mph to be unsafe are assuming there's significant traffic on curved roads that might not have the best maintenance. I also assume you're driving a large truck or SUV which has abysmal handling, whereas I'm used to the tighter handling of my Subaru BRZ.
Generally, I don't think speed causes crashes, it just makes crashes worse. So if I'm coming from assumptions above, then crashes basically won't happen.
Add some traffic? Then the safe speed depends on their discipline. Are drivers keeping right except when passing? Or is some asshole playing "traffic cop" and camping the left lane at the speed limit, or even below it?
Make roads narrower. Add more bends and lateral shifts. Plant trees along the road to obstruct sight lines. Build roads so that only speeds below the speed limit are safe on them and people will travel below the speed limit.
If if the conditions actually require it, that’s when I brake. Not because a sign told me too when I may not actually need to. I feel that’s probably the most economical option.
You can slow people down by making lanes thinner, adding in-road obstacles or chicanes, removing road markings to take drivers out of their complacency and get them actively thinking, and at the slowdown at the end of a road, using tightly packed lines or rumble strips to give the impression of speed, to which they naturally react by slowing down. You also stagger junctions, and put in bends, rather than have a fast road run directly onto a slow one (or vice-versa) and then say to yourself "WELL, I DID MY PART, I MADE A NICE FAST ROAD SLAM RIGHT INTO A SLOW ONE, AND IT'S ENTIRELY ON THE DRIVERS TO NOTICE THAT STOP SIGN AND SLOW DOWN IN TIME. NOT MY PROBLEM IF THEY DON'T"
Naturally, if you do the opposite, and build a wide, long, straight road with few visual indications of how fast people are going, even the most conscientious will likely zone out and start unintentionally speeding up. It's simple human psychology.
You can't be like "human psychology's not a thing, I'll judge every single human like they're completely omniscient and perfectly rational", because there are millions of people who unintentionally do things they don't rationally want to do, every single day, because they were psychologically manipulated. Use road design to manipulate them into doing the right thing, rather than manipulate them into doing the wrong thing and then directly take money from them. That's a dark pattern.
This is not remotely close to entrapment.
Indeed, nothing forces, but road designs really strongly suggest through the use of psychology. The mafioso didn't force you to be a drug mule when he said he'd murder your family if you didn't. The website didn't force you to let them sell your data when they put in giant bold letters "AGREE AND ENTER" and in 5 point grey on grey "decline" -- after the website's owners ran multiple rounds A/B testing to see what was most effective at getting people to click the option that gives them free money. They didn't force you, it's all your choice buddy. You feel tricked or conned? Like you were carefully goaded into making a choice against your best interest? Well, you shouldha read the small print, sucker!
Anyway, I don't think these things are "entrapment" (meaning the police coerce you into breaking a law you wouldn't otherwise have broken), but they are sketchy, especially if the organisation in charge of enforcement also gets a cut of the fines.
Your example reminds me very much of Brookside, Alabama, where the tiny town's police department did everything in its power to bilk passing motorists for its own private enrichment. https://reason.com/2026/10/01/judge-preliminarily-blesses-1-...
> Brookside "recognizes" that its "policy of aggressive policing," which "prioritized generating revenue for the department's expansion," "likely interfered with the Town's obligation to administer justice equally under law," "undermined the public's trust in the justice system," and "raised serious constitutional concerns under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment."
Uh, yeah it is? This is literally textbook coercion through threat of murder. I'm not sure how this is relevant to people who don't pay attention to speed limits and speed, though.
Also, the example in your linked article isn't even related to speed limits:
> According to the lawsuit, Coleman "was following three or four car lengths behind" her boyfriend's car. But Sellers claimed she was "tailgating." He also claimed to smell marijuana, which supposedly justified ordering Coleman out of her car and handcuffing her.
You keep designing deadly streets and roads that encourage speeding, you keep producing and marketing bigger and bigger more dangerous vehicles... Ads about power and speed... And then turn around and blame people as being solely responsible?
No, the overall system is a direct cause of crashes and deaths as well.
At the societal level these things are numbers games. If you don't want people going 60 on a road don't build a road where normal conditions cause that to be a comfortable and safe speed.
I remember twenty years ago flying into someplace in Florida and finally getting my rental car on the road at 2 AM. At a certain point I was on what was, to me growing up in New England, the equivalent of a divided six-lane highway.
I open up because no one the was on the road, and immediately get blue flashing lights in my mirrors.
Turns out this "six lane highway" was considered the equivalent of a back alleyway and the speed limit was 35.
Agree that the lottery is silly though. I would give people a free hit a year. You get a warning saying, this one is free if you don't break the limit again. If you do, pay both fines.
Also index the fines to income.
We can kill speeding. It's just a matter of resolve and time. It'd save a lot of lives.
"Quiet down you gangly bunch of blowhard bollards!"
That just felt satisfying. If I could channel John Cleese (the indignant version of course), the above line would be perfect.