Flash Your Headlights!

[poppe]

To Dallas drivers: For the two & 1/2 years I have lived here, I have only seen one cop on the G.W. Parkway and he was speeding too along side with other cars... I have also noticed no one goes the speedlimit unless traffic is preventing. Am I just lucky in avoiding Cops?

I remember driving on 121 between Preston and Coit. (pretty much the boarder of Plano and Frisco) and I noticed a little copper tower on the side of the road. I was thinking wtf What is this? Are they starting to deploy these now? If so that's uber gay. I ran by there again today and I didn't see it. But I have seen them elsewhere like on 75 near the GuitarCenter and that Nissan dealer.



Never happened to me. If that's true that is so F*ed up. But my registration is all good to go anyway.

Hey we live pretty close. Yeah Preston is 45, but you can get away going 55 easily. Got passed by a cop going 60 on it... I acctually used to drive 45 on it because preston has so many cops, but I kept getting cut off and honked at for driving to slow (and passed by the cops). So now my slowest on preston is 55.

 

[®îçhå®?]

They do that in the UK aswell. Who saw Top Gear on Sunday with James May talking about it??

 

[Counterfit]

Friggin SUV is a tank!

I bet it handles like one too.

A few weeks ago (on the day of his retirement party, no less,) my father got rearended by a Plymouth Voyager, while in his Rendezvous. I'll just say this: Bumper vs. Radiators
Of course, he had already gotten bumped two days prior

And one last thing, I believe the "Official" worst drivers list goes: 1. NJ 2. RI 3. NY, but if that description of Texas drivers is accurate for the whole state, they should be up there.

 

[VE3NEF]

I try to, whenever I get the chance. The only problem is, if you get CAUGHT flashing your lights your get screwed royally. I think the penalty is much worse than actually speeding.

Anybody been caught flashing their lights?



-V

 

[wcoppernickle]

Ticketed

Last week I flashed my lights to warn drivers about a motorcycle cop was running radar just around the corner. What I didn't know was that there was another motorcycle cop in the midst of the cars, and she pulled me over and ticketed me with "Unlawful use of Headlights." A fine of $195, here in Texas.
Before this I had never heard that it is illegal to flash to warn others, but apparently it is. I'm guessing that the cops have all sorts of laws on the books that they can pull out to write up people who are following the law, but impeding their ticket writing.
My approval rating for the police is at -10 on a scale between 1 and 100.
I don't think it's right that the police should be able to run speed traps when there are kids selling drugs to students in the public schools. They need to worry about crime, not people who are minding their own business. If a person is driving safely, even if he or she is speeding, then let them speed. Don't sit there and wait for a speeder.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

well the ticket is questionable at best. Pretty much the cop was being an ass. You defences is you where warning the drivers of a road hazard coming up. (just don't say what that the hazard was a cop) I think more he was just enjoying his power. I personally have a very low respect running speed traps. I believe tickets should be used to stop the speeding behavior not to make money and speed traps are for money. I like the cities that have policies in place that do not allow cops to keep reusing the same spot over and over again and require them to move around. That way they are not setting up a trap for money. they are moving around and catching speeder every where. Also I like the cities that have a very low quota for there cops to fill. Basically a number that should easily be done with out much work and really only getting people who really deserve it. not every person they pull over.

 

[Grakkle]

I do it sometimes. Quiet frankly I get a thrill out of other people getting caught. I speed all the time and rarely ever see someone flash me. I am just a bad person.

I never flash and I don't intend to start. Agree with above about thrill of getting away with speeding and others getting caught... I often drive 40 kms over the limit and have never had a ticket. Just a bastard like that I guess.

 

[Butler Trumpet]

It saved me again... well kinda. I was only doing 76 in a 70. But I still saw the guy flashing, and slowed down and there was a cop about a half mile away.

I then flashed for the next mile.

Seriously I hope this catches on sometime.

 

[Evangelion]

This post, is to ask everyone to do the same that this truck and myself do every time we see a cop... wait until you get past them, then flash your lights like crazy to let people going the other way to slow down.

So that drunk-drivers and people who believe that speed-limits don't apply to them can avoid being caught by the police? Yeah, that sounds like a really good idea! Or not.

I was really thankful for that guy, cause I was doing about 79 or 80 (speed limit 70) and I cant afford any more tickets, cause I got 2 last year.

If you can't afford to get more tickets, why don't you just... you know: obey the speed-limits?

 

[mad jew]

Speed limits are crap. Why should I trust a painted piece of metal when it comes to determining my speed? I'm indestructible and when I speed, nothing bad happens.

 

[Evangelion]

12 experiences over 4 YEARS... thank you for the continual intelligence insults, even tho you know nothing more about me than this.

Zero tickets in 12 years. I don't know how I do it. Oh, wait. I do. I just obey the speed-limits.

Lets just say that it paid for itself within 6 months.

You break the law that often? Hey, maybe I should buy a nightstick. it too would "pay for itself" pretty quickly. I heard those old ladies are especially easy targets.

 

[holamiamigos]

are there any issues of distractions.... my only concerns...

 

[DZ/015]

You need to be going faster than the state troopers here in Massachusetts to get ticketed. Good luck with that. I've yet to encounter one driving less than 90mph.

 

[mad jew]

Zero tickets in 12 years. I don't know how I do it. Oh, wait. I do. I just obey the speed-limits.

You break the law that often? Hey, maybe I should buy a nightstick. it too would "pay for itself" pretty quickly. I heard those old ladies are especially easy targets.

Posting twice in a row is against the rules here. Do you look as unfavourably upon that as you do upon speeding and beating old women?

 

[Evangelion]

Posting twice in a row is against the rules here.

It is?

Do you look as unfavourably upon that as you do upon speeding and beating old women?

No, since posting twice in a row doesn't harm anyone. And I haven't seen any rule that says that powsting twice in a row is verboten. is there a copy of the forum-rules somewhere?

Speeding and beating wold women on the other actually DO harm other people, and everybody knows that it's against the law.

 

[CortexRock]

Personally I wouldn't flash oncoming drivers - I think if you get caught speeding, you deserve everything you get. Not saying that I don't speed occasionally - if I did, and got caught then I'd take my lumps.

I have police officers in my family, and have been told that most manually operated speed checks base the decision to pull a driver over on the following formula:

Speed limit + 10% + 2mph

(so theoretically, you could do 79mph in a 70 zone and be okay).

Not sure about GATSO (fixed roadside) cameras though.

But I also heard that those new digital ones that measure average speed over a quarter mile don't work if you change lanes between cameras! Anyone in the UK heard this?

 

[Henri Gaudier]

I read on the BBC site that over 90,000 UK Police had got caught speeding last year but only just over 300 were fined. It's the same in France ... perhaps everywhere. So it can't be that bad then can it? Otherwise they'd be punished ....

More seriously, in congested areas - it's a bad idea. Stupid in fact but out here on the open Roman roads and car-less motorways ... where's the harm? I used to speed all the time but now cash is tighter and this aspect of green living is bedding in .. I've started cruising almost 90% of the time. Around 80/90 KM instead of 160 KM. My 60 litre tank used to get about 560 KM/350 miles and now it's more like 750 KM/460 miles. With petrol back up to €1.35/$1.85/£0.92 a litre it's an absolute necessity. This is for the best petrol though - 98 octane which is what I always use.

I always flash. Just common decency. Although in Summer there are a few speed traps* and we are unfortunately starting to get lots of Speed Cameras the most common cause of me flashing is to warn people about dogs sat in the road! But that's farmers dogs for you ... they're a bit daft.

*It's funny how they're at the bottom of a steep hill isn't it but never going up?

 

[mfacey]

Speeding tickets suck. I'm lucky enough to have all the fixed speeding cameras on my Garmin GPS and it warns me when I'm approaching one too fast. As for the mobile ones, I'm still screwed. I've had my license for just over 4 years now here in Holland and I've managed to accumulate 4 speeding violations (all from mobile cameras) and one other violation for turning left where it wasn't permitted.

I really hate mobile speed cameras though. On one occasion I was momentarily driving a few km/h too fast and got a fine. The new systems being used here in Holland measure your speed over a set distance (they take a picture of you entering the zone and exiting, and calculate how long it took you). These are much more fair as it only books the people that structurally drive too fast.

I drive too fast on a regular basis. Generally between 130 and 140 km/h in a 120 km/h zone. I was in Germany briefly last week and hit 195 km/h on the speedo. Doing that legally is great!

 

[Evangelion]

I drive too fast on a regular basis.

In that case you deserve every single speeding-ticket you get. And whining about those tickets is dumb because it's entirely your own fault.

 

[mfacey]

In that case you deserve every single speeding-ticket you get. And whining about those tickets is dumb because it's entirely your own fault.

Well yeah, a ticket is always your own fault isn't it?

Let me also add that I don't speed it congested areas, only on the motorway when its safe to do so. I also speed within the margin mentioned above because the fines above that range start to get very high. I now get by with fines no higher than 30 euros.

 

[xUKHCx]

Personally I wouldn't flash oncoming drivers - I think if you get caught speeding, you deserve everything you get. Not saying that I don't speed occasionally - if I did, and got caught then I'd take my lumps.

I have police officers in my family, and have been told that most manually operated speed checks base the decision to pull a driver over on the following formula:

Speed limit + 10% + 2mph

(so theoretically, you could do 79mph in a 70 zone and be okay).

Not sure about GATSO (fixed roadside) cameras though.

But I also heard that those new digital ones that measure average speed over a quarter mile don't work if you change lanes between cameras! Anyone in the UK heard this?

Haven't heard this, would've thought that they would have over come this very early on in development as it very likely that someone will change lanes over such a distance.

 

[atszyman]

No, since posting twice in a row doesn't harm anyone. And I haven't seen any rule that says that powsting twice in a row is verboten. is there a copy of the forum-rules somewhere?

Forum Rules there's a nifty little FAQ/Rules button at the top of most of the forum pages where the rules are spelled out nicely.

Number 6 in Minor Problems:

Sequential posts. Combine your comments into one post rather than making many consecutive posts to a thread within a short period of time.

Admittedly it's listed as a "Minor Problem" but if you're going to equate beating up old ladies for cash with speeding then personal insults and posting twice in a row should also be considered roughly equivalent.

 

[CortexRock]

Haven't heard this, would've thought that they would have over come this very early on in development as it very likely that someone will change lanes over such a distance.

Generally I've only seen the speed over distance cameras used in roadworks, with signs saying that you should stay in lane... that's what made me curious!

The new overhead 'variable speed limit' gantries on the M6 and M40 are a whole different thing though... apparently they all have these speed over distance cameras built in.

 

[Evangelion]

Admittedly it's listed as a "Minor Problem" but if you're going to equate beating up old ladies for cash with speeding then personal insults and posting twice in a row should also be considered roughly equivalent.

Is two posts in a row "many posts"? And where exactly did I resort to "personal attacks"? Is it a "personal attack" when I consider it downright stupid to break the law and helping others do it as well? That when I disagree with this "hey, lets help others break the law and endanger the lives of other road-goers!"-mentality that fills this thread, I'm resorting to "personal attacks"?

Uh, whatever dude And why do I get the impression that you are focusing on my terrible crime of posting two messages in a row, instead of focusing at the real subject here: helping others break the law.

Next time you guys decide to help other break the speed-limit, keep this is mind:

http://www.10news.com/news/13329599/detail.html

Or this:

http://www.mauinews.com/story.aspx?id=31132

Or this:

http://starbulletin.com/2007/06/06/news/story05.html

Or this:

http://www.lex18.com/Global/story.asp?S=6618969

Or this:

http://orangecounty.injuryboard.com...er-crashing-into-light-pole.php?googleid=8801

Yeah, let's help those speeders avoid those traffic-tickets, since breaking the speed-limit is everyones god-given right !

Seriously: I'm just 100% fed-up with people who believe that rules and laws do not apply to them. What is it with this stupidity and selfishness?

 

[atszyman]

Is two posts in a row "many posts"? And where exactly did I resort to "personal attacks"? Is it a "personal attack" when I consider it downright stupid to break the law and helping others do it as well? That when I disagree with this "hey, lets help others break the law and endanger the lives of other road-goers!"-mentality that fills this thread, I'm resorting to "personal attacks"?

I didn't defend speeding, nor did I say you should help people avoid tickets. When someone blows past me on the highway I secretly hope to see them pulled over later on in my trip. It's not that I don't ever speed but there is a point of recklessness that gets passed.

You are the one talking about abiding by the rules and putting attacking old ladies in the same category as speeding.

Posting multiple messages in a row in the same thread in a short time period is a minor annoyance and spelled out in the forum rules but it is not the same as a personal insult (which I didn't accuse you of). In much the same way, speeding is not the same as beating up old ladies. But if you're going to be a complete sticker for the laws/rules then it helps to abide by both.

Most people here, when talking about speeding, are probably talking about the typical 5-10 MPH over the posted speed limit (which if it's anything like here, is required to keep up with traffic), this is not too dangerous much like a couple posts in a row is not too big of a deal. Now when you start getting 20-50 MPH over the limit we're talking recklessness more akin to 10s of posts consecutively in a thread. I will sometimes flash my headlights, much the same that I will sometimes point out a minor violation of the forum rules. It all depends on how generous I'm feeling that day.

The few times I've been pulled over I graciously accepted my tickets and paid my fine/went to defensive driving. I haven't ever tried to get out of a ticket and I don't offer any excuses for what I was doing other than my own stupidity. Much the same way I've handled any notification of breaking or getting close to breaking forum rules.