Neither am I... I'm comparing it to a "getting somewhere ahead of everyone else at all costs and doing it with only myself in mind" mentality. "It's all about me" is, after all, a mindset that's very handy when committing murder, too.

Soundy: I support the tougher regs on speeding/racing. I've had friends killed by SR's.
I despise reckless drivers. And I DO believe in safe driving, etc.
However, I think this whole arguement has really been, as mentioned before by Sebberry, is the lack of CONSISTANCY of enforcement.

It happens quite often, as I hear/encounter and see a lot of these inconsistencies. Speeders not being pulled over, pulling over and harrassing drivers, etc. I myself have gone through this and have had other friends go through this as well, often while I was with them. While I'm not going to say I follow the limit to the letter but i'm definitely not the chronic speeder. Even if I'm in a rush.

I believe that the police should be enforcing these laws, however, they just need to be more consistent. I know a few officers personally and I've heard them talk about colleagues that try to "pressure" a situation out of people, or will abuse their right to guage a situation and hand out the worst punishment possible, just becauuse they CAN. I've seen the police at Mopac tuning in Langley, harras a patron for having a loud and tuned car, while afterwards, goes back to his loud and tuned mustang, and start doing short drags on the back road. Not caring that i've been there taking all this in.

And people who DO get the short end of the stick, will stop believing in the justice and law system as well.

I'm totally down with the officers that do their jobs. It's just very hard to take it at face value sometimes when the new laws are so vague, seemingly putting people in a very compromising situation, combined with that more and more abuse of power by the police are seen year after year. It's the whole "crime by association" mentality of the general public.

If 3 cops taser a guy to death in an airport and lied and got away with it...the all the other cops must be....., you know what I mean?

well, since this law was put into place 10 days ago, how many cases have you heard of innocent people getting their car impounded?

Something really jumped out at me, and it was this sentence by sebberry.

"I can't believe that someone is at risk of losing their car due to their natural tendency to speed up when the car next to them is also speeding up to pass."

This is a little off topic but, NEVER DO THIS!!! If someone is trying to pass let them pass. Even slow a little to make their pass easier. Speeding up does nothing but create a dangerous situation. That is part of being a good driver. Understanding what to do to make situations safer. On the other side of the equation the person passing should use the gas. An automatic kicks down into a passing gear and it is called that for a reason. A manual needs to be downshifted to create the same. So the bottom line, pass like you mean it when safe to do so, and when being passed allow the pass to happen quickly and safely.:thumbsup:
Sorry, rant over.

With some changes in my wok, I am once again doing a drive twice a day that I was doing the past few years. Despite this law being in place and the signs over the road reading "Tough new driving laws start Sept 20", I am seeing much more aggression on the highway than I did 10 months ago.

Here's a question - I am in the right lane, driving at the speed limit going with the flow of traffic leaving 6-8 seconds of space in front of me while being tailgated. The tailgater finally decides to pass me only to cut back in front of me and tailgate the car that was previously in front of me. Is this type of driving subject to immediate vehicle impoundment?

I dunno, but they said on the radio today that they've impounded something like 275 province-wide total since the 20th. The latest in the lower mainland were a pair of HAs who lost their bikes last night after getting nailed doing over 160 through the 80km/h construction zone coming up to the Port Mann.

Story time: I was taking the Barnet Hwy coming home this afternoon, took the cruise off and was letting resistance slow me down as I came into the 50 zone going into Port Moody. I was just going past the 50 sign, in fact, running at about 65, when I saw the bright yellow jacked at the bus stop up ahead...

I was down to 55 by the time I passed him (didn't want to hammer the brakes and look TOO obvious), but he wasn't even paying attention... he had the laser cocked (picture one of those movie cops running around an abandoned building, holding his gun up by his chin) and was watching intently down the street for someone who was REALLY driving like an idiot. Sunny day, good visibility, almost no traffic... me driving nice and mellow, if a bit over the limit, obviously wasn't perceived as a threat.

Personally, I'm glad officers are allowed to use their own discretion in handing out speeding tickets...

It's certainly not a "natural" tendency... not for me, anyway. Might be for him. Probably is for most of RS.

I've been clocked many times doing 60-65 on Granville both with the traffic and no traffic at all and I've never been pulled over, you usually have to be doing something very obviously stupid to get pulled over.

What you were doing seemed perfectly safe at the time (and I am sure it was). Wouldn't it be nice to know that what you were doing would never result in a ticket? That's all I am advocating for, but unfortunately I have seen people get nailed for doing just as you described.

No, it is not natural for me. :rolleyes:

I see it all the time. If I am in the left lane driving 2-3km/hr faster than the car in the right lane, they tend to speed up by the same.

If I am in the right lane and needing to make a left lane change, I may speed up by 3-5 km/hr to position myself next to the space I want to move into only to have the car I was attempting to move in front of speed up.

I wasn't talking about speeding up by 20km/hr in a deliberate attempt to prevent a pass on the freeway, but of course that's probably what you assumed.

I also notice a tendency for drivers to speed up when a passing lane opens up on the highway.

There's a section on the Malahat here notorious for this. It goes from twistysingle double lane, to a big stretch of straight, smooth 4 lane. The speed limit is 80km/h. Inevitably you'll have some retard driving 60 in the 2 lane sections, and then once they hit the 4 lane they speed up to 100. If you don't pass them, they will slow down to 60 again when the 4 lane ends and goes back to twisty highway, and you'll be stuck again. Of course the police very often put a radar trap at the end of the straight section nailing those who are just trying to pass said retards.
Frustrates the hell out of me.

sebberry, that is kinda what I was thinking. I live very far from the lower mainland but do drive to the sunshine coast 3-4 times a year and feel sorry for you guys. Some roads around here, I don't see another vehicle for 10-15 minutes at a time, in the middle of the day.
I did have to say what I said. If it makes only one person improve their passing or being passed habits it is a victory.

Just wanted to say, I think it's funny how so many people have this idea that the cops are "out to get you"... if you're not driving like an asshole, the cops probably are not going to pull you over.

The only people i know who have ever said shit to me like "the cops were picking on me" were usually the biggest retards I knew, and usually drove like assholes 24/7.

Pretty much my experience as well. I was driving to 100 mile through Whistler and was pulled over on the sea to sky by a older white suburban that had followed me for about 10 miles. Thought he was using me as a bird dog. I had passed many cars and was speeding by 20km the whole time. THe traffic was not heavy. I was driving smoothly without going heavy on the gas or brakes, giving lots of room to the cars I passed. The officer was polite, as was I and actually gave me a break on the ticket, and even complimented how nice my car was for a 1992. No drama and he could have gotten me at 35 over. I also have a pretty good driving record and I think that helps. Oh yea, I am 50 and treated him with the respect he deserved. LOL How is that for a suck up post LOL

That's what I don't understand. Every day I see asshats weaving in and out, tailgating and driving aggressively towards other drivers. Much of my driving is as you described (calm, smooth, lots of room, etc...) To pick you off - he just wanted an easy target.

On the other hand - if what you were doing was dangerous enough to warrant a stop and ticket, why did the officer let is persist for 10 miles while doing the same thing as you?

Oh, I know the spot - right where the highway safety squad car pulled a u-turn in the middle of 4 lanes of traffic.

I pissed a few people off that day. Obviously the officer's intent was to ensure people were driving slowly down the S curves. While almost everyone around me slowed to 80 when seeing the speed trap, I kept just slightly under the 70km/hr limit for the duration of the S curves. The 4 cars behind me were all tailgating eachother, despite having just driven past an obvious speed trap.

"On the other hand - if what you were doing was dangerous enough to warrant a stop and ticket, why did the officer let is persist for 10 miles while doing the same thing as you?" Quoted from sebberry

I think that since I was speeding by 20 to close to 40 over he was waiting for me to do something stupid or actually dangerous, so he could really nail me. Since he followed for so long and saw that the way I was driving was not putting others in danger he pulled me over before he got too far away from his beat.

And well they should have. And if I had, it would have been deserved. C'est la vie.

Would it honestly have been deserved from a safety perspective?

Oh that's classic.

The safety squad waiting for someone to actually do something dangerous.

On one hand it is funny because many of the offences they do ticket for aren't dangerous, yet on the other they want to wait for the situation to get out of hand or wait for someone to get injured so he can drive home his point of road safety.

See, it is an "out to get you" game. ;)

Seems like you got it pontiac.

Probably not.

But again, that's the GOOD thing about officers having that discretion.

You lament that the law allows them discretion and come up with all these scenarios (some of them ranging from far-flung to downright outrageous) where that could be a negative... but how many times have ALL of us here BENEFITED from them having that discretion?

Under the law, if a cop sees you doing 1km/h over the limit, he should stop you and hand you a MINIMUM $138 ticket... but 99.9% of the time they won't unless you're doing something else really stupid as well. Most of the time they'll give you about 10km/h of leeway... at their discretion of course.

Do you really want that discretion removed? You really want to have to be paranoid, not about toeing the line between 39 and 41 over the posted limit, but between being 1 under or 1 over?

As it stands right now, they're even giving that leeway to the new excessive-speeding penalties, concentration on those who are actually doing 50 or more over... and still reeling them in left and right.

FWIW, I've never received a speeding ticket where I WASN'T speeding. Of those I have received, more than half, the cop wrote it up for the lowest amount, even though it should have been more, and more often than not I've been let off with just a warning.

So I'm sorry if I don't have the same concerns as you about officer's discretion at applying the law.

Honestly, yes, I would prefer if officers ticketed for 1km/hr over the limit. That way the law would be applied consistently and equally and I would never have to worry about being ticketed for doing something safe, albeit over the posted limit because everyone else would be driving at the speed limit.

I don't think we need, nor will see a benefit from such a military grade of law and order, but I'm sick of worring about getting a speeding ticket for making a simple lane change.

As for my outrageous examples, they're either based on situations I encounter daily or other posters here have even fallen into that example.

but then we would be living in a police state where everybody HAS to follow the rules, OR ELSE.... which seems to contradict some of the other points that you would bring up.

The thing is, this would never happen. So rather than bringing up fantasy situations of "what if", how are you going to persuade the gov't to improve the laws?

Are you f'ing serious? 90% of RS posts complaining about being treated "unfairly" by the cops are utter whiner BS by people who are complete idiots behind the wheel. "Oh, I was only going double the speed limit, I can't believe those asshole cops gave me a ticket for that! Fuck the popo!" Riiiiiiight.

Pfft. If that actually happened, he'd have nothing to whine about, and what fun is that? It's way easier to be an Internet Warrior when battling The Man... doesn't require actually getting off your ass and doing anything.

http://www.johnvidas.com/Site/home/E.../southpark.jpg