Hammer Time: Speed Trap City
Imagine you are driving down on a well traveled interstate on a family vacation.
Everything is good in your life. Traffic is minimal. The road is a never ending horizon of the straight and narrow. Just you and your family. When all of a sudden…
Lights. Sirens. A cop getting ever closer to the rear bumper.
You see the cruise is still on 75, pull over, and await the inevitable.
“Sir, I pulled you over because you were speeding down this road.”
“I apologize. I didn’t realize I was speeding.”
“You were driving 75 on a 55.”
You’re shocked. Not at the speed. But at the speed limit. You saw no signs in the area showing the speed at the old double nickel. The officer writes you up. You sign on the dotted line, and start figuring out where you go from here.
So what will you do? The fine would be $280 if you don’t bother showing up to court. Do you take the time off to explain your side of the story? Or do you simply pay the fine and go on with your life?
What would be the best thing to do?
More by Steven Lang
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I fight every one (fortunately I don't have many). If I'm going to get fleeced on BS tickets (like a 50km/h speed limit where it is usually 80 because there a some traffic barrels sitting on the road) I'm going to make the courts works for every penny. If everyone did this we could bog down the ticket racket and maybe our governments would stop with the "Speed Kills" BS. I'm starting to rant. Hopefully the medication will kick in soon...
Makes me glad I live in Manitoba, with our public auto insurance. A fine like this might impact the cost of your driver's license if it put you over 6 demerits in the year, but it would have no impact on your insurance.
I was on Maui last week and noticed underposted speed limits, one case of three speed limit changes in 300 feet and locals going 15-20 over. Speed traps were in obvious places and yet on a small island it was locals getting caught. I think they mostly leave the tourists alone there.
Best cure for speeding? Go past a cop at about 110 and 7000 rpm and then have to appear before a very small town judge. Kept my license barely, explained to the judge I needed it to keep my job and thus pay the rather large fine. After getting hammered by the judge, I then had to let him know I could only afford to pay about half the time and I had to ask him for an extension. Not a real fun day.