Speeding Story

If you live around the Frankfurt region....you might know of the two speeder-accidents from the past month.   In both cases.....pedestrians were killed within the city limits, and it's strongly believed by the police that speeding (depending on where you are in the city, it's either 30 kph or 50 kph....meaning 18.5 mph or 31 mph) killed the folks.

In this case from Saturday night...police now have 50 different witnesses coming up and all report that the driver was going greater than the normal speed.  

So this last incident has triggered two topics that drivers hate with passion.

First, the city is talking about more blitz-cameras (the speed cameras).  I don't think they are suggesting a mere dozen additions.....you might be looking looking at dozens of these set-up around the city.

Second, the city authorities want to have a discussion about the catalog of fines.  This means they want speeders to pay a price of exceptional value when caught within an urbanized area.  The talking point right now?  At a certain speed, you go to a permanent loss of your license.  Where this occurs?  Unknown.  It wouldn't surprise me if this were set at 50 kph over the speed limit.  It also wouldn't shock me if they said a three-year loss of the license for speeds of 30 kph over the limit.  

So all of this brings up the topic....when did this high-speed racing start to be a problem in Germany?

Typically, at least in the 1980s....if you wanted to go and take your car on a high-speed run....you'd go to some local racing track.  You'd pay some entry-fee, and get five to ten laps to get the thrill out of your system.

If you follow the news....this mostly seems to be a problem from the past twenty years....centered exclusively on young men...and following along some trend that you started to notice around 2000 with customizing of cars.  At least once or twice a year...the news media will center on this and discuss these car modifications (some illegal).  Its become a money-pit for some guys to dump cash into.  

The sad thing about this trend now?  If you went around and added forty blitz-cameras to the city, you could be talking about regular people being affected, and easily having most everyone giving the city 300 Euro a year for their minor infractions.  

(note: I average about 40 Euro every two years on blitz-cameras myself and I'm not much of an aggressive driver)