Getting a ticket while legally parked

[parm104]

Originally Posted by sebberry

I feel much safer knowing the police man has a knife to scrape at my windows with.

Now, how about those clubbings? Purse thief in Hillside area clubs woman

I was with you for parts of this thread but now you've jumped off the edge...

Are you trolling or is there an actual relevance between the link and the topic of conversation?

[sebberry]

If an officer can't tell if a window is tinted and has to take a knife to it, then it's probably quite light. (Hey, that's one way to establish VLT regulations - if 3/5 officers need to take a knife to it, then it should be legal as it's clearly not dark enough to be obviously tinted)

The article? Just pointing out the irony. Women can't feel safe from being clubbed and mugged, but I feel so much better off knowing that the policeman has a knife to save me from my own tint.

[Sango]

I am aware the officer does have the right to slash the illegal tint on the spot at their discretion, after confirming that the owner has an illegal tint. Other than that, they won't just slash if they cannot confirm and depending on how the owner behaves too.

They have slash people's tints from time to time especially to those to act strange to try to make an excuse or evade the question about the the suspicion of an illegal tint.

Officer quotes from what I head...:
Why do you have your windows down at night?
Why are your your windows down when I (the officer) approached? They were up before I pulled you over.
Why is your windows down during the rain?
I know your BSing me, raise the windows up, I know you have the tints. (after owner keeps evading to answer the question directly and the officer is now serious)

I never had a problem with my tints with road checks (counter attack), or border crossings for that matter... I'm surprised they only ask me to roll down the windows, then followed by your general questions and off I go.

[parm104]

Originally Posted by sebberry

The article? Just pointing out the irony. Women can't feel safe from being clubbed and mugged, but I feel so much better off knowing that the policeman has a knife to save me from my own tint.

I don't feel that you are ever going to be in a position where you can logically and usefully give input for future legislative reforms. If your logic has somehow (whether your joking or not) put together the idea that the use of a Swiss Army Knife by a police officer should be used only if it serves as protection for you. It's a UTILITY knife...FOR the officer....Even if you were making a sarcastic joke; your joke would require us to infer that you legitimately thought the officers actions were to save YOUR life...Again; it's not all about you. There are many pieces to the puzzle. An officer scratching off your tint just may have saved the life of a pedestrian that you wouldn't have seen had it not been for him scratching off the tint with his Costco Swiss Army Knife.

With that logic, I can say, prostitutes can't feel safe because we have Willy Pickton's out there trying to kill them but police officers can spend time giving me speeding tickets....Do you see the gap in logic there?

Anyways I think this topic has been beat to death. Enough with the "I think this should..." issues. EVERY car forum has AT LEAST one "Petition to Change Window Tint Laws" and they're always started by some young-buck amateur who has no idea about the way laws are created, why they are created or even how they are created. I would suggest you either hit the library, do some research and write up a memo to initiate an action against this unjust law; or let it be.

So at least in my situation, I have tinted windows...I always have...And when and if I do get ticketed for it; I don't go contesting the laws and arguing the validity of them. I've been ticketed ONCE in 11 years for a window tint infraction. Officer came up to me, told me he's gonna give me a ticket for window tint, I said okay, got the ticket...went home. Easy.

I was well aware of the risks before tinting my windows and I willingly and consciously chose to act contrary to the statutes. If I get penalized for it later, I won't complain about it...

[sebberry]

I somehow don't think tint will prevent me from seeing and thus killing a pedestrian. Has it ever happened to you?

Wouldn't it be nice if you didn't get a ticket for what can only be described as reasonable tint? I say reasonable because it must be light enough that you've only been ticketed once for it in 11 years. Now you have some form of negative police record that could possibly come back to haunt you. Still think tint laws are there to serve you?

Anyway. If the police genuinely feel that they're doing the community a service by scraping away tint they could barely see in the first place (hence needing a knife to "check" for the film) so be it. Ask that woman who was clubbed and mugged if she feels safer knowing police officers are working hard to protect her from illegal tint.

[scottch-awe]

Originally Posted by Graeme S

I'll be honest. I personally think that tints that are too dark (tints like 5% are the ones that come to mind offhand, but I'm no skyentist) are completely and totally unsafe. I've driven in cars with tint at night, and have felt very very unsafe. I don't like not being able to see everything around me. Street light suck, I'm paranoid and worried that one day there's gonna be someone whose DRLs have been deactivated or aren't working and I won't see them in my blind spot when I make a lane change.

My cars have never had tinted windows. And my car at the moment is a dark blue with black leather seats. Sure, it gets warm, but that's why God invented A/C.


Now, all of that having been said, I'm against modifying the tint laws in order to allow front tint. "But why?" you might ask, as Sebbery has, bringing up all the all-things-considered-reasonable points that he has.

1) "The Line"
How do we decide what is safe at the front and isn't? Let's assume that we allow 70%, and say that's safe for the fronts (including the windshield). So what do we do in terms of measurement and enforcement?

First, we're going to have to give all officers updated regs (and since most officers get pissy at tint at roadchecks, we'll have to make sure they get training). Who's going to pay for this? The newspapers will be up in arms "RCMP officerspaid to look at windows!"

Second, we'll have to do one of two things:
1) Officer-issued metering devices.
2) Metering devices at inspection facilities.
If an officer thinks that someone's tint is too dark, the person will have to get it checked. Now, we're all familiar with how incredibly annoying a VI is. Nobody wants to have to go to an inspection facility and pay a giant chunk of money to get their car inspected and tell them it's OK. So logically, we should hand out light metering devices. If an officer suspects a car's tint is too dark, all they have to do is shine their light through and see how much passes through the tint.

But again, that's going to cost. "RCMP on the hook for fancy flashlights". That's not going to be very good optics.

Neither would it make many road-going individuals happy that they have to get their car inspected within a few days to make sure they don't need a ticket. Inconvenience, annoyance, and more than anything else, time out of an officer's day to deal with more paperwork. Because we can all agree officers' time would be better spent investigating serious crimes rather than following up on a tinting inspection.


Finally: Who decides what's safe?

While you may feel that an 80% is safe for use, others may feel that 50% is safe, or like it is now that 5% is safe for the rears. Who's to decide? You say that we should look at those two and "decide which is safer". Well, yes. When people are given two solid and distinct choices, it's entirely probable that people will be able to choose what they like best. Show someone two shades of green and they'll tell you exactly which one they like.

But it's not yes/no, black/white. It's shading. A full fucking spectrum. In my younger days, I spent hours agonizing over which shades of which colours to use as my font and background colours on my livejournal (yes, I was one of those emo losers, shut up). I knew what colours I wanted, but I just couldn't find exactly the right ones. #0000FFF or a bit lighter? Darker? WHAT?!

That means we'd have to invest money into science. Yes, science. The thing that you continually bring up in your speed-doesn't-really-kill-stupid-people-kill rantings (which, while I don't necessarily disagree with the content, I do disagree with the audience and the tone). Which means we'd have to hire people to find out real road conditions. And what would really be safe.

Now while we think that's easy, let's try and remember that BC includes everything from Downtown Vancouver (which is ridiculously well let at nearly any hour of the day) all the way out to the Trans-Canada that leads to Golden and Rogers Pass. I very very much doubt that the same tint which allows you to see everything around you with perfect clarity at noon in Downtown Vancouver would do the same out in the BC/Alberta-border boonies.

And as a result, for those of us who live in Ye Auld Big City, we might think the rules and regulations suck ass. But only maybe because we're not seeing the big picture that the scientists and lawmakers who did the analysis did.





Also, I'll be honest. I'd rather see more money going to permanently house the mentally ill and help rehabilitate drug users and hire more nurses and surgeons and build more hospitals rather than going through the hackery of fixing an annoying yet ultimately unimportant tint law.


[/rant]

I absolutely agree with this!
Too dark tints are just too dangerous! I´d never choose 5% tinting, it´s just too much, especially at night.
The other thing (and I really gave a thought to a question if it´s just my problem with authorities or just some common sense or critical thinking) - who is supposed to decide what´s safe? And if we have a look on tint laws (state by state) - they differ so much! CA 88%? It´s nonsense. Considering that in NY they have 70% (north!) and somewhere in between there are states with law which allows 30% VLT... OK, I definitely agree that there SHOULD be a law for this but in some cases it´s just ridiculous.. (like CA, yes). I think 35% for all the states could work well - and the darker the tint, the more oil/money/energy we can save (by the way) - on air conditiong!