LEGAL RESEARCH DIGEST

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) have created a "Speed Management Program" to develop a wide range of strategies to control or manage speeding of motor vehicles on the nation's highways. Motorists who exceed posted speed limits or drive too fast for road conditions are responsible for injuries, deaths, and massive property damage. A part of the Speed Management Program is to assess the effectiveness of "variable" speed limits in reducing crashes and fatalities. To that end, the National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP), managed by the Transportation Research Board, has a study underway to assess the impact of, and issues associated with implementation of, variable speed limits and to develop operational test plans for the most promising applications. In conjunction with that study, an examination of the legal issues that may arise from implementation and enforcement of variable speed limits is desirable.