10/6 I'm trying to beat a radar speeding ticket on "speed trap" grounds.
I want to see if I can find the Engineering & Traffic "Speed Zone"
Survey for that road to see if the speed limit's set too low, or a
survey wasn't done recently enough. Does anyone know how or where
you go about obtaining these?
\_ if you haven't already, snag a copy of the 'fight your ticket'
book from nolo press. It covers all of this stuff, in good
detail.. -- Been there, done that, beat my ticket.
\_ Pay the fine you ass! Or drive slower.
\_ Pay the fine AND drive slower!
\_ Speeding tickets are an underhanded regressive tax for the
most part. If the system cared more abouit safety and less
about raising money enforcement would be on other things.
\_ As long as the speed limit is set in a sane way, I'm fine
with speeding tickets. It would be interesting if we had a
system where your fine was proportional to your income, like
some Scandinavian countries.
\_ The argument here is about the speed limit being set wrong
(specifically, that it's lower than the speed at which 85% of
people actually drive on that stretch), not about cheating the
system.
\_ 85% of people deciding to break the law doesn't make breaking
the law right. 85% of people deciding to drive above the
speed limit doesn't necessarily mean speeds above that limit
are safe.
\_ Perhaps, but it makes enforcement arbitrary
and hypocritical. Especially when approaching 100% of
cops and politicians speed. (and the number for the
general populace is closer to 95%)
\_ In these situations, to avoid being pulled over, do not
be passing people, changing lanes, or young and black.
\_ you forgot having out of state plates in BFE states.
\_ It also makes driving below the speed limit dangerous,
when everyone is tailgating you, or speeding pass and
then cutting in front of you.
\_ "85%...doesn't make right." You know... we live in a
democracy. Laws exist to serve the people, not the other
way around. If the majority of people break a law, I
believe that by definition makes it "right" in our society.
\_ If the majority of restaurant waiters evade tax by not
reporting all their tips to IRS, does that make not
paying tax on tips right?
\_ you've never waited tables, have you?
\_ No, but I've tipped at restaurants and I've seen
how much the waiters collect in one hour. Anyway
is this relevant to the point?
\_ maybe yes, maybe no. I'm not really that
interested in this debate. my point is that
compliance with taxes on cash tips is probably
less than a tenth of a percent in most
places.
\_ The IRS collects taxes on the imputed
value of tips collected to counter this.
\_ That's a false comparison. The correct comparison
would be "majority of taxpayers all not claiming
gratuity income" Good luck finding that. If the
majority of americans cheated in the same way on
their taxes, then yes, I think that way of "cheating"
should become legal.
\_ Wrong. The first poster who quoted 85% wrote
"... lower than the speed at which 85% of people
actually drive ON THAT STRETCH". The correct
comparison is "if the majority of WAITERS don't
report tip income", not "if the majority of
taxpayers don't report tip income". On the other
hand, if what the first poster wrote were "...
lower than the speed at which 85% of people
actually drive IN AMERICA", the correct comparison
would be "if the majority of TAXPAYERS don't
report tip income". See the association?
\_ Ah, but you're ignoring the "who it effects"
\_ Ah, but you're ignoring the "who it affects"
facet. Speeding affects... people who drive
on that road. Federal tax evasion affects all
taxpayers (and some non-taxpayers) in one way
or another, hence they are involved in the
majority.
\_ what many folks here dont realize (and would if you bothered to
read the nolo book, is the letter of the law (at least in california)
isn't against violating some arbitrary limit of speed (unless you
were going over say 70mph), but that the speed was fast enough to
be 'dangerous'. This 'fuzzy' definition provides for lots of
flexibility to the defendant, as the cops now have to *prove* the
speed was dangerous. Usually they use the traffic engineering
studies to estabilsh a 'prima facie' speed limit that anything over
is *assumed* dangerous and this is the posted 'maximum speed limit'
you see.. But you still have room to argue against this, as there
are a number of things that you can attack on the traffic study,
including the 85 percentile speed travelled speed that the OP
mentioned.. Do you research, show up to court prepared, and argue
your case. If you dont have a good argument, maybe you were driving
hazardously, and should just pay up and not deal with the hassle.
\_ Is over 70 always indefensible?
\_ I've driven numerous times on roads with limit 75.
\_ I bet you are a democrat, right?
\_ See, AMC, what happens when you censor political threads? Now
we start to pollute other threads. |
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