Police

A few days ago an off duty police member from another town reported a family member as allegedly committing two traffic infractions.  A constable from our local RCMP has attended our home twice to try to serve this family member with the traffic tickets, but has (honestly) come when this family member was at work.

Question: I just phoned Abbotsford police about a driver of a Nissan GTR license plate 735-TRB that passed me at about 160 kmh on Riverside road. They say there is nothing they can do with the report unless I am willing to go to court. I have a life and work and am not making my wages for the day if I to go to court.

I drive a semi tractor trailer for a living. I was wondering what cops' take is on slowly rolling through a stop sign at 5 kph, after scanning the intersection in a rural area and seeing no traffic.

I would imagine that your opinion of police traffic surveillance tactics probably depends a lot on whether you are the recipient of a ticket or not because of them. You may have actually seen Corporal Smith in Nanaimo dressed up as the Easter Bunny or Constable Martell of Kelowna wearing a hoodie and holding up a sign made of cardboard. They certainly got to see a lot of traffic violators and provided information to pick up teams a bit further down the road.

Radar and laser detectors are currently legal to install in your vehicle and use to avoid prosecution for failing to follow the speed limits in British Columbia. One has to ask why BC is one of the few provinces in our country that has not made this illegal. If you think like I do, inappropriate speed is a significant contributor to collisions and should not be encouraged in any way.

Got your quota yet? It was a jab that I heard often at the roadside and some days I really wanted to respond to it. "Yes, thank you. This ticket means I get a new toaster!" Somehow I don't think the driver would have seen any humour in it.

Just perused an interesting map, it shows the location of crashes in our area. We have a difference of opinion as to the RCMP and their use of speed traps and were both entitled to this and I always respect others opinions.

After just coming back from a trip I thought I would see what you have to say about an issue that has been bugging me for some time. One can not drive very far without encountering one of what I call the crazies. The driver who drives like a fool, way too fast for either weather or road conditions, passing when its not safe, Etc. Etc.,and generally putting everyone in his or her path at risk.

I was issued a ticket for Speed Against a Municipal Sign for driving over 30 km/h in a playground zone. The officer had no laser and no radar. She flagged me over, saying "The speed limit here is 30, you were not doing 30." I can't say whether I was doing 31 or 51. My best guess based on the location I was pulled over would be somewhere between 30 to 40 km/h.

When a vehicle is in yaw it is rotating around a vertical axis through it's center of mass. The long, curved Y shaped marks left by the tires on the pavement were characteristic of this motion. If they were striated and of constantly diminishing radius they were of great interest for collision reconstruction because the vehicle's speed could be determined from them.