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Friday, June 2, 2006
Speed Traps: Lawbreaking or moneymaking?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
An auto insurance company spammed me to death while I was online one day.
“Click to see better rates!” “Click to see better rates!”
I clicked. I saw better rates.
Imagine that. Four other well-known auto insurance companies were undercutting my beloved lizard, the gecko.
You know the gecko. He dances around your television screen for 60 seconds several times a day talking about fantastically affordable auto insurance like this lizard has got the cheapest rates nationwide.
Well, in my case, the lizard lied.
Right about this same time, Governor Sonny Perdue’s Office of Highway Safety puts out a press release telling Georgians about the “100 Days of Summer H.E.A.T.” and the impending heat on checkbooks, license points and, yes, insurance rates for those issued tickets between May 22 and Sept. 4 (which is not really 100 days if you bother to count).
I accept that Sonny is giving out traffic tickets left and right in order to save lives.
I accept that on the one and only day the traffic advisory on the radio says “316 and I-85 is clear sailing all the way to Spaghetti Junction,” I don’t know about the cute little “H.E.A.T. advisory” and what waits for me down the road.
I accept that on that day a cop with his motorcycle hidden in the last remaining bushes on 316 stood on the edge of the highway with a radar gun threatening speeding tickets to all the passersby.
I accept that the four cars besides mine were all doing the same speed but the motorcycle cop decided I would be the ticketed one. How nice.
I accept that yes, 316 near I-85 is now almost in its entirety a construction zone, meaning 45 mph for two more years whether you want to accept this nightmare or find another way downtown.
I accept that I will pay a double fine and my insurance rates will skyrocket just when I had found out the lizard had lied!
But what I don’t accept is cops hiding behind bushes. Because really, if you want to trap people, why not hide outside a bar or nightclub and write a year’s worth of DUI tickets in one night?
I’d accept that because that would really save some lives.
What I don’t accept is what I saw this morning on my better-late-than-never training run for the Peachtree Road Race at Suwanee Park. I don’t accept that right around mile 3, when the jogging trail runs parallel with McGinnis Ferry Road, I see a police car parked in the middle of some tall bushes ready to surprise people during their morning drives.
All this hiding in bushes looks so ridiculous that it makes you wonder if this is really about lawbreaking.
Do you think speed traps are really more about moneymaking instead of saving lives?
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