Diminishing Driving Skills?

Ever notice that over the years, some familiar roads have had their speed limits radically curtailed?  I used to live at Kanwal, and on the way into Wyong, once you got past the Wyong Hospital (Golden Fleece service station for those even older), the limit used to increase to 100 km/h (well 60 mph even, before 1975).  Around van Stappen's corner at (now) Wadalba (but then, Korokoa, or even Wyong North) it was a full 100 km/h.  Honestly it was!

A few years later, in the late 1980s the limit was changed to 80 km/h.  And now in the 2000s, the limit is actually 70km/h.

It's the same road.  In fact it's quite a bit better now.  There probably is quite a bit more traffic, but really, is our general level of driving so bad that we need to have a limit 30km/h below what it once was in my memory?

This strangely applies to the old Pacific Highway at Palmdale.  Previously - before the Freeway was built - the road used to be two lanes in each direction, and a 100km/h limit.  When the Freeway was built parallel to it, the same road was reduced to one lane in each direction (but the paved surface was still two lanes wide, with a large concrete median strip).  And the obligatory speed limit reduction to (you guessed it) 70 km/h.  In this case, the road is used by substantially less traffic, is incredibly wide, and is in really good condition, but the limit is now 30km/h less than it used to be!

I don't know about you, but I think it must be that we can't drive as well as we did twenty or thirty years ago.  And hell, the cars are a lot better now, that's for sure.

I think this is a sad reflection on the driving ability of the general public, as the RTA only drop these limits based on general accident records.  What can we do?