Google Maps speed limit leaderboard

This weekend, I’m at a bachelor party for a friend. Yesterday we went golfing, which, if you know anything about me, was well outside my expertise and skill set. However, we made it work after many missed swings and a score that would have been well above 100 without generous handicaps.

After we went golfing, I did a fair amount of designated driving. I don’t mind driving, but hauling 6 people around in a massive SUV is a huge change of pace from what I normally drive. In these situations, I air on the side of caution, which means I usually drive at the speed limit. This can be frustrating to drivers who are used to faster companions on the road.

As I slowly rolled down the highways of northern California, I started thinking about spending. Google has a great feature that shows the limit and your current speed. What if we gamified this? You can imagine a world where streets and roads have “leaderboards” that show who rode them the fastest.

This would be massively detrimental to road safety because people are competitive. However, it would be fun to incentivize more travel. If there were a leaderboard, some people would have to try and overtake someone else. I doubt the speeding and additional traffic accidents are worth it, but regardless, it’d be entertaining to see people compete for top-speed slots.

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