Police Chief Says iPhone Users Are Cowards

BloodyIron said:
Guess what, these speed traps obviously arent working. BECAUSE PEOPLE STILL DIE.
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That's crazy talk. That couldn't possibly be true!

ordovician said:
Whenever anyone is going faster than the general speed of traffic, it can create a dangerous situation. I think you're confusing this with the study that showed that increased speed LIMITS does not increase fatalities. Big difference.
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No difference. "Speeding" is the act of driving faster than the posted speed limit. If the general flow of traffic is moving at a rate greater than the posted speed limit, all of the drivers are speeding. Thus, speeding does not necessarily yield a "dangerous situation".
 
Rofl-Mic-Lofl said:
...we should keep passing laws...
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And therein lies the problem... Passing laws upon laws solves nothing. How about a little education? People are going to do whatever they want, not matter what is written on a paper someplace with some random guy somewhere telling you what you can and can't do.
 
Increasing yellow light times by 1-2s is more effective at preventing accidents than cameras. Cameras are just a money grab.
 
phide said:
That's crazy talk. That couldn't possibly be true!


No difference. "Speeding" is the act of driving faster than the posted speed limit. If the general flow of traffic is moving at a rate greater than the posted speed limit, all of the drivers are speeding. Thus, speeding does not necessarily yield a "dangerous situation".
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>.< I think I implied that. Everyone going 70 in a 55 is safer than 1 guy going 70 in a 55, with everone else going 55. The issue goes back to discretion on the part of a police officer, and indiscretion on the part of cameras.
 
obs said:
Cameras are just a money grab.
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Thats the truth. How many cities now have gotten in trouble because they actually reduce the yellow light times so they can "catch" more people running the red lights just so they cane make more money. Cowards. They just can't rob people like normal thugs.
 
how dare YOU law enforcement pass me up doing 90 while i do the SPEED Limit with no lights or sirens ON...YOU should follow the laws and set examples before we do...
 
maademperor said:
worse, when I flash my lights at people as a warning I dont think they even know what I'm trying to convey
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try flashing your lights at someone and having them flash back or flip you the bird :(
 
So if I use an iPhone to find the location of cameras and subsequently exercise increased prudence in their vicinity... how does that make one a "coward".

Cameras are a "tax", nothing more.
 
ordovician said:
Speeding has been shown to not increase fatalities? Are you delusional? .
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Not at all.
You can reference anything you'd like, but hard numbers don't become a factor until you actually try it out. And guess what? Montana actually tried this out in the 90s.

And guess what? They had the lowest fatality rate EVER during the period when they did not have speed limits.

When the National Speed Limit was repealed- fatality rates reduced to the lowest levels as well.


What do you say about the autobahn in Germany? They don't have any speed limit whatsoever and they have a CONSIDERABLY better fatality rate. It's perfectly legal to fly around a police car over there.

Then when the US again mandated a National Speed Limit law (Has been in place ever sense), fatalities begin to rise again.

Coincidences? Hell no.
 
fightingfi said:
how dare YOU law enforcement pass me up doing 90 while i do the SPEED Limit with no lights or sirens ON...YOU should follow the laws and set examples before we do...
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while I do agree with you, it's a non-argument. it's stated that they are allowed to break whatever law to enforce the law you broke. which I think is complete bullshit. if they worked in teams they wouldn't need to speed to catch a speeder. either way if I put others in harms way when I speed how is it any different for them?
 
Rofl-Mic-Lofl said:
Totally irrelevant.

If that's the cause of the accidents, we should keep passing laws against phone usage while driving, etc. That doesn't make it right to totally disregard public safety and keep putting up cameras instead of doing the right thing that is best for the safety of the people: adding in a countdown timer and increasing yellow light times.
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How is that irrelevant? The camera didn't cause Driver B to hit the back of Driver A who stopped suddenly due to knowing the camera was there. Driver A did nothing wrong. Driver B is at fault but according to you it is the camera that's at fault. Explain that please because technically it is illegal to speed, tailgate, and many other things that are defined as "reckless driving." If Driver B hits Driver A because they they are speeding, following too closely, or talking on a phone without a hands free headset in an area like DC where that is illegal then Driver B is totally at fault. Period.

Yes, we should keep passing laws against phone usage and we should slap the people who get caught with HUGE fines. $75 fines to the Senior VP of a company is chump change. DC is already on hands free only area but it's not enforced nearly enough nor is the punishment enough to make those people who are caught not do it again. Make them pay for breaking the law. They'll learn after they pay a $250+ fine a few times. And I don't care if somebody says that's too much. You have to hit the person where it hurts the most which is our wallet in order for things to sink in.

And I never said we shouldn't increase the yellow light times. Combined with a camera that might actually increase the amount of tickets. I say that because of the number of idiots here in DC who will instead hit their gas pedal to try to make it through the light because they know they have an extra 2 seconds.
 
Red light cameras are cowardly if you ask me. You are cheating. Thats part of the game...if you are not there to catch me, I win. Thats just how the game is played.
 
increase yellow light times, and SYNC the god damn green light on major roadways so if you do 55mph (or 80kph for us) you always hit a green...but while they are at it, bump up speed limits beyond 1950 standards when people drove boats with no seat belts, they need to raise speed limits 25% across the board, cars are much safer than they were 50 + years ago, time the speed limits started to reflect that
 
If I were the cops I would use the information to my advantage, by not devoting so many resources to those areas, and to put them slightly in front of or after them (or other areas not known). That should actually increase the amount of tickets. Just have a memo a couple of times a week with a map of all the current know speed trap areas.

It’s really not that hard to turn this into a big advantage for them instead of against them.

Maybe I'll send them an E-mail and help them out.
 
To everyone complaining about speed/traffic cameras being a "source of revenue", just wait until your city, county, state has to lay off some of its officers from budget cuts.
In every area that i know of local to me that has implemented these cameras, none of them caused any officers to lose their jobs but rather allowed more of them to be out there performing their other duties serving and protecting you. What happens when they get laid off because idiots chose to ignore traffic lays, and then circumvent a means of catching those people. What happens when you are in need of police assistance and you cant get it, or they arent there soon enough to protect you, who wants to bet that you'll be complaining then to.
Its not like this "source of revenue" generates a profit for law enforcement. The money generated from that goes right back into the budgets for law enforcement, and could in some cases mean less of your tax dollars have to be used, or in place of those tax dollars when there isnt enough.
I see people asking "If cameras can do all this... bring in so much revenue... tell me again why so many human officers are required?" (user comments from the article site)
WTF are you smoking? Officers do so much more than babysit your traffic violations.
 
Reduce speed traps (except for DUI enforcement) and raise the speed limits, then allow cops to rough up people that run from them and cause high speed chases. Cops are happy, I'm happly.
 
"I think that's the whole point of this program," she told The Examiner. "It's designed to circumvent law enforcement -- law enforcement that is designed specifically to save lives."
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You stupid ignorant man. Why are those cameras and speed traps there? To make people slow down? Pretty ironic you want to have people run red lights and speed so that you can get some more cash into the coffers at the expense of public safety.

$100 says this police chief is a die hard republican because this is the kind of bullshit, "values" induced tripe my grandfather would have said years ago, who was also law enforcement. No one else would support such blatant blocking of information and technology to make money.
 
dr.stevil said:
really? that stinks

drove thru maryland a few times on my way down to NC and they don't mess around. I've never seen so many cops on one stretch of road in my life lol
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Inverse proportions: smaller the state or locality, the stricter the enforcement... for obvious. monetary reasons.
 
This man is another one of the hundreds million reasons this country sucks more and more each day.

Typical lying BS - all for the sake of a dollar. Much like retared parents they hide behind buzzwords like "safety" and "children", "future" , "green".

He's going to say anything he can to keep free ticket money flowing into his department. If he was an honest cop and REALLY cared about safety - they would keep the traffic light and make everyone caught go to a drivers ed program or something, no points, no $ exchange, just 100% "safety". (i still think it would be a stupid idea but at least the money grab aspect would be eliminated).
 
InsanePerson said:
To everyone complaining about speed/traffic cameras being a "source of revenue", just wait until your city, county, state has to lay off some of its officers from budget cuts.
In every area that i know of local to me that has implemented these cameras, none of them caused any officers to lose their jobs but rather allowed more of them to be out there performing their other duties serving and protecting you. What happens when they get laid off because idiots chose to ignore traffic lays, and then circumvent a means of catching those people. What happens when you are in need of police assistance and you cant get it, or they arent there soon enough to protect you, who wants to bet that you'll be complaining then to.
Its not like this "source of revenue" generates a profit for law enforcement. The money generated from that goes right back into the budgets for law enforcement, and could in some cases mean less of your tax dollars have to be used, or in place of those tax dollars when there isnt enough.
I see people asking "If cameras can do all this... bring in so much revenue... tell me again why so many human officers are required?" (user comments from the article site)
WTF are you smoking? Officers do so much more than babysit your traffic violations.
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That gave me a good laugh. Thanks! I needed that. I PRAY that all these cops are laid off. They are beyond worthless and are nothing more than government thugs. At least if they don't have their gun and badge and they try their thuggish BS we can kick the crap out of them and not get in trouble for it.
 
Rofl-Mic-Lofl said:
Red light cameras are not to reduce accidents, they are for the sole purpose of ticket revenue for the city. Infact, red light cameras INCREASE accidents.
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This is a proven fact. There have been numerous studies done in San Diego alone that show this is the case and yet the city still maintains that it's about safety. You see, whenever government introduces any new device, law, or some sort of legalistic vehicle in the name of safety, you have nearly zero chance to stop it and one it's in it's in. The only thing that will stop red light cameras is to make them so expensive to operate that cities that employ them will stop.
 
eggrock said:
Reduce speed traps (except for DUI enforcement) and raise the speed limits, then allow cops to rough up people that run from them and cause high speed chases. Cops are happy, I'm happly.
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Until they "rough up" the wrong person..........;)
 
To those that think we need more laws... My cousin was killed by a drunk driver. Driving while drunk is illegal. Where was the law to save him? Eh? No piece of paper with something written on it (let alone a politician or judge) flew in out of nowhere and saved him. Laws prevent nothing. This is the same argument we keep having with gun control. Laws do nothing except burden those who would actually follow them. The rest of us just do what we want.
 
CanadaOwnsJoo said:
increase yellow light times, and SYNC the god damn green light on major roadways so if you do 55mph (or 80kph for us) you always hit a green...but while they are at it, bump up speed limits beyond 1950 standards when people drove boats with no seat belts, they need to raise speed limits 25% across the board, cars are much safer than they were 50 + years ago, time the speed limits started to reflect that
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Yes and no, depends. Although the speed limit is 30mph on the narrow residential campus roads at my university, which I think is absolutely outrageous.
 
Ibanezfoo said:
To those that think we need more laws... My cousin was killed by a drunk driver. Driving while drunk is illegal. Where was the law to save him? Eh? No piece of paper with something written on it (let alone a politician or judge) flew in out of nowhere and saved him. Laws prevent nothing. This is the same argument we keep having with gun control. Laws do nothing except burden those who would actually follow them. The rest of us just do what we want.
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So lets make driving drunk legal cause the law is obviously doing nothing right?

I'm sorry for your friend, but the fact is the law against drunk driving does in fact help, however because some people believe they are too good for the law, or believe them to be ineffectual and "just do what they want" still do it, and cause accidents and those laws then provide you the ability to rot in jail for it.

It is views like yours that make innocents such as your friend victims.
 
There are relevant points on both dies of the 'law' argument. But it remains that if the law should be respected, it has to be in service of not only the common good but the common wish, as well. Quite clearly, from our responses today, that second aspect isn't addressed by such speed traps.

I was born and raised in the DC suburbs and can attest it is first class, overboard anal about traffic laws. And while I have no objective numbers, I would posit this is a large part of the reason why the D.C. area consistently has some of the worst traffic in the country.

The greater D.C. area has 290 red-light and speed cameras -- comprising nearly 10 percent of all traffic cameras in the U.S., according to estimates by a camera-tracking database called the POI Factory.
 
phide said:
For all intents and purposes, yes. How else could you explain citation quotas?
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Umm, easily... The budgets they get each year assumes "X" amount will be offset by citations, the next years budget is based upon how much is brought in.
If you know you want to get "X" amount approved and and citation income amounts for x% of that, you can set quotas that get you there.
 
Exitwound said:
Yes. DON'T SPEED.

Why do people believe that they have the right to speed and then call conspiracy when they're caught? Just obey the limits and share the road. Way too many idiots on the road who think they can do what they want. Whether or not speed traps or traffic cameras work, the issue is that speeders and tailgaters are a nuisance and very dangerous to others on the road.
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Speed limits are often completely arbitrary and when the majority of people are speeding it is because it is safe to do so. Or do you curse those driving 75 on the highway passing your granny ass who likes to put along in the fast lane?

Vermillion said:
Where's the proof they cause more accidents? I'd like to see it. Bottom line is everybody should have good breaking distance no matter what speed they're driving. I won't say don't speed because EVERYBODY speeds. But there's no excuse to drive dangerously by tailgating or cutting across 3 lanes of traffic to get around a single car like I saw happen in front of me at least a dozen times on a trip up to Bethany from DC this weekend. One idiot damn near took my front end off. Stupid bastard in his black Hemi powered Charger needs a smack upside his head.

I do think this lady is little crazy for saying what she said about people dodging speed traps and camera traps. The police can simply move a half mile down the road in either direction on faster intervals to screw people up or they can feed bad information to the application since it's based on user input. With cameras everybody learns where they are anyways.

But using this to bypass sobriety checkpoints in my opinion should be a criminal offense. They're putting others lives at risk so that they're not caught doing something illegal and dangerous to not only themselves but others. It's not hard to call a taxi especially in the DC area. Hell use the Metro. Puke on the metro during the ride back for all I care. But don't get behind the wheel drunk and put me, my family, or anybody else in danger because you're a f*cking moron.

I do find it hilarious to watch people try to justify apps like this or hardware like radar detectors by saying the police just want money. Well if we all stopped speeding and obeyed all traffic laws they wouldn't get their money either, keep that in mind. If you're going to speed or break some other traffic law then learn to deal with the f*cking consequences of your actions.
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If EVERYONE drove with the required distance between them, I doubt cars during semi heavy traffic would even fit on the road, much less causing avoid completely gridlocked type traffic.\

It should also be apparent to you that if people are slamming on brakes at questionable yellow lights, as opposed to safely proceeding through them even when barely turning red, or people slamming breaks when they see a speeding cameras that accidents are going to happen. Simply blaming it on people driving too close doesn't change the fact that these cameras are causing accidents.

ordovician said:
Speeding has been shown to not increase fatalities? Are you delusional? Whenever anyone is going faster than the general speed of traffic, it can create a dangerous situation. I think you're confusing this with the study that showed that increased speed LIMITS does not increase fatalities. Big difference.

As for the cameras, you're right. The problem with them is that, unlike a human, they have no discretion. The guy who tailgates, passes on the shoulder, speeds up, slows down, drives irradically, etc. is going to get the same speeding ticket as the guy whose wife is giving birth at the hospital at 4 AM.... I say it's every right for the people to inform themselves on the whereabouts of police activity. Sorry, cops, you cannot have your police state. We are supposed to be a free country. I cannot believe this woman implies she wants to make it illegal for people to COMMUNICATE. That whole first amedment thing is for losers anywa, right? God I hate cops.
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You obviously haven't looked into the topic because simply speeding does not increase accidents. If everyone is speeding it is much safer than half speeding and half driving 20 MPH slower and just as safe as everyone driving 20 MPH slower. The danger comes in the differences in speeds, regardless of how fast people are going, because crashing at 65 MPH or 79 MPH is still crashing going really fucking fast.

Vermillion said:
Ah, but you only have part of the equation which is why I asked my question.

How many of those accidents are due to people speeding, following too closely, texting, reading/writing e-mail, talking on a cell phone, or something else so that they aren't paying attention to what's going on in front of them?

My bet is the camera isn't the core of the problem. Driver A hits the brakes a little harder to stop in time so as to not get a ticket from the camera. Driver B hits Driver A because Driver B was too busy sending a text while driving so they were going to fast and didn't have safe braking distance. How is that the camera's fault?
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If accidents rise because of the implementation of cameras, then by the very definition, using technicalities or common sense, the cameras are what is causing the accidents. To say its for other related reasons that weren't increasing accidents before the cameras begs me to ask the question of why you are playing devil's advocate.

Rofl-Mic-Lofl said:
...That doesn't make it right to totally disregard public safety and keep putting up cameras instead of doing the right thing that is best for the safety of the people: adding in a countdown timer and increasing yellow light times.
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Amen. The sad and outrageous thing is cities won't do those things because they decrease ticket revenue even though they are shown to be the most effective at reducing accidents. Even more outraging is that cities have been caught lowering yellow light times after putting up cameras to increase ticket revenue. Quite frankly, I believe those city officials deserve to be in jail for a long time for committing treason for the almighty dollar.

InsanePerson said:
So law enforcement is viewed as a for-profit organization now huh?


Heres an idea, stop breaking the damn laws if you want to avoid getting fined
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Are you retarded? Did you really just cut my entire post down to three out of context words? :rolleyes:

InsanePerson said:
So lets make driving drunk legal cause the law is obviously doing nothing right?

I'm sorry for your friend, but the fact is the law against drunk driving does in fact help, however because some people believe they are too good for the law, or believe them to be ineffectual and "just do what they want" still do it, and cause accidents and those laws then provide you the ability to rot in jail for it.

It is views like yours that make innocents such as your friend victims.
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I'd like you to intelligently and without rhetoric or false logic explain the underlined part of your post. 10 dollars says you simply look like a foolish asshole for saying it.
 
InsanePerson said:
Umm, easily... The budgets they get each year assumes "X" amount will be offset by citations, the next years budget is based upon how much is brought in.
If you know you want to get "X" amount approved and and citation income amounts for x% of that, you can set quotas that get you there.
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All business is for profit, there is no way around that argument. This includes government. You can not operate at a loss.

Police cruisers and equipment is expensive, someone has to pay for them and the tax payers have voted by allowing enforcement to seek additional revenue sources. The tax payers can incraese police revenue, but they don't, this forces the business to either seek alternative routes or go bust.

A city next door to ours went bust this year, they ended up terminating all the cops, leaving any patrols to the state highway patrol.... that worked out really well (sarcasm). They decided that its better to simply trap more to raise revenue.
 
moetop said:
If I were the cops I would use the information to my advantage, by not devoting so many resources to those areas, and to put them slightly in front of or after them (or other areas not known). That should actually increase the amount of tickets. Just have a memo a couple of times a week with a map of all the current know speed trap areas.

It’s really not that hard to turn this into a big advantage for them instead of against them.

Maybe I'll send them an E-mail and help them out.
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You are right, this is actually quite a great tool for the cops. They can fix fake stations so people would slow down, they can provide false reports, so people would slow in some areas, and they can fool the system by constantly moving when they are posted...

When a person is unsure if a cop is there, they will drive cautiously, if they KNOW that there is no cop, they will speed like hell.... speeding like hell = $$$$$$$
 
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