The 10,000 Post thread V3

[Duke87 1,070]

(181)

 

Connecticut has an interesting policy where they do not give you points on your license for a speeding ticket unless you attempt to challenge it in court and fail. This policy, of course, is to encourage people to just pay up when they get a ticket rather than taking it to court. Saves the taxpayers money by not having to support the court costs and means more revenue since fewer tickets are overturned. It also means it's basically impossible to have your license suspended unless you do something insanely stupid. It would take 6 speeding tickets in 24 months, all unsuccessfully challenged in court. Of course, other offenses are worth more points and are usually how suspensions come about (DUI is an instant automatic suspension).

 

New York, by comparison, is far stricter. 3 speeding tickets in an 18 month period is enough to warrant a license suspension and the system is the opposite in that it actually effectively encourages drivers to challenge tickets in court because they stand nothing to lose by doing so but often will gain. It's fairly standard practice in traffic court in New York for the judge to offer you a plea bargain for a lesser offense worth fewer points, and this can only happen if you challenge the ticket.

 

 

Where things get interesting in the US is if you commit an offense in a different state from the one you live in. The fines (or possibly jail time, for serious offenses) are determined by the jurisdiction in which the offense occurs (may be the state, the county, or the municipality). But the points on your license are determined by the state in which you live, and each state has a completely different point system. This can result in weird things happening, like an offense that would not generate points in the state in which it occurred resulting in points for the driver anyway because it does in their home state (or vice versa). 

[Larks2242 251]

182.

 

Double whammy...

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

183

 

In Michigan, there are no speed cameras, and I'm not sure there are any towns that use red light cameras.  In Toledo, there are a couple of places that use red light cameras, and then there was a small town near Cincinnati I think where they used a speed camera as a fund raiser.  It was such a grievous misuse of municipal authority that the state of Ohio actually came down on that town and told them to stop it and smote them into a million little pieces of penniless howling rage.

[Muck308 55]

184

 

I don't know of any speed cameras in my area. There are plenty of sensors though.

[ROFLyoshi 1,760]

185. Speed cameras and red light cameras are common here. I pass one every day to work.

Naturally there is controversy on revenue raising, especially since there is a claimed faulty camera on one of our tollways. I always drop my speed 5km/h below the limit when passing under that particular overpass.

[Duke87 1,070]

(186)

 

In Michigan, there are no speed cameras, and I'm not sure there are any towns that use red light cameras.

 

Per this link, no, there aren't.

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

187

 

That's comforting for Michiganders.

[Larks2242 251]

188.

 

I find it funny some states don't allow them.

[astronelson 339]

189.

 

I don't really have any problem with speed cameras. I don't drive often and when I do I do my best to keep at or below the speed limit.

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

190

 

The problem with speed cameras (any kind of camera enforcement these days) is that they are never about safety but about fund raising.  They toss around numbers in the tens of millions of dollars worth of revenues, not just for the municipalities using them, but also the kickbacks that go to the companies running them.  That's right, they're not run by your local cops.  They're run by some corporation in a far-off land.  They are a plague upon the roads.

[timmie 988]

191

 

In Belgium, and in most parts of Europe, they are operated by the police. So the money goes right to the state. I can live with that, traffic laws are very absolute, for good reasons, so enforcing them is perfectly okay in my opinion.

[Duke87 1,070]

(192)

 

The problem with strict enforcement of speed limits is that they are set at very often unreasonable points. The speed limit on I-95 in southwestern Connecticut is 55 mph, like most suburban freeways in the northeastern US. But unless there is traffic (which, admittedly, is not infrequent), you will not find a single car on the road going that slow.

 

Standard engineering practice is that speed limits are supposed to be set at the 85th percentile of actual traffic speeds (i.e., the fastest 15% of cars are speeding, everyone else is in compliance). In the real world, though, speed limits are constrained by politicians, and are usually set lower than such a speed either because state law does not allow for a speed limit that high, because the local community wishes people wouldn't drive as fast as they do through it, or because the local police want a juicy opportunity to set up speed traps.

 

 

Common sense dictates that if a law has a very low compliance rate, then something about the law must be unreasonable. This would dictate that the concept of speed limits deserves revisiting. Personally, I find the concept of legally enforceable speed limits to be stupid. It's one thing to post warnings saying "we recommend you don't go faster than this", but hey, it's supposed to be a free country. If you want to be a jackass and drive 120 mph down the freeway, knock yourself out I say (perhaps literally. ).

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

193

 

Local politicians in Ann Arbor lost their minds over the state of Michigan raising the speed limit over a section of road that the State Police, not the Ann Arbor PD had jurisdiction.  They studied the road, found that the speed limit should be higher as per Duke's explanation above, and then raised it against the insane cries of anguish from the Ann Arbor politburo.  Of course they were rolling on the ground foaming at their mouths over deaths due to speeding, that raising the limit would only encourage speeders to go faster and thus kill more people blah blah blah, but what actually happened was that no one was traveling any faster than they were before the limit was raised, accidents were down, and of course, tickets were down.  And that last thing was the most important thing to the AA politburo, because fewer tickets means less cash.  Aw.  How sad for them.

 

And living here in Japan, EVERY SINGLE ROAD is like this, ALL the roads.  The speed limits on the highways is 80 km/h!  80!  I can't believe it.  They have no business calling them highways.  Of course, no one drives that speed on them, everyone is a good 20 km/h or higher, and plenty of people are passing the "normal" speeders as though they are standing still.  It would be wonderful to live in a magical place where this wasn't the case, but nowhere I've lived is like that.  There are artificial speed traps everywhere.

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

(194)

 

"R" on the gear shift stands for "Race" ....right?

[Muck308 55]

195

 

No R on my gear shift. Automatic transmission so no letters at all! Driving a standard around Western PA can be a challenge at times. Many hills.

[Larks2242 251]

196.

 

(194)

 

"R" on the gear shift stands for "Race" ....right?

 

Right, Real racers drive backwards!

[Duke87 1,070]

(197)

 

No R on my gear shift. Automatic transmission so no letters at all!

 

Say what? An automatic means you don't need to shift between 1/2/3/4/5(/R/N), but it still has P/R/N/D/L.

[ROFLyoshi 1,760]

193

 

And living here in Japan, EVERY SINGLE ROAD is like this, ALL the roads.  The speed limits on the highways is 80 km/h!  80!  I can't believe it.  They have no business calling them highways.  Of course, no one drives that speed on them, everyone is a good 20 km/h or higher, and plenty of people are passing the "normal" speeders as though they are standing still.  It would be wonderful to live in a magical place where this wasn't the case, but nowhere I've lived is like that.  There are artificial speed traps everywhere.

198: And this is a country well known for it's high speed rail network?

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

199

 

High speed rail?  Yes.  You get into the big cities, and rail is pretty awesome.  Tokyo local trains and subways are clean, always on time, safe, and constantly arriving.  It's great.  The Shinkansen is an intercity wonder, a drive from my home to Osaka that would take 7+ hours takes a mere 3 or so, depending on how well you time the train changes.  But of course, you get outside the cities and it becomes evident that a car is necessary to have any kind of permanent life.

[Duke87 1,070]

(200)

 

Japan is amazing for an infrastructure geek. I'd certainly love to visit on those grounds alone (screw the culture, show me the trains, bridges, and highways! ). Dunno that I'd ever be able to manage it, though. The language barrier is very imposing and finding foodstuffs there which I would consider edible may be difficult.

[ROFLyoshi 1,760]

201: Germany was a bit like that for me. My country doesn't have a big highway network like the US (this is probably due to being an extremely sparsely populated country). To see the Autobahn in action was great, as well as riding high speed lines. The separation of a suburban rail network and a high frequency underground rail also fascinated me, as we have no equivalent, rather a hybrid system.

[Mr Saturn64 742]

Having never left the USA, I'll say that roads and more prominent than any other transit.

202, sorry forgot to add, sorry.

[timmie 988]

203

 

Germany is an infrastructure wonder (the Netherlands too). They have everything, a vast highway network, high speed trains (the ICE), S-Bahn, U-Bahn, ordinary rail,... For someone from little Belgium, it's very impressive, since our infrastructure is very basic. That's the difference between a large and a small country, I suppose.

[Muck308 55]

204

 

(197)

 

No R on my gear shift. Automatic transmission so no letters at all!

 

Say what? An automatic means you don't need to shift between 1/2/3/4/5(/R/N), but it still has P/R/N/D/L.

 

 

Yes but my gear shift has nothing written on it. Only on the dash and directly underneath the gear shift are the gears indicated. Had it been a standard the gears would likely be indicated on the gear shift as well.

[Duke87 1,070]

(205)

 

Sounds like detail fuss. My car has the letters written underneath the shift lever, not on the lever itself (as is typical). But when you say "no R on my gear shift" it sounds like you mean your car doesn't have a setting for reverse.

[Craig-Abcvs 1,595]

(206)

 

"Star Trekking across the universe!  Only going forwards, we can not find reverse!"

 

 

[GeometryMath Algebra 614]

207

 

LOL. BTW, I'm gonna watch Star Trek tomorrow! 

[timmie 988]

208

 

Ha, this makes me think of Tintin, I think it is the 'The Red Sea Sharks' album (Coke en stock in French) where they are operating a freight ship when Haddock breaks something, forcing the ship to go only backwards. Ah, memories of my childhood.

[Duke87 1,070]

(209)

 

Welp, back to work today.

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

210

 

Duke, Japan's infrastructure is amazing.  AMAZING!  They're working on a HUGE bill in the Diet to upgrade a lot of the highways and such to better earthquake-proof them.

 

So far as the food goes, don't let that intimidate you too much.  You stick around Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, or the other BIG cities, and there are plenty of normal food you'd find from back home, as well as signs in English, and a handful of people who can do the whole speak-English thing.