Tope or not Tope?

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous bumps in the road

Back on May Day¹, of this year, I published this article which, among other things, talked about the rate of bicycle fatalities in the U.S. I used these fatality statistics as a device to illustrate the perceived safety of U.S. visitors and residents in Mexico. Shortly after writing that article, I read on a news site that covers my Hometown, U.S.A. about yet another car-meets-pedestrian fatality in said town. I say “yet another” because in my Hometown, U.S.A. (it really doesn’t matter where exactly, just that it is in the United States), cars killing pedestrians or bicyclists, or anything else on the road that isn’t another car, is so common that it barely registers as a crime². Often, it never does³. Car culture in the U.S. is so dominant and encompassing, that large swaths of the legal system there are designed to protect the interests of drivers conveying themselves from here to there; and pretty much all outdoor space is designed around and for the convenience of automobiles.

And later still, I was riding my bike in my neighborhood in Mexico, and I was rolling my eyes at having - for the umpteenth time - to gingerly navigate my bike wheel through the offset pattern of twin rows of steel topes.

And now, I suppose I should pause and offer some definitions.

Some definitions

Topes (pronounced “toe-pay”) in Mexico are quite similar to what are called “speed bumps” in the U.S. Topes are purpose-built bumps in the road meant to control automobile traffic speed. In the U.S., the vast majority of speed bumps are asphalt “bumps” that span the width of the roadway, and that gently curve up enough to slow cars down to 15 or 20 miles per hour⁴. In Mexico, topes are made of a variety of materials - often asphalt, but also concrete, rubber, and steel. Asphalt and concrete topes tend to slope up sharply, which means vehicles have to slow down a lot to avoid damaging their undercarriages, wheels, and suspension. They also tend to be significantly taller than speed bumps in the U.S. Steel topes are embedded across roadways in a series of small steel “bubbles”, like a row of corn on a corncob. Often there are 2 offset rows of these steel bubbles butted up against each other - which means that if you want to cut through them on, say, a bicycle, you must do so at a precise angle between the 2 rows of steel bumps.

Twin offset rows of steel topes

The other significant difference between topes in Mexico and speed bumps in the U.S. is that topes are everywhere. They are ubiquitous. They are on residential streets, major avenues and thoroughfares, and highways. They are usually not on freeways or toll roads, but that’s about it⁵. Vehicles driving in and around cities and towns in Mexico are constantly slowing down for topes; it is just an inherent part of the driving pattern here. And, because often topes are not well-marked (asphalt topes are often not painted, so they can be very difficult to see), drivers must always be diligently on the lookout for them when driving on unfamiliar roads. Often there are signs on the side of the road indicating a tope (see the photo at the top of this article), but these signs are easy to miss and may not even be present in some cases.

Why so many topes?

Firstly, they are cheap. It costs a lot less to pile up some asphalt across a roadway to slow traffic down than to install traffic lights or to hire traffic police to monitor intersections and approaches to towns, schools, hospitals, etc. Secondly, they are remarkably effective at slowing down traffic, thus rendering roadways through cities, towns, and villages much more safe for pedestrians and other non-vehicle traffic. The cost of speeding over a tope in Mexico is not a mere traffic citation - it can mean living without your car while it is in the shop getting fixed. The cost is major inconvenience, and parts and labor. In Mexico, it is simply impractical to ignore topes.

Is there a point here?

Oh, well, yes. I was getting to that. So I wrote that article about bicycle fatalities, and shortly thereafter found myself being annoyed by topes, and it occurred to me (things do sometimes occur to me) that instead of being annoyed by topes, I should be celebrating them. Topes are the passive traffic speed regulators that places like the U.S. are missing, at the expense of the approximately 8,500 pedestrians and bicyclists murdered each year⁶ by motor vehicles in that country.

This is not to say that Mexico is a walker’s/cyclist’s paradise - pedestrians and cyclists collide with motor vehicles here too, with the same kinds of deadly consequences. But there is a pragmatic logic to the idea of modulating traffic speed with wheel-alignment destroying barriers: absent them, drivers will speed; drivers will drive dangerously fast through neighborhoods, past parks and plazas, past schools. And, absent these otherwise annoying speed modulators, more people would die. Just like they are dying in the U.S. in record numbers without them.

Mexico must recognize a truth that the U.S. tries to pretend does not exist: given the opportunity, people will do very stupid and dangerous things. So, it might make some sense to remove the opportunity. When it comes to cars, the U.S. has little appetite for removing any opportunities for stupidity and danger. Doing so might infringe on a person’s freedom. Or at least a person’s right to kill with impunity.

So, I have come to appreciate the tope, that ugly, annoying, suspension-killing lump of dumb asphalt that has likely saved countless lives. I acknowledge that not everyone in Mexico feels the same way about topes that I do, but not everyone in Mexico has seen the consequences of a system that values unimpeded vehicular movement over human life like I have.

I’d be interested in hearing other people’s thoughts on topes - especially those of you who live and/or spend time in Mexico. Yes, they are annoying - but would Mexico be better off without them? Or at least without so many of them?

1. May 1, for those of you not steeped in socialist culture.

2. Some vehicle-pedestrian/cyclist collisions are truly accidental and shouldn’t be treated as a crime. What are crimes are instances where the vehicle is speeding, driving on the shoulder or bike lane, turning without yielding to pedestrians and cyclists, or just generally being operated without sufficient driver awareness.

3. I read once - I don’t remember where exactly - that if you want to kill someone in the U.S. without facing consequences, just run them over with your car.

4. Although often, they are not designed to do anything more that “suggest” that you might want to slow down. Some speed bumps in the U.S. are so gentle and unimposing that cars regularly don’t slow down at all for them.

5. Topes are not found on major thoroughfares with traffic lights (typically found in larger cities), as the traffic lights serve the purpose of the topes.

6. As I pointed out in that previous article I linked to in the opening paragraph, this number is climbing in the U.S.; the U.S. is the only developed country where traffic fatalities are an increasing statistic.