Since January 7th, 24 U.S. and state highways in Southeast Texas have new posted speed limits of 75 miles per hour, rather than the previously posted speed limit of 70 miles per hour, according to a report released by the Texas Department of Transportation.
“It's an unsafe situation to have speeds that are set too slow because then you have people doing all kinds of different speeds. You want to keep everybody moving at the same speed and that's really a safety factor,” said Marc Shepherd with the Texas Department of Transportation.
Shepherd said the new speed limits are part of a statewide effort in reviewing posted speed limits of 70 miles per hour.
He said a group of engineers examine the roads and determine a safe speed that 85% of the population uses.
“All those signs are really doing is just reflecting what the speed of people typically are driving,” he said.
There will be outliers who travel faster than the posted speed limit as well as individuals who drive slower than the speed limit, Shepherd said, but most people drive a safe and reasonable speed.
Roger Schade, the owner of Diamond S Diner off U.S. 90 in China says he’s happy about the increased speed limit.
“Seventy was ok. Seventy-five is great. It actually brings more people down 90 so we get more business. Plus it makes it a shorter trip to Beaumont, so not as many people mind driving back and forth to China,” he said.
TxDOT has plans to increase more U.S. and state highways in the near future. When they finish, they will move on to FM roads.Speed limit increases on some Southeast Texas highways
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