Lexus owners are Sydney’s slowest drivers, BMWs are the fastest
Go nowhere faster.
GOFAR car tracking systems has crunched the numbers on more than 10 million kilometres travelled around Sydney, and uncovered the average speeds travelled by different brands.
It turns out there's no real advantage whatsoever to owning a luxury car, and it doesn't really get you anywhere any faster on the whole, although there were a few outliers.
A luxury car might be a nicer way to wait in traffic though, because the average speed on Sydney roads was a leisurely 44km/h, and most brands actually came in substantially below that.
Source: GOFAR
BMW drivers might be speed demons, or maybe they just happen to spend more time on the freeway than others.
Lexus owners, on the other hand, crawled along at an average speed of only 31km/h on Sydney's roads, and quite likely found themselves outpaced by plenty of cyclists.
Those are only the top 20 brands using GOFAR systems though, out of the 50-odd total car brands in Australia.
"People may be very surprised about the data as we expected luxury and sports cars would outpace the cheaper models," said Danny Adams, GOFAR inventor.
"It shows that there is no added advantage in travel times by owning an expensive car. It might feel quicker because expensive cars can accelerate and brake in shorter time, but that is also more dangerous and expensive in fuel and wear and tear on the vehicle", he added.
While freeway driving would bring the numbers up, living in certain areas would also bring them right down. Sydney has 7 out of the 10 slowest roads in Australia, and making your commute along Harris Street (average speed of 14.5km/h), Cleveland Street (average speed of 17.1 km/h) or Military Road (average speed of 18.7 km/h) would definitely bring your numbers down.
Most car brands were below the average speeds, but unless they're in a rush the drivers might not mind. Regardless of how fast you go, the satisfaction you get from driving a car might simply come down to how nice the buying experience was.
