New GPS-powered features could help reposition a gizmo that has historically appealed to the young and the reckless.
Comment: Look like you're a Nascar fan, a Nascar name, didn't I see you around a Nascar wheel or was that Dale.
Comment: Under certain circumstances, speeding isn't all that bad. But in residential and high pedestrian traffic areas, excessive speeders should be arrested and not simply ticketed. And people who run red lights are just plain selfish ***holes. Here is my idea for people who despise dangerous drivers as much as I do. Be a database saboteur; locate any user generated red light databases that allow public input, and flood them with any intersection you want to remain safe. Aw what the heck, flood them with every intersection you can think of. Have a nice day.
Comment: Technology that can alert citizens to the presence and location of law enforcement won't be 'legal' for long....so get it now while you can. Sounds to me like a new Electronic Intelligence war will be brewing, one that pits US Citizens against its own Government. First the Patriot Act/Cell-Phone snooping, and now GPS signals and traffic cameras. The fun is just beginning.
Comment: Perhaps the trooper is there to enforce the speed limit, maniz. Speed limits are created to try to ensure safety for all-pedestrians and motorists alike. Speed laws matter everywhere, not just in residential and school zones.
Comment: You did not read my post closely-enough. Having him standing there causes people to slam on their brakes and drive WELL BELOW the 75mph limit, hence the long and completely unnecessary traffic jam in that spot every damn morning. And it surprises me that he and his teammates aren't smart-enough to have realized after the first few days that they were doing the OPPOSITE of what they should be doing; ensuring the traffic keeps moving briskly (and at the posted speed limit) during the crucial rush hour.
Comment: Perhaps if the motorists drove around 75 or so, they wouldn't need to slam on their brakes. Why slow down if you're driving within the speed limit? I also commute every day (not as much as you, I'll admit). And I encounter State Troopers several times a week. I've noticed that if the flow of traffic is at or around the posted speed limit, nobody slams on their brakes and the Troopers don't bother you. If traffic backs up when everyone is driving within the limits, then perhaps that's a good reason to expand the highway or find an alternate route. It's still not a good reason to thumb your nose at the laws and speed because it's convenient. SLOW DOWN!
Comment: My daily commute involves a long, straight stretch of a 3-lane highway with a 75mph speed limit. There are no exits, side streets, or neighborhoods nearby, NONE. Yet, at least one trooper sits there almost always. As a result, the morning rush hour gets clogged right in that spot for miles. WHY IN THE WORLD would the highway patrol choose to do the opposite of actually keeping the traffic MOVING? I am not advocating triple-digit speeds here, but these LEO knuckleheads needs to learn that people stomp on the breakes wherever they see them, regardless of speed. In most cases, highway speed traps are entirely uncalled for. Enforce speed laws where they they matter: in residential and school zones. Keep the highway traffic moving.
Comment: while i am forever a lead foot. since i turned 50 i usually only go over 5mph of the speed limit. oh what a shame to be old wiser! with no tickets.
Comment: One more note-My family and I recently drove from New York to Florida on vacation. We drove within the speed limits of every locality we passed through. We drove cautiously and defensively, through good weather and rain storms. Perhaps it took longer than it would have if we had been zipping past all of the other cars or travelling with the "flow of traffic speed". But we made it safely in the end. And no speeding tickets. Imagine that.
Comment: Mike, no one advocates that people should be driving 90 MPH through residential neighborhoods, but notice that the 30 mph speed limit didn't prevent this either. I never have accidents because I ALWAYS drive with the assumption or expectation that someone around me is going to do something dumb. I am often proved correct. Accidents are a result of driver inattention or, more often than not, stupudity. (as in the case you cited) Everyone needs to drive defensively. I am astonished when I am driving downtown and pedestrians just walk right out across the street when the light tells them to, without looking! They just assume that drivers will stop at the red light as they supposed to. My advice:never assume anything.
Comment: How about a little old-fashioned common sense? I'm sure (I hope) most everyone would agree that driving at excessive speeds is more dangerous than driving at more reasonable speeds. It results in having to brake faster and earlier in the event that you do have to slow down or stop. How many fatalities are the result of speeding and running red lights? Perhaps the advocates of speeding have an argument to justify these deaths? I live on a fairly quiet street where the speed limit is 30MPH. However about two years ago, some idiot came roaring down the street at about 90, swerved, hit my neighbor's rock wall, a tree, flipped over and skidded across my front yard. The driver was killed instantly-practically severed in two. If my two kids had been playing there, I submit they would probably have been killed. Be cautious, be careful, and SLOW DOWN! It's just not worth it.
Comment: Radar detectors are not just used by reckless Kids; they are also used by responsible adults that resent being caught in a revenue producing "speed traps" when their only crime is driving at what is typically the "flow of traffic speed". It is no secret that municipalities use speed traps as a way to generate capital off of unaware tourists. The last time I crossed into Florida from Georgia I counted 26 different speed traps in a 150 mile stretch of Highway. Are they there for public safety? No. Are they there to promote social responsibility? No. Are they there to collect their cut of the multi-billion dollar Florida tourist industry? Bingo. Aren't we already big enough suckers by paying these contrived gas prices without further contributing to these "hidden luxury taxes?"
Comment: The police really need to find better things to do than handing out speeding tickets on wide-open highways. This month's Atlantic Monthly has an interesting article which shows how stupid the USA is in the way it enforces traffic laws. We actually cause more accidents by trying to over-enforce. This proves something that I have personally suspected for a long time. Maybe high gas prices will reduce the presence of police on the highways. Police should be out there basically to help motorists, and to keep traffic moving! The greatest waste of gasoline is to be idling on an interstate. Traffic tickets and red-light cameras primarily serve to generate revenue. Interestingly, in Dallas, they are discontinuing red-light cameras in some areas because they worked to well! Accidents went down, and people stopped running red lights; but the city wasn't making any money! Imagine that, discontinuing a program because it worked. Only government could come up with such reasoning.
Comment: While I find the technology to be wonderful, my question is this: Are these devices just giving drivers something else to blame for their own lack of ability to pay attention? It's almost as if these devices are allowing drivers the ability not to heed basic traffic safety. If you can't even know when you are in a school zone, or pay a little more attention to that traffic light, then I don't believe you belong behind the wheel at all.
Comment: RockyMountian Radars are much better tan this system and this knowledge can only make them better Rocky mountian radars need an on and off switch so when you piss off a cop by its use you can slow up and turn it off so he can read your speed and not knopw you have one!!!
Comment: Daniel McGinn, check out http://www.trapster.com . It's a speed trap sharing social network that uses the GPS function on your mobile phone. It already works on about 10 different mobile platforms with GPS (Nokia, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Java/J2ME devices) and will of course support the GPS iPhone. It also works on phones that do not have GPS.
Comment: No one need to buy the device. Everyone who feels the need for speed no only deserves a tickit but you are also contributing to the higer fuel prices - - shame-on-you. I see this everywhere I drive. Drivers punching it just to beat the driver ahead or the next light. And alot of drivers going way over the speed liming in town or on the freeway. If everyone in this country whould just slow down to the speed limit law then you would not get a ticket and it would also help in slowing the demand for feul in this country and just maybe are fuel prices could go lower.
Comment: Hey, that's me! I was the young reckless driver with a radar detector. Now I'm a 43 yr old Dad with a mini-van!
Comment: These devices are (not GPS systems) made for people who constantly break the laws designed to protect society. The radar devices & now "don't run a red light" device are not a necessary part of a vehicles tools to other wise navigate the road if you are not a violater of the rules. As mentioned in the article these devices were once for the reckless...they still are!
Comment: These devices are (not GPS systems) made for people who constantly break the laws designed to protect society. The radar devices & now "don't run a red light" device are not a necessary part of a vehicles tools to other wise navigate the road if you are not a violater of the rules. As mentioned in the article these devices were once for the reckless...they still are!
Comment: These devices are (not GPS systems) made for people who constantly break the laws designed to protect society. The radar devices & now "don't run a red light" device are not a necessary part of a vehicles tools to other wise navigate the road if you are not a violater of the rules. As mentioned in the article these devices were once for the reckless...they still are!
Comment: What's a massicure-a cross between a massage and a manicure?
Comment: Hey Wallruss, I'm sure your for gun control also. I have used one of these devices for years now. I drive 50,000 miles a year and that puts me at 4 times the risk of a traffic ticket than the average person. The cost of a ticket on your insurance is far beyond the cost of the ticket itself. When I have the unit on I drive much more aware and slower because I am more aware of the police presents. By the way 98% of the red light tickets given out are not for people "running the light at full speed" they are for not coming to a full stop before a right turn. Hardly the massicure liberals would have you believe is going to happen if we don't have a camera at every light. these cameras are tax revenue generaters, nothing more
Comment: T'aint the hated liberals promoting these devices my friend. It's your own corrupt local politicians. Wear your gun proudly and talk to them. Then you'll get a real understanding of "power structure"!!
Comment: Driving 50,000 miles a year doesn't increase your risk of a traffic ticket-speeding does! You just seem more interested in seeing what you can get away with. (And by the way, I am not for gun control. I own a Smith & Wesson .38 Special)
Comment: I am not for gun control. I own more guns that anyone you know. I live out in the west and shooting and hunting are a part of my every day life. I shot for many years both target and combat match for the U.S.Army Special Forces. I am not a liberal, not by any stretch of the imagination. I am however a former Law Enforcement officer who has stopped many a speeding citizen. Many a citizen for running a red light. And cleaned up many, way to many victims of someone who is willing to bet the lives of others that they can drive outside the laws and limits with out getting in a wreck or getting caught. The arrogance of this typical ( not all, just the vast majority ) person is as thick as the odor at the south end of a north bound skunk.
I have actually had citizens try to sue me in court because me and my radar out smarted them and their Fuzz Buster. I got pretty good at defeating the dang things. And I must admit there is a bit of satisfaction in writing a citation to someone who thought the Fuzz Buster was going to stop me.
It is a very simple measure of which side of the law one walks. If the cops are considered someone to hide from, someone to watch out for because they may catch you, you are on the wrong side of the law. Not all cops are good guys. And the good Lord knows that the one I like catching most is the crooked cop. But most of the cops I know and worked with over the years ( in Nevada, Wyoming, Utah, Idaho and Montana ) have been pretty stand up guys. Guys that put their life on the line time and time again trying to keep things safe for the citizens out there. And yes, writing tickets is a very real part of that because there is always some Horses *** that thinks that speed limits are for someone else not them, that stop lights and stop signs are only for someone else. That it's OK for them to pass in a no passing zone. That it's OK to speed through a school zone. That using turn signals is for wimps and ninnies. And that is all fine and dandy until their arrogance gets them into a wreck and someone gets hurt then they start crying "I am so sorry, but it was an accident". No it is not. It is the direct result or a criminal action. They choose to disobey the law and because of that some one was hurt. Not an accident, but a crime.
Comment: What makes you think that anyone that uses these so they can run red lights is going to pull over for an emergence vehicle? What a crock of crap. It you are using this device and you are running red lights or speeding I do hope that when you cause an accident you are the one they put into the body bag. BUT unfortunately it most likely won't be. It will be some pregnant mom with her other two or three kids in the car. Or some ones grand parents. A wreck caused by someone using on of these things should not be called an accident, it is will full disregard for others safety and should be pursued with criminal charges. This is no better than hurting someone in a DUI / DWI situation. You disgust me promoting this device.
Comment: Here is a thought, OBEY THE SPEED LIMIT! It is there to protect everyone.
Comment: I'd like to see a system where if a car detects radar being used, it uploads that event to a database and alerts other users of that service in the area. Basically you'd need a weighted system where x radar events generate a temporary "hot spot" and propagate a warning out to subscribers as long as the hot spot is active.
Comment: jblackwell88 - What you describe is what Trapster(R) already does, check it out at http://www.trapster.com
Comment: Here is a thought: OBEY THE SPEED LIMIT. It is posted for everyones safety.
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