[GMONEY]

Just need to watch your speed... 466a is patrolled alot between SCSO and FHP and Fruitland Park Police. I talked with Chief Isom of Fruitland Park. He said he gets complaints all day about speeders on that road. Then when they start ticketing the people, they gets complaints of speed traps.
If the speed limit is 45 do 45. if it is 35 do 35. speed limit on 466a is 45 and 35. those are the only 2 changes to it except into school zones.
Talked to Deputy that works that Charter School on 466. They stopped 2 speeders their last week, going 55 and 62 in the school zone with the caution lights flashing. He said both cases neither driver knew they were in a school zone. Go figure..

Bottom line, dont do the deed if you dont want to pay up!!!

[wmchale]

don't drive Rhen no speeding ticket

[otherbruddaDarrell]

I am also in favor of giving them tickets. Too many cars are speeding at his time of year.
I also think that people who warn other cars by flashing the car lights are not using sense. If you pay attention and drive the speed limit, use your turn signals and not be an agressive driver then you will not be pulled over and given a ticket!
How many times have you seen cars passing on hills, no passing zones and double yellow lines around here?....lots!
When cars are pulled over the officer might find a fugitive, narcotics,etc.
So flash your lights to warn people breaking the law and let them slow down before speeding again.....NOT
Driving for 45 years, cars, motorcycles, commercial vehicles,hazmat vehicles and never had a ticket.........wonder why?

I did get pulled over in a school zone in 1992 for going 10 over. It was the same officer that was my teacher for mph radar certification!
didn't get a ticket (yes I was in uniform in my own car) but he chewed me out big time! Yes people make mistakes and most officers will take things in consideration if you have a decent attitude with them.
During the time I was a patrol sgt. I issued several thousand tickets. At least half were warnings.

[Talk Host]

I usually get into more trouble than it's worth when I try to explain this, but here goes again.

On the matter of a town, county or state using speeding tickets to generate revenue:

Here's the way that works. When a town council, county legislature or state government is preparing its budget, it looks at the revenue that was generated "last year" from court imposed fines in their jurisdiction. They then must consider that as a revenue stream, just like license fees and tax revenue. Its real money that was generated. It is put into the budget for next year as a real source of revenue to run the jurisdiction They never tell cops, "hey guys, you gotta hand out 2-million dollars worth of tickets." It's expected that "on average" a certain percentage of people will get caught breaking the speeding laws.

Now, do cops have a quota they must meet on tickets? Well, you can answer that yourself. Let's say you have 20 police on your force and part of their job is to enforce traffic violations. 10 cops write an average of 50 tickets per month. (that's a little over 1 a day). 5 officers hand out 60+ per month. (more aggresive) 3 write 40 tickets per month. But, two of them only write 3 tickets a month.

You say to those two, "hey guys, what are you doing while on duty? The other guys are outproducing you by 300%"

Now, if you tell them to start doing their job like everybody else have you established a quota.

If you own a widget factory and everybody makes 60 widgets except for two guys who make only 2, they are out the door, right?

Let's say for a moment that there is a quota. What that would really mean is that the police are told to catch as many law breakers as possible. In a ticket quota system, they would never be told to give tickets to people who are "NOT SPEEDING." Isn't that want we want, for them to catch law breakers.

One final question.....................................If a speed limit is 45 miles per hour and somebody is driving 55 miles per hour in that zone and a police officer sees them, what should that officer do:

1. pretend he didn't see them
2. give them a ticket

[billethkid]

break the law. They are not money grubbing. They are taking advantage of a revenue opportunity that some inconsiderate drivers are providing by speeding.
Do you notice hoe everybody slows down in those towns with a reputation for speed traps. Proves the concept works....eh?
Since when is it a negative when an action taken by the police promotes adherance to the law.

More cops....more tickets....TV has way too many who drive recklessly and too fast....go get em Dano!!!!!!!!

btk

[mulligan]

There's those pesky widgets again!!

[djplong]

"Not speeding" is no guarantee of not getting a ticket - not when radar is treated as infallible but, yet, it IS quite fallible.

If reasonable speed laws were posted, this wouldn't be a problem.

Here in NH, we had a big project (Nashua's "Exit 2" as part of the US-3 widening through town) that built an extra bridge across the Merrimack River between Nashua and where I live in Hudson. Previously, it was a 1-mile or so 2-lane bridge that ended at "T" intersections on either side with traffic lights because each end was a connection to a major road (the Daniel Webster Highway in Nashua, and NH-3A in Hudson).

After the project, there were TWO THREE-lane bridges (one for each direction) with a much larger intersection (with dedicated turning lanes) in Hudson at NH-3A and onn/off ramps for the DW Highway in Nashua - and the "bridge" continued on to join up with a huge new "Exit 2" on "the turnpike" (US-3).

Speed limit for 2-lane secondary road: 55MPH

Speed limit for 6-lane expressway: 45MPH

And in D.C., which I drove through this past July and August.. Speed limit for I-395, 6-lane expressway with no traffic on a Saturday morning: 45MPH (I got a ticket via photo radar for doing 56MPH)

[Talk Host]

Originally Posted by djplong

Speed limit for I-395, 6-lane expressway with no traffic on a Saturday morning: 45MPH (I got a ticket via photo radar for doing 56MPH)

Isn't that 11 miles per hour over the legal limit?

[MelZ]

Originally Posted by Talk Host

There is an even better way to avoid receiving a speeding ticket.

Just flash "your tin" and drive away smiling for the rest of us keep at the speed limit and pray.

[djplong]

Originally Posted by Talk Host

Isn't that 11 miles per hour over the legal limit?

Yes - but my point was that it was a *45* zone - 6-lane, limited access FREEWAY going dead-straight (no twisting curves like I-89 in the Vermont Green Mountains).

What COULD have been a 65 zone, but being generous and saying it SHOULD have been 55 since it IS more of an urban area, was marked as *45*.

[Talk Host]

Originally Posted by djplong

Yes - but my point was that it was a *45* zone - 6-lane, limited access FREEWAY going dead-straight (no twisting curves like I-89 in the Vermont Green Mountains).

What COULD have been a 65 zone, but being generous and saying it SHOULD have been 55 since it IS more of an urban area, was marked as *45*.

Do I get your point that the speed limit was set at 45 in order to generate speeding tickets rather than being based on some traffic safety study. I find it odd that a city the size of Washington would deliberately bollix up normal traffic flow by instituting a lower speed limit just to give tickets. I would rather believe that a safety study showed that 45 was the proper limit.

But then, I may be wrong, they may have done it to generate revenue from speeding fines. I'll bet they have a hay-day on weekdays.

[gemorc]

Originally Posted by djplong

Yes - but my point was that it was a *45* zone - 6-lane, limited access FREEWAY going dead-straight (no twisting curves like I-89 in the Vermont Green Mountains).

What COULD have been a 65 zone, but being generous and saying it SHOULD have been 55 since it IS more of an urban area, was marked as *45*.

They got you on video doing 11 mph over the limit. Sounds to me you were speeding and got caught. If the sign says 45, do 45.

[GMONEY]

Originally Posted by billethkid

break the law. They are not money grubbing. They are taking advantage of a revenue opportunity that some inconsiderate drivers are providing by speeding.
Do you notice hoe everybody slows down in those towns with a reputation for speed traps. Proves the concept works....eh?
Since when is it a negative when an action taken by the police promotes adherance to the law.

More cops....more tickets....TV has way too many who drive recklessly and too fast....go get em Dano!!!!!!!!

btk

Could not agree more!!!!!

[djplong]

Originally Posted by gemorc

They got you on video doing 11 mph over the limit. Sounds to me you were speeding and got caught. If the sign says 45, do 45.

So you'd be ok if they slapped a 5MPH speed limit on a road near you, made the sign hard to see (the spot the got me was literally right after the freeway "started") and then nail you for going 16MPH on a road clearly made for higher speeds?

Oh - and from what former D.C.-area residents have told me, they only actually issue the tickets to out-of-state plates when they review the data becaues people from the metro area can easily fight the ticket BECAUSE of the lack of marking. For me, being from NH, it's not exactly easy to go 500+ miles to fight a $50 ticket.

While I'm generally a supporter of the police, I'm not blind in that support. Especially when things happen like how a cop pulled me over for screeching my tires for a fraction of a second - brand new car more powerful than anything I'd had and I let the clutch out a little too fast. I'd had this car for less than 48 hours after driving an econobox for years. He cited me for "Creating an environmental disturbance: Noise".

...AT BOSTON'S LOGAN AIRPORT.

I fought that ticket and won. If I lived in MD or VA I would have fought the speeding ticket. It's not like I'm some demon on wheels. The last time I'd gotten a ticket of any kind before this was either 19 or 20 years ago.

[BogeyBoy]

Originally Posted by djplong

So you'd be ok if they slapped a 5MPH speed limit on a road near you, made the sign hard to see (the spot the got me was literally right after the freeway "started") and then nail you for going 16MPH on a road clearly made for higher speeds?

Oh - and from what former D.C.-area residents have told me, they only actually issue the tickets to out-of-state plates when they review the data becaues people from the metro area can easily fight the ticket BECAUSE of the lack of marking. For me, being from NH, it's not exactly easy to go 500+ miles to fight a $50 ticket.

While I'm generally a supporter of the police, I'm not blind in that support. Especially when things happen like how a cop pulled me over for screeching my tires for a fraction of a second - brand new car more powerful than anything I'd had and I let the clutch out a little too fast. I'd had this car for less than 48 hours after driving an econobox for years. He cited me for "Creating an environmental disturbance: Noise".

...AT BOSTON'S LOGAN AIRPORT.

I fought that ticket and won. If I lived in MD or VA I would have fought the speeding ticket. It's not like I'm some demon on wheels. The last time I'd gotten a ticket of any kind before this was either 19 or 20 years ago.

Part of the responsibility of having a driver's license and operating a motor vehicle is obeying the rules of the road. If you drove for 19 or 20 years without a ticket you must agree with that or have been extremely lucky. You said that on the Saturday morning there was no traffic. Did you expect them to run out and change the signs and speed limit to 65 for your convenience? Try driving that road at 4:00 pm on a weekday. Accept the fact that you were caught speeding, pay the fine, and move on.

BTW - I'm sure many roadways were designed for a certain speed but speed limits are set lower due to traffic flow, growth in the area, number of accidents, new traffic lights, new intersecting roadways, and countless other factors that may save your life someday.