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Comments
I've read about the costs associated with air enforcement. The real chances of getting caught are so astronomical, it's like hitting the pick 3 in the lottery.
Not if the home state recognizes the doctrine of sovereign immunity, which protects both local and state governments from this type of lawsuit. This doctrine is still relied upon in many jurisdictions throughout the country.
The municipality could produce some sort of explanation for short-timing the yellow lights - no matter how flimsy - that would undoubtedly hold up in court. The municipality would stand little chance of losing money by taking this action.
It has been documented that yellow lights have been shortened in both Washington D.C., and San Diego when the cameras were installed, so this is not a mere urban legend.
And at least one in Dayton.
The light is somewhat obscure by location. In past before new post office had been built it seldom turned red for the main traffic artery. Many people probably ran it when it was red at odd hours at night.
But it probably disappointed the "planners" because it doesn't have much traffic and the trip doesn't turn the light red other than high post office traffic times. So they short-lighted it to gain more "safety" (revenue) for themselves and the city. The city's mantra for the lights is safety. Heck all they need to do is put the cops out doing something instead of sitting in donut shops and alleys talking to each other. I haven't seen a police car cruising looking for traffic law violations in 15 trips in-out of downtown area on two different arteries.
The money grab is irritating because the city always is crying the suburbs need to help fund the city and their wasteful, crime-encouraging ways. But they don't provide traffic protection in any way. Oh today they have a renewal on the ballot for earnings tax which is paid 70% by people who don't live in the city. You'd think they'd provide better protection for those people driving to and from work and other things for the 70% they get. But traffic cameras will suffice as long as they get 10$ or so out of each ticket that they're able to collect on.
I feel like the antispeed limit people on the closed discussion felt about the speed limits. It's not reality as a working method for law enforcement. I look at the inconsiderate drivers eating, drinking, drugging, phoning, boom-boxing, junk-driving cars that shouldn't be on the street and are a danger to those around them. Put some police on the streets instead of cameras.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
They don't need timing markers, they can use other things like timing you between bridges or other items that are usually found crossing highways.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
I see no need whatsoever of saying that. Repent & Retract.
I think every minivan in Bellevue today has a 20mph speed governor. Vehicular cholesterol.
I'm discussing one particular circumstance. That cirucmstance is when the car is not able to stop but tries to any way. I've done it before and slid part way into the intersection. In this circumstance, it isn't necessarily bad behavior but the fact that the driver is now being asked to analyze yet another variable in a split second (do they want to chance a ticket).
You're showing the same mentality, get out of my way regardless of the circumstances.
No, you're just misreading my comments.
I agree, however, that a rear-ender is usually better than t-boned.
Maybe they don't do it on purpose but some of ADOT's engineers actually retimed a light around here and caused 15 minute backups in the morning. So without thinking about it they may make the yellow shorter. I know that on another light on the same highway set by the same people, the yellow is so short that if I enter the intersection at the same time it turns yellow I have to push my car to the limit just to make it when it turns red. I have personally experienced lights in Phoenix where the yellow has gotten shorter over time. Its not an urban legend.
ARS 28-701A:
"A. A person shall not drive a vehicle on a highway at a speed greater than is reasonable and prudent under the circumstances, conditions and actual and potential hazards then existing. A person shall control the speed of a vehicle as necessary to avoid colliding with any object, person, vehicle or other conveyance on, entering or adjacent to the highway in compliance with legal requirements and the duty of all persons to exercise reasonable care for the protection of others."
Oh, and I was given a warning once for going the speed limit of 55 in the left lane when people were wizzing around at 75.
90 MPH = 8100
75 = 5625
55 = 3025
50 = 2500
It can't be that simple. A civic going 90MPH is going to generate less wind resistance than a semi going 90MPH. :surprise:
Still does, just not able to go more than 20MPH over the limit.
Not to mention the murky definition of exactly what the "intersection" is. In AZ if you have an intersection with a sidewalk and striping like this:
--\=======
|_______
|
|
The ======= line is actually the beginning of the intersection. Worse, if the two sides of sidewalk don't line up, you take the one that will produce the smaller rectangular "intersection". It is so confusing that some intersections actually have had to put down red lines marking the boundaries of the intersection so that it shows up clearly and without doubt on the photo where the intersection is.
Drag = Cd * 0.5 * d_air * V^2 * A
Cd = Coefficient of drag.
d_air = Density of the air.
V = Vehicle velocity.
A = Vehicle frontal area.
The drag does go up with the square of the velocity, but factors like the frontal area (huge on a semi, small on a Civic) and drag coefficient (also huge on a semi, small on a Civic) affect the result.
Also, in winter (when the air is more dense) your drag at a given speed goes up too.
I do try to be considerate of circumstances. Today on the way home I come up behind this car in the left lane going 15 under. It took forever to pass it because there was this moron in the right lane that decided to just drive the same speed until he turned off. So I flash my lights, no response. I toot the horn, no response. So as I'm passing I see one tire is actually a spare and as I'm going by they turn left. If they had just put on their emergency flashers I wouldn't have been so irritated and flashed my lights and honked my horn. But without that it looked like just another two cars trying to block me in after a long line of them on the way home.
Observation: The number of stickers, bumper or otherwise, on a vehicle is directly inproportional to the driver's I.Q.
When you see a sticker you disagree with, use your Black rattle can of paint ASAP.
I have been saying that for a long time. But everyone gets a pass for at least one reasonable bumper sticker, say like "X" for president, but not for stuff like "My other car is a spaceship".
I also have to add that the other day I saw a bumper sticker that looked like it had a whole page of a book printed on it. I mean I was stopped at a light right behind it and could barely make out individual lines let alone words.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
For future reference, the phrase should be "inversely proportional".
james
Huked on foniks wurked fur me!
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
Last week, one of the guys I work with had his Malibu totaled by a 90 lb woman in a 1-ton crew cab Dodge that ran a red light while on her cell phone. Luckily he's just a little sore (mentaly and physically).
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
:P
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
I went through the red light camera in Dayton that used to be short-lighted. About 600 feet on the thoroughfare is the next light-no camera. The car about 300 feet behind me went through; I went into it just as the light was yellow. He ran the light solidly.
Next light about 800 feet on. A truck carrying wallboard and other builder supplies went through that light after it was red. He was ahead of me.
Don't tell me those cameras have any effect. Having policemen roaming and watching the cars running the lights would do a lot more to stop the dangerous habit of some people.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
First off nobody has shown that more money goes to the business than the political division save one case.
Secondly how does your example prove anything?
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
It doesn't look good for our speed cameras on the 101 but it is so hard to get details. Here is what I can make out:
Citation: $157.
$73 to the state
$43 to Redflex
$32 partly to Redflex (for rental of equipment) and other operating costs.
$10 to Scottsdale court costs
Source: http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/0124photo24.html
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5366552067462745475&q=%22meditation+on+- the+speed+limit%22
Everyone who exceeds the speed limit on a 55 mph highway, which includes me :P , runs the risk of having the bankrupt come up on the big Wheel of Fortune and getting a ticket.
They go beyond "questionable" all the way to inconsiderate if you ask me.
And no, I'm not really interested in seeing us go back through the speed limit argument again. Everyone pretty clearly defined their positions the last couple of times.
If he'd been smart enough to back off after he nearly rammed me to show that I was using HIS lane, I could have pulled back over, he could have put his testosterone damaged brain back into chemical balance and gone on.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
When I leave work, I pull out of the garage onto a two lane 35mph road with a turn lane. I have to turn left, but the traffic is usually OK so it is rarely a headache. Anyway, as I am pulling out today, a Saturn Vue is coming down the road, and pulls into the turn lane to turn where I am pulling out from. But instead of proceeding (there was no oncoming traffic), she stops in the middle of the road and waves me out! I was kind of scared to do this, as if she changed her mind and hit me, I would certainly be found at fault. I am sure she was just trying to be nice...but come on.
Oh, and I think 9 out of 10 Subarus I saw today had their foglights on. It wasn't foggy or even raining when I was out. Ooh you look so cool.
This is in stark contrast to the people yesterday who were going out of their way to be rude. Speeding up and slowing down, blocking passes, going under the SL in the left lane, etc.
42% said they don't have time.
At least 23% are honest about it.
We're behind a cop car, approaching an intersection. The light turns yellow, then red, just as the cop car gets there. He instantly flips on his light bar just long enough to "legally" go through the intersection without stopping.
This idiot tour bus comes up on my rear end and has the audacity to flip his bright lights on at me. (This was in broad daylight; I just looked in my rear view at the right moment.)
Well, he can't get over into the middle of 3 lanes because there's a line of traffic. Finally he gets over and we see he's an old geezer.
Don't leave the driving to Starr Tours!
Best story I ever had was having an obnoxious trucker between Dayton and Cincy in speed areas and in construction areas. I stopped at a phone booth in Cincy (used to live there) and looked up his truck company in Greater Cincy (Kentucky), called in my complaint, talked to the owner who thought the truck was around Columbus on its way back from Cleveland.
I'd love to have heard that conversation when the trucker did show up and tried to explain why he was on a different route than the owner thought. An Extra load maybe?
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
So my wife used her cell phone to complain. The woman on the other end of the line was a fast-talking "New Yawker" who kept asking all kinds of questions about our location and the time, but nothing about what we were complaining about. Then the line went dead.
I'm going to follow up again tomorrow at work.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
Kyle
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
I am not sure why I was so convinced he would stop me - maybe because of the friends I had had in the car. Ironically, since I never touch alcohol, I could just see me being pulled over and run through the course because of the probable smell of alcohol in the car - I hear that our law enforcement folks are rather aggressive about stops on weekend early-morning-hours. Not that it is unjustified; we have had 9 or 10 deaths in the past 12 months as a direct result of inebriated drivers. That was one of the only times I have been paranoid about being stopped. The only other times is when I am driving my car with expired tags (I have the new tag in the car, just haven't put it on yet), though I have only been stopped once for that and it was because the license plate was "obscured" (i.e., the officer was fishing!).
Man if I were paranoid I would say they were trying to follow me.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
Maybe your car matched the description of a car associated with some recent crime. No doubt they checked your plates for ownership, registration.
A couple of years ago in August, wife and I noticed a car full of teens coming into county fairgrounds as we were leaving, about 1 hour before sunset. Their car was exactly the same as ours. Within a mile or so after the fairgrounds exit, a county sheriff car started to follow and did so for approx 10 minutes which included a number of turns to take various back farm roads back home. He stopped following and made a U-turn presumably after he called in my plate number to ID us.