, Columnist
Speed Limit on the Autobahn? It’d Be Great for the Planet
Slowing down can help reduce transport pollution. Electrification will help us speed up again.
Sorry speed freaks.
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Could Germans’ cherished right to drive as fast as they like on the Autobahn soon be outlawed? With the country’s center-left Social Democrats now leading the polls ahead of this month’s federal election, we shouldn’t rule it out: If voted in, they promise to limit motorway speeds to a maximum of 130 km per hour (81 miles per hour). Possible coalition partners, the Greens and Left party, also want a highway speed cap. 1
For libertarians and petrol-heads, not to mention the German engineers who spent decades building ever more powerful combustion engines, this would be hugely disappointing.