Can you drive the whole Skyway Stage 3 pegged at 60kph?

One of the most recent strange regulations we’ve seen is the universal speed limit of 60 kilometers per hour on the entirety of Stage 3 on the elevated Skyway. Despite being a toll road and effectively an Expressway, drivers who use Skyway Stage 3 are limited to a maximum of 60 kilometers per hour, whereas on the old parts of the system, cars and motorcycles could go up to 80.

It got the Autofun team wondering: Could you drive the entirety of the Skyway Stage 3 at just 60 kilometers an hour?

First of all, why 60. The theory goes that the reason 60 kilometers an hour was chosen is because Skyway Stage 3 was envisioned to have what SMC president  Ramon Ang called a “variable direction lane” system. In essence, the lanes along Skyway Stage 3 could be bi-directional or have traffic running in one direction at a specific time, and have it run in the opposite direction at a different time, depending on traffic conditions.

Is the system working? Well, it is certainly necessary to follow the speed limit, as the Skyway’s enforcers make sure you don’t speed, with radar guns and various cameras that track your speed along the whole stretch. So yes, you can (and likely have to) run the whole stretch of the Skyway Stage 3 at 60 kilometers per hour.

Is it safe? If everyone else is doing it, then yes. The safest speed is the speed of prevailing traffic, being neither faster nor slower than the rest of the cars on the road.

Is it boring? Kind of. Imagine infinity as a road that stretches on, forever, and the only thing you can do is watch as time slowly drifts by. That's what it feels like. Did we say kind of? We meant yes.

Interesting to note here, though, is that 60 kilometers per hour can technically open the Skyway to motorcycles with displacements lower than 400cc. Before all of the 125 and 150 riders bombard our comments section, no, the Skyway isn’t considering it. We’re simply posing the idea that, if everyone is limited to 60 on the Skyway, then the argument that smaller displacement bikes – 200cc to 350cc bikes in particular – can’t keep up with high-speed traffic is moot. And as the only validated (yet quite flimsy) argument for keeping the Skyway 400cc-exclusive is rendered moot by the 60-kilometer-per-hour speed limit, then perhaps the regulating body can reopen the discussion.