Speed Bumps

I understand that this doesn't exactly threaten world peace; however, it's irritating and here's why:

It seems that more and more streets are having speed bumps installed -- Basswood Rd, Via Rivera in RPV, Via Valmonte (I'm sure there are others), and now I see them going in on Via Del Monte. Via Del Monte,which has been there since glaciers retreated, and has never had speed bumps, now all of a sudden needs them? When I was a kid (just after the invention of the automobile) these streets all existed, but none of them had speed bumps. In fact, Via Valmonte was Hawthorne Blvd in those days! You think it's busier today?

What has changed to make all these speed bumps necessary now? Are drivers driving that much faster than we did in high school (impossible -- we drove so fast our watches stopped), or are we just becoming less and less tolerant of any perceived inconvenience?

From a real estate perspective, the owners of homes on these streets (and they are inevitably the ones who prevail upon the city to install speed bumps) all knew they were buying on a relatively busy street when they bought, and generally paid less for their homes because they were in that type of location. That was their compensation for it. If the traffic, noise, dirt, whatever were that unattractive, they should have bought somewhere else. But nooooooo -- no longer wanting to pay the price for having saved money when they bought, they now want to shift the cost onto the rest of us by making driving on their street inconvenient and uncomfortable for everyone else. Half my cars bottom out on the Basswood speed bumps if I go over 10 mph. I see the hand of shock absorber manufacturers in this.

If the current trend continues, most roads will have speed bumps: once the busiest have been dealt with, the next busiest will seem busy and will get them, and so on. This is probably Abe Maslow's Corollary #29. So before we get to that stage, I have an idea: why not just go back to dirt roads? That way, no one will be able to go that fast due to the ruts and pot-holes, and sewer/utility maintenance will be ever so much easier. The dirt roads certainly won't be any rougher than they are with all these speed bumps, so just rip up the pavement. Screw it. I can just see it: after a few years of that "Oh, it's so dusty/muddy". OK, let's pave the roads. A few years later "People are driving too fast now". Fine, let's put in speed bumps.