>>>>>Had no idea a Prius would go that fast! ...
>>>>
>>>>Indeed, 100 miles/h would be about 160 km/h. I start feeling uncomfortable when I am at around half this speed (i.e., 1/4 the potential energy!). But then, of course, our highways here are probably not so convenient for speeding.
>>>
>>>100 mph isn't difficult for a lot of cars but I don't know if you are familiar with the Prius - it is a hybrid gas/electric and some people claim they lack power. This is going to boost sales <s> ( which should please environmentally friendly Al Gore !)
>>
>>Thanks - I didn't know that, so some of the messages in this thread weren't clear to me.
>>
>>However, quite often the question is not so much, how fast the car can go, but rather, can it stop on time. The old car I use can easily make quite a lot more than 70-80 km/h (50 mph), but (at least on our roads here) that is simply too dangerous.
>
>The roads here and in Europe are pretty good and some roads could certainly be driven safely faster than the posted limits by a lot of the cars on the road. ( my car - the Cadillac STS -is popular in Germany on the autobahn because it is comfortable at 200 kph but the top speed limit on US highways is under 120 kph. ) And on these highways maneuverability and stabilty at high speed are really the issues, since there isn't much call for stopping.
>
>Of course a lot of our drivers are unsafe at any speed <s>
>
>I have spent a lot of time in places where roads in the rainy season were pretty impassible and in the dry season were very strangely shaped and rattled your teeth at 20 kph <g>


Have you ever driven through Big Sur? IIRC the speed limit in some spots is 15 mph, and you don't even want to exceed it. The view makes it worth it, though. You realize why some Californians wouldn't live anywhere else.