As someone who worked with the police force of a college town, I can tell you that while we did occasionally set radar traps, we were basically looking for aberrant behavior: line crossing, swerving, unsafe passing, or exceeding the flow of traffic. I absolutely endorse radar cameras in school zones and neighborhoods. On the freeways, not so much.
Interesting thread because it relates to legal principles discussed elsewhere, but in a non political way.
I think this an excellent example where a limited degree of selective prosecution (not of course by race) is a good idea.
Drivers base their behavior on the current rules. If you change the current vague and uncertain standard, the transition will be brutal, with many accidents due to drivers paying more attention to their speedometers than the road.
This would be equally true if you raised existing limits to new, no excuse, limits, and if you set the same firm formula, for how far above to allow, that has to be used by every police officer in the land.
I recently had a different experience. Headed into Indiana on 294, 80/94, the expressway was stopped more than go, so I got off and took 2-lane roads through the IN countryside. No map - just knew to keep heading S, SE and eventually I’d hit 30 (Lincoln Highway) or see signs of Ft Wayne. Traffic was light, and 99% of the folk on the road knew how to drive and where they were heading. Traffic just flowed PERFECTLY in the low 70s (slightly above the posted limit), with everyone aware of where everyone else was, using the “extra” lanes around intersections and making way around the infrequent slower traffic, turners, etc.
It is hard to describe, but it was a wonderful sensation on a beautiful early summer day, the likes of which I cannot recall experiencing at any time in the recent past.
Some of the roads in France have a dual speed limit. It’s 10 Km/H lower if it’s raining.
Many (most?) states solve that conundrum with two sets of overlapping weasel words in their laws.
One is that the posted limits apply to good conditions and the mere fact you are driving slower than the posted limit does not ensure safety or legality in bad conditions.
The other is a so called “basic speed law” which holds that no driver may operate faster than is safe for the conditions. Which conditions include things like the roadway, your vehicle, other traffic, weather, etc. Which amounts to saying “Use your good judgment, but you’d better hope it’s slower than any nearby cop’s good judgment.” Some states even go so far in their basic speed law as to say that the safe speed may, in especially favorable circumstances, exceed the posted limit.
Now for sure what I take to be your underlying point stands: That if the goal is a) automated zero tolerance enforcement, and b) limits based on actual safety, then c) the limits must be dynamic.
100%
I was driving on Staten Island and got dinged by a camera for doing 36 in a 25. Now, the next time I’m on that road I absolutely, positively, watch my speed closely. I will not ever do 36 on that street again. If my township had speed cameras we wouldn’t have the problem of people doing 45 in our 25 zones, and if all the money went to the general state coffers, or to fund state run road improvements, it’s a win win.
Camera installation is money well spent to improve public safety.
The only issue with the 1 MPH over ticket is that people can argue that they weren’t actually over the posted speed limit. If you give tickets to everyone who is measured at 10MPH over, they can argue that they weren’t actually 10 MPH over the limit, but that doesn’t matter, because the ticket was for exceeding the posted speed limit, and they were certainly doing that.
And also, I don’t care how well you have been trained in estimating speed, any ticket based on, “I observed him going 82mph.” without any sort of measuring device (radar gun, cop pacing, airplane & time between those two arrows, &c.) should be thrown out.
That depends. If the posted speed limit was 75, then “I saw him going 82” without any sort of measurement is pretty weak. But if it was a 25 MPH residential street, then someone going even remotely close to 82 is definitely a menace.
There’s a little stretch of road that I drive often where the limit goes from 50 to 40 to 30. It’s not a speed trap - it’s definitely a safety issue. Just after it drops to 30, you encounter a blind turn, a slope that obscures the road ahead, and 7 roads/driveways spilling into the main road. Oh, and there are no shoulders on the 30MPH stretch because there’s a church on the hill on one side and a cemetery on the other - no way to put shoulders in. Oh yeah, and occasionally there’s an Amish buggy making its way from one shoulder to the next shoulder.
I have people getting pissed at me all the time for doing the limit thru there - I’ve even had them pass me on the shoulders in the 40MPH part - I guess they showed me!!! But the entire stretch from the first 40MPH sign to the 50MPH sign isn’t even a mile. How can one have so little patience that such a short time at a slower speed is a burden??
They can flip me off all they want. On the other hand, if their need for speed causes an accident, it’ll inconvenience a lot of people who have to find a detour along the winding country roads that fill this county. Idiots, the lot of them.
I wanted to say two things. I once asked a local traffic engineer why speed limits were generally so low across the board, and gave him an example of a particular street locally where there’s a 30 mile an hour limit posted but I’m morally certain I could drive at least 10 miles faster and have more than enough time to react to any traffic safety situation that might come up without even cutting it close. He responded that he had no doubt I could drive perfectly safely on that road at 40 mph, but that in determining speed limits they had to design them around consideration of the least capable drivers you can find that are able to legally drive. He pointed out that many states (including mine), for instance, allow folks to have a driver’s license with less than optimal corrected vision of 20/40. He cited reaction times for older drivers, which I forget what they were, but recall that the average 80 year old had a HORRIBLE reaction time compared to that of a 20 year old.
The other is an anecdote from a time when I got my first speeding ticket when I was 17 and appeared in traffic court. I had to wait a long time for my case to get called and got to watch a lot of others appear before the judge before my turn. The case before mine was one where a young cop actually wrote a speeding ticket for someone driving 41 in a 40 zone. The cop started up talking about the careful calibration of his radar gun when the judge blew a gasket and basically accused the cop of engaging in “harassment”. I found myself agreeing wholeheartedly with the judge in this case. Sadly, the judge failed to take a similar view with my case where I was clocked going 18 miles over the posted limit.
I’m in deer country and am constantly seeing dead ones on the side of the road all over the place-one got killed 2 weeks ago 500 yards from my apartment. If you want one as a hood ornament, knock yourself out (literally), but don’t expect me to be in a hurry to acquire one too. [during crepuscular lighting conditions I’ll go even slower]
%100. We have a lot of moose too. Do not want one coming through my windshield.
But of course when you go the speed limit, you get some idiot right on your bumper. If I have to slam on the brakes to avoid a horrific accident, that’s gonna be on them if they rear end me.
Each “highway” out here in CA is rated for it’s safe speed. IMHO-a ticket should be given for exceeding the safe speed by a significant amout- say more than 10% over.
But speed limits are not al all based upon what people really drive. Having been on the San Jose traffic & Safety commission, I know that speed limits are sometimes set due to neighborhood requests for lower speeds- usually in school “paths” where parents drive to get their kids to school.
In some towns speed limits are set in order to generate ticket money.
Good one. Or- I hope poor unsafe weather.
Nope. Never. I want the human element to decide I am driving in an unsafe manner.
Yeah, but that is a bit of the issue, isn’t it? A cop can shoot his radar and write a ticket if you are over the posted limit, whether or not you are driving in an unsafe manner, no?
Your view of traffic conforms poorly to reality. I always drive at the speed limit. I also keep to the right. This works well for everyone. The world that your mind perceives is illusory.
ACAB, so I have no recommendations on law enforcement. But if you get pulled over for speeding, it’s your own less-than-intelligent fault.
[quote=“Dinsdale, post:34, topic:1003276”]
The problem with that is that the “human element” is highly variable. A cop who had a row with his wife might be prejudiced against women. If he got rear-ended in his own car by a BMW, he might just take it out on any hapless BMW drivers. Of course, he or she may be prejudiced in many other ways - colour, age, length of hair, etc.
A properly set up and visible camera discriminates against only those who are breaking the law.
I think that the idea that a driver can choose to ignore the posted speed limit is ludicrous.
Every car should be equipped with equipment to determine and enforce the speed limit.
I also believe that a static speed limit is kinda dumb.
At night, alone, with a car that can handle it: have at it: 100mph
In light traffic with perfect visibility and dry roads:
80mph
Moderate traffic? 65mph
Light drizzle? 60mph
Heavy rain? 50mph
Your car is smart enough to operate the windscreen wipers, it can probably set a speed limit,
In more urban environments the speed limit should be drastically lower. There is a dramatic increase in the fatality of a meeting of a pedestrian and a car around 20 mph. I believe the speed of cars anywhere where there conceivably could be a pedestrian shouldn’t be higher than that.
And that speed limit should be hardwired in the car.
With automatic complete and life-long forfeit of any driving privileges upon any sign of tampering.
Humans are terrible at assessing risk, especially the risk of speed of the vehicle they are operating.
Letting every boy racer decide for themselves how fast they want to go is a terrible idea.
I think speed limits should be dynamic, at least for major roads and highways. We’re a democracy, so whatever a majority of drivers think is good in any given conditions should roughly define the functional limit. Figure out what the average speed is at a given moment, and ticket those who are significantly faster than that, maybe by 10-20% over what everyone else is doing.
Most highway speed limits are designed with a safety factor, so if it’s raining or something, doing the limit is still safe. This means that when it’s dry, the actual safe limit is somewhat higher. Conversely, if it’s snowing or freezing rain, the actual safe limit will be much lower. Trust the average driver to know what speed is safe for the conditions, and ticket appropriately based on that.
Can’t do it.
All devices that measure speed have a margin of error. And that margin is present in the operators manual of the device. If the margin is +/- 1 mile per hour I could not write a cite at 1mph and would have to start at 2.
When I first got on the job in '82 the margin for radar units was at least 4mph. If an agency wrote tickets at 1 over a lawyer could subpoena the operator manual in discovery and show it was possible his client was not doing 1 over and the cite would get thrown out.