# Topes



## joaquinx (Jul 3, 2010)

The State of Veracruz has eliminated all, yes all, topes. From now on they are called "reductor de velocidad." I drove from Xalapa to Minatitlán without seeing one Tope sign. They were replaced with signs with the new wording.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

the reductor de velocidad are usually the little ripples..Some transito gave me a ticket because my car went vroom rather than padam padam.. there fore I was over the speed limit...
Did they eliminate the actual topes and replaced them or just the words and signs?


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## joaquinx (Jul 3, 2010)

citlali said:


> the reductor de velocidad are usually the little ripples..Some transito gave me a ticket because my car went vroom rather than padam padam.. there fore I was over the speed limit...
> Did they eliminate the actual topes and replaced them or just the words and signs?


There isn't a single "Tope" sign to be seen, whether a little ripple or a big hump. They have the reductor sign or nothing.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

So we are only talking about a sign consolidation but the actual bumps are still there , right?

At least they have signs better than some of the country roads around Huajuapan where they have the huge topes and sometimes a sign and sometimes nothing.. I almost broke all the pottery I bouhgt on those darn things.


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## Hound Dog (Jan 18, 2009)

You are damned lucky, joaqinx:

In most of Southern Mexico (defined as Chiapas, Oaxaca, Tabasco, southern parts of the Yucatán Peninsula from the states of Campeche to the southern part of Quintana Roo,highway impediments, whether known as " reductores de velocidad" or "topes" are hardly marked at all if at all. These impediments are not easily gauged as to their severity of construction and many are located along rural highways in isolated áreas as well as interspersed incongruously along some urban expressways for no apparent reason except to damage your axle. There is no rationality to these impediments including the fact that many are easilly negotiable while others are quite dangerous and can damage your car. The reason for this is that many Mexican drivers from southern urban áreas have *ZERO *respect for indigenous villagers inhabiting and strolling about roadsides and tend to speed dangerously through isolated villages encountered along the way from, say. San Cristóbal de Las Casas to Palenque or what have you. I am not intimidated by Mexican drivers but have learned over the past 15 years that there is no respect among them for highway signs meant to regulate traffic through rural villages - especially those inhabited by the indigenous so - *TOPES!* - some rather nasty constructions. That´is why, on the 200 kilometer drive between San Cristóbal de Las Casa and Palenque, there are some 300 topes - some rather formidable. As a consequence, it takes about five hours to drive a distance that should take no more than two hours. Locals love to sit around the local plaza watching strangers passing through bust their asses on topes that would trip a mule.


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## joaquinx (Jul 3, 2010)

citlali said:


> So we are only talking about a sign consolidation but the actual bumps are still there , right?
> 
> At least they have signs better than some of the country roads around Huajuapan where they have the huge topes and sometimes a sign and sometimes nothing.. I almost broke all the pottery I bouhgt on those darn things.


Yes, the humpity bumps are still there. I broke some nice green pottery from Oaxaca on the "bumps" between Perote and Xalapa a few years ago.


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## joaquinx (Jul 3, 2010)

Hound Dog said:


> Locals love to sit around the local plaza watching strangers bust their asses on topes that would trip a mule.


A few years ago, I saw some unlucky Mexican driving a Corvette get stuck on a rather large and high tope.


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## Hound Dog (Jan 18, 2009)

_


joaquinx said:



A few years ago, I saw some unlucky Mexican driving a Corvette get stuck on a rather large and high tope.

Click to expand...

_I love the notion of a Corvette making love to a tope.

Back in 2001, when we had first moved to Mexico, we drove with Zapoteco friends to Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca in our then low-flung Chrylser we had brought down from California. The topes in Teotitlan were so challenging that, in order to negotiate them with our Zapoteco frriends in the car, at every tope entering town until we arrived at their residence, they had to get out of the car or the car would become stuck and imobilized on the tope. The father of the family was the son of an influential family in Teotitlan and approached his father, a city official, telling him the topes in Teotitlan were a hazard to the cars of strangers visiting the town. His father´s response was, "So?"


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

The corvette story is great, you should have taken a picture.

The story of having to get out of the car to go over the topes just came up a couple of weeks ago when we were in Teotitlan del Valle. The grand father brought it up but the kids did not remember having to get out because one was a baby and the other was 4 and is now 16 but we must have been a funny sight. Those topes were murder.


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## TundraGreen (Jul 15, 2010)

This won't be a popular opinion but…

I think topes are great. They are much more effective at slowing down traffic than speed limit signs. Anything that slows cars down is a good thing in my opinion.

Full disclosure note: I don't own a car and travel by bus all the time.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

Unfortunately the topes are built without any standards some are impossibly tough and some are just little rolls. some are build where people want to sell merchandise some to slow the traffic in towns and some just because some one does not want the cars to go too fasr past whatever. It seems that there is no reasons for many of them and since many of them are not marked they can really cause accidents.

We took a small back road in the middle od nowhere in Oaxaca, the road was in a horrible shape partly dirt full of large holes, there were no houses but still lot of topes..Not sure what the idea was since you could have walked faser than the cars.


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## joaquinx (Jul 3, 2010)

TundraGreen said:


> I think topes are great. They are much more effective at slowing down traffic than speed limit signs. Anything that slows cars down is a good thing in my opinion.


I have to agree. The typical Mexican driver ignores all traffic signs and warnings and is only careful when observed by the police. My street is paved with those lava rocks and slows down all traffic to a crawl. This is good as there are a few children who play on this street and there is a central de salud there that always attracts a large number of customers. 

But the topes that resemble small mountains or are not marked are the ones I wish weren't there.


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## Hound Dog (Jan 18, 2009)

_


TundraGreen said:



This won't be a popular opinion but…

I think topes are great. They are much more effective at slowing down traffic than speed limit signs. Anything that slows cars down is a good thing in my opinion.

Full disclosure note: I don't own a car and travel by bus all the time.

Click to expand...

_Well, TG, I could agree that rationally placed and properly marked topes can be a good thing in congested urban and school zones, small villages where pedestrians tend to meander aimlessly about roadways on their way to markets or public service centers and other such áreas requiring caution. This is an obvious social problem in Mexico (and countless other countries) where many drivers throw all caution to the wind, race through congested villages and towns and then, all too commonly, run away from accident scenes if they cause human or property damage This disregard for human life and property is especially serious in Southern Mexico where we live much of each year. In many parts of Chiapas, Oaxaca State, (Northern and Southern) Veracruz State, Tabasco and the Yucatán Peninsula and this disrespect for village life, especally indigenous village life is exacerbated by the animosity many ethnic groups feel toward each other in an often very touchy society with that animosity emanating from all sides of the ethnic mix. So, topes become a tool of law and order where highway signs supposedly regulating civil behavior among drivers and pedestrians alike, are virtually ignored. Many Mexican drivers normally ignore road signage meant to enforce rules of civility but they tend to be overly-respectful of topes - thus the seemingly random placement of unmarked topes here and there in Southern Mexico and the excessive respect paid topes by Mexican drivers unfamiliar with the terrain who tend to melodramatically slow down to a crawl in observance of the national tope ritual.

One of the great entertainments in Southern Mexico is the gathering of guys at certain topes along interstate routes as they pass through villages to observe the occasional outsider hitting the unmarked tope at bone-jarring speeds. An immensely satisfying local ritual in Chiapas made even more entertaining if an axle or tire is blown. Small town people have to have their diversions as well as big city folks.


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## ktmarie (May 11, 2014)

TundraGreen said:


> Full disclosure note: I don't own a car and travel by bus all the time.


Oof. As far as "passenger experience," I think going over topes in buses isn't necessarily better than in cars. We've definitely prioritized finding (and paying more for) direct buses just to minimize how many topes we go over. The actual tope isn't the bad part...it's the fact that their existence tends to inspire the bus driver to slam on the brake, only to slam on the gas until the next tope. 

I'm definitely being de-sensitized to car sickness while living here!


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

Long distance buses do not go over many topes as a rule but local ones do so it all depends where you travel, topes are topes wether you drive or are driven and there is nothing worst than being on a bus on a curvy road full of topes like the road between Las Casas and Palenque. Give me a car anyday..done that road on buses vans and cars and the car is the best way to go.


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## TundraGreen (Jul 15, 2010)

ktmarie said:


> Oof. As far as "passenger experience," I think going over topes in buses isn't necessarily better than in cars. We've definitely prioritized finding (and paying more for) direct buses just to minimize how many topes we go over. The actual tope isn't the bad part...it's the fact that their existence tends to inspire the bus driver to slam on the brake, only to slam on the gas until the next tope.
> 
> I'm definitely being de-sensitized to car sickness while living here!


Agreed the topes are just as much of a problem in a bus. But the drivers usually know where they are and most are really good at slowing to a crawl to go over them. It is better on intercity buses than on local buses.


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