AMERICA'S FAST LANE

By STEVE LOPEZ/HELENA

In the name of research, the Toyota Camry hits 90 m.p.h. coming out of Great Falls on Interstate 15. Every other state in America puts a number on a sign to tell you exactly how fast you can go. Montana leaves you some leeway. You can drive whatever speed seems "reasonable and prudent" during daylight hours, depending on conditions.

The needle hits 95 now. Sure, it's a bit fast, but you've just parachuted in from a big East Coast city where you get tickets for parking in front of your own house, and this wide-open liberty is making you crazy. The Rockies spin out of the ground like the spurs of a boot, and a herd of antelope is grazing along a bend in the Missouri River. Willie Nelson and Ray Charles come on the radio to sing Seven Spanish Angels, and it seems prudent, if not reasonable, to nose up to 100, 105, 110. At 112, you can almost see the seven angels. It's 85 miles from Great Falls to Helena, with a lot of curves (it'd help if they had signs saying CURVE AHEAD, SLOW TO 90), and you cover it in a 57-minute blur with neither the doors falling off nor an officer of the law making an appearance.

They hate you for this in Montana, especially if you're from out of state. You blow through like it's the Wild West and ruin a perfectly good thing for people with the sense to keep the speedometer at, say, 88. But they don't hate it so much that they're ready to give up the right.

A proposal to switch to a numerical speed limit of some sort will be decided this week; Custer had better odds.

Butte legislator Joe Quilici, one of the sponsors, has all but conceded. And Bob Gibson has editorialized against a new speed limit in the Billings Gazette. "We already have one that says there are times when 35 might be prudent and times when 90 is prudent," he says. What more could a man ask? (At night, the limit is 65.) Governor Marc Racicot, for one, wants a new speed limit, but doesn't expect it to happen anytime soon. Montanans are not nut-case antigovernment types, he says, a tad sensitive about the militia thing that captured so many headlines. But they want stronger evidence of a link between driving like a maniac and dying like one.

This year's body count has already surpassed last year's total of 198, but not even the highway patrol pins the entire difference on m.p.h. Even so, common sense tells you speed kills, says Major Bert Obert of the Montana Highway Patrol. Especially when some people are going 110 and others 55. Montana troopers say they've clocked drivers at up to 150 m.p.h. It was insulting enough for troopers before 1996, when the speed limit was 65 and the fine was $5, payable on the spot. Drivers kept fives tucked in their visor, but at least they slowed down. Now they routinely rocket by troopers at 90 and better, knowing that judges have thrown out tickets for up to 100 m.p.h.

"You used to have something to brag about at the coffee shop if you caught someone going 100, but now you see it every day," says Sergeant Larry Strickland, who pulled a guy over at 105 only to hear him gripe, "No way, officer. I was only doing 96." The problem with "reasonable and prudent," troopers argue, is that there aren't three fuzzier words in U.S. lawbooks.

At the Windbag Saloon, a former brothel on Last Chance Gulch in Helena, unemployed office manager Carol Muir wants a speed limit of 75 or 80, but bartender Bob Maronick says, "I don't want to have to look at my speedometer all the time." In the cause of investigative reporting, Muir leads a three-saloon tour, and this scientific survey gives a slight edge to speed limits. A Great Falls Tribune survey found 64% in favor of a speed limit but only 50% in favor of bothering with a special session of the state legislature to get it done in January.

"It'll never happen," says trooper Mitch Tuttle as he cruises Interstate 15 in search of speeders. His radar locks onto an Olds coming the other way at 102 m.p.h. Tuttle crosses the median, turns south and shifts into warp. He's at 100, 110, 120, 130, 135. Now he's got him. Mike McCready, a 21-year-old Canadian student on his way to a reunion of Mormon missionaries, steps out of the car.

"You know what the speed limit is in Montana, son?"

"Yes, sir. Whatever you feel safe at."

"You feel safe going 102 in a 1985 Oldsmobile?"

The question answers itself, and Tuttle writes out a $70 ticket. Let that be a lesson to you. Even if you're on a mission from God, keep it under 102 when you pass through Montana.