Torontoworker

Back from vacation, back to the land of slowness...

shinrai

I was over there for a work assignment for a year. Always had rental cars. Rental car company sent me a bill for ~10 photo tickets at one time. Miss that place.

Ronan

I know the feeling. Also, getting used to the randomness of lane changing here is fun

69gaugeman

How much did that cost? What was the speed limit?

Topaz330ci

Slowness is right! Slow pace/motion country! Snails everywhere....

Torontoworker

$250 Can per day - 200km's allowed per day - $1Euro per extra Km over the 200km's. Company was Avis Prestige. I did 950 km's over four days which means an extra bill for the 150km's over. They fully inspect the car when you bring it back - the chick who looked the car over checked every freakin inch including all four rims for marks or nicks so you have to be aware of where you park he car and how you drive because the $1500 deductible is just sitting there for them to find and excuse to use...

Speed limits vary. Example was driving between Salzburg and Munich it was pretty much 80kph, 100kph, 120kph because of construction and then you would hit the 'delimited' sections where there is no posted limit. Because of traffic and construction the drive wasn't that great as you'd just get up over 200kph and you'd come across a group of cars going 150kph and slow down and they would move over and then another few minutes of high speed before the whole process of slowing down for other cars begins all over. Throw in the speed limited construction zones and it's a bit frustrating.

There are better autobahn's for high speed driving and day of the week / time of the day really matters for traffic patterns. I did hit 285 (I have an understanding and trusting spouse!) for a few minutes on the way to Lindau until I came across traffic. It feels like your coming out of warp 9 and back to impulse power when you slow down behind traffic running 100kph.

I was talking to a fellow in Stuttgart who was lamenting the good old days of the Autobahn where the driving was better and less cars. His opinion was that recent immigration from other countries and of course since the unification has made driving on the Autobahns a drag in his opinion. I can't comment on that but I did find the standard of driving around Munich terrible compared to around Stuttgart and the black forest. Austria was great except for the speed limits are set at 130kph max. The Swiss are plain **** about speeding is all I can say. Inside the cities they use lot's of camera's for speeding (photo radar) so when it says 50kph look out if you speed as the rental company will be sending you the fine - billed to your card! I'm hoping I don't get one from Austria where I passed into Austria from Germany and sort of kinda didn't slow down right away...

John 996 TT Cab

That deductible is 1,500 Euro. I got dinged for some wheel damage in September. This time round photos of wheels and all exposed panels before and after and much closer inspection on taking delivery of the car.

irobertson

I know what you mean. I hated driving home from Ottawa airport when I got home.

I got tagged right at the border for not having a green sticker on my window! First time I've ever seen a toll road without a booth to pay at. They were just out trolling for us dumb tourists. 100 Euros, cash or credit card, right on the side of the road. I was so pissed off that I took off into the tunnel, and immediately got photographed for doing 95 in the 80 zone. Never got anything in the mail though.
It was the only downer to the whole trip. Driving in Germany and visiting the new Porsche Museum were both fantastic.

alexl911

I lived in Germany for five years and moved back to Canada in last December... a few weeks ago I got dinged for 129kmph in a 80 zone In Germany 129kmph on a d-restriced section of the Autobahn could get a ticked for going to SLOW

Torontoworker

I don't understand why they don't have a 'welcome to Austria' on signs anywhere? You go through a tunnel and see a sign with the transparent cross through it meaning no posted limit and of course you squeeze the loud pedal. THEN, a few km's down the road you see an overhead gantry with a bank of overhead video camera's for each lane and try to nail the brakes from something above 200kph. Nice... Welcome to Austria you stupid tourist gringo type suckers! And the funny thing is; the Austrians complain that Germans are cheap bastards 'charging for everything' - meanwhile look in the mirror mode...

John 996 TT Cab

Be thankful you don't live in BC. 129k in an 80k zone is immediate seizure of your car. It gets impounded for 7 days I think. Large $ speeding ticket, towing and storage make it around a $1,000 cost for exceeding 40k over the posted limit. Last year cops got 4 911's in one batch at 122kph in 80kph zone and took all four.

Torontoworker

I guess we thought we had it bad with our 50km over cash grab... Meanwhile, more people are killed by people not using signals, checking blind spots, running red lights, txting and they receive... a ticket when they injure people? Maybe if the Government took your car away for the same length of time for being a left lane bandit I might have more respect for these silly speed kills (despite the evidence that it does not.).

Meanwhile Ontario 'speed kills' lobby are having a problem explaining the data that it doesn't to the public...

http://www.cleveland.com/roadrant/in...o_turnpik.html