This is why when you see emergency lights, move the @#$% over!

[dazzleman]

i fucking nearly hit the side of an ambulance last night. Driving on this rural piece of 2 lane road. I'm driving along and i approach a curve. I'm definitely in my lane and the fucking ambulance going the other way has its inside tires on the middle yellow line (can't remember what its called at the moment for some reason). So the fat side part of the thing is clearly on my side of the road and i was well on my way to hitting the side of the damn thing. I jump on the breaks and put my car half on the grass. Fucking ambulance.

Were the sirens going?

If you hear the sirens, you should slow down and pull over toward the right, so as to allow the ambulance more room.

Emergency vehicles have to be able to run red lights and go all over the road, in order to get where they're going as quickly as possible.  You have to be prepared for that, and yield to them, regardless of what direction they're coming from.

[Catman]

What about people who pull over on the left median?  I've always heard that's a cardinal sin.

The best thing to do is pull over as far to the right as possible, leaving a little bit of room if there's a guardrail for the officer to approach on the passenger's side.

On the highway in CT, the state police approach from the passenger's side, which I think is a good idea.   On more local streets with a lower volume of traffic and lower speeds, they'll come to the driver's side.

Remember that story I told you about when that idiot stopped in the left lane on 495?

[dazzleman]

Remember that story I told you about when that idiot stopped in the left lane on 495?

I remembered a different road, but maybe I have the stories mixed up.

Was this the person who was driving too slowly in the left lane?

[TurboDan]

Remember that story I told you about when that idiot stopped in the left lane on 495?

It definitely IS idiotic, but I could kinda see how someone could panic and just STOP when they a police car pulling them over. 

[dazzleman]

It definitely IS idiotic, but I could kinda see how someone could panic and just STOP when they a police car pulling them over.?

I think what drives that reaction is fear.  Some people are so afraid of being pulled over by the police that they just pull over to the left out of fear, rather than thinking for a second about the best place to pull over.  Generally, these are the sort of people who are rarely or never pulled over, and they have an irrational fear of the unknown when it comes to dealing with law enforcement, especially if they are the target.

For those of us who have been pulled over a few times in our driving careers , the fear of the unknown is really gone, and we can deal with it more rationally.  We also have the experience to know how to handle the situation better.

I have long thought that the nervous-nelly types who are overly skittish about the law and law enforcement are a greater danger on the roads than those of us who aim to drive safely, but aren't overly concerned about staying within the absolute letter of the law, and aren't really afraid of law enforcement.

[TheIntrepid]

i fucking nearly hit the side of an ambulance last night. Driving on this rural piece of 2 lane road. I'm driving along and i approach a curve. I'm definitely in my lane and the fucking ambulance going the other way has its inside tires on the middle yellow line (can't remember what its called at the moment for some reason). So the fat side part of the thing is clearly on my side of the road and i was well on my way to hitting the side of the damn thing. I jump on the breaks and put my car half on the grass. Fucking ambulance.

What road?

[Catman]

I remembered a different road, but maybe I have the stories mixed up.

Was this the person who was driving too slowly in the left lane?

Yeah, I was coming back from CT in a marked cruiser and the left lane was like a freight in low gear.  Way up ahead was a Jeep Cherokee and everyone was jumping into the middle lane and passing.  So, eventually it was my turn.  Rather than pass on the right I flashed my blue lights and she stopped in the middle of the f'ing left lane.  I guess she didn't understand to get the fuck out of the way and pull right.  I can't believe there was no pile up.  I finally got her into the median, yes, the median.   So here I am, way out of my jurisdiction with some hill billy douchebag from Vermont.  I was so pissed I wanted to tear her a new ass, which I did, but I made sure I calmed down before I went over to her. 

I asked her what the hell she was doing.  "I'm not from around here".  Yeah, "No Shit, evidently there's no freakin highways in Vermont".   So I yelled at her for left lane camping and got her back on the road, fortunately nothing bad happened or I would have been in a bind. 

[dazzleman]

Yeah, I was coming back from CT in a marked cruiser and the left lane was like a freight in low gear.? Way up ahead was a Jeep Cherokee and everyone was jumping into the middle lane and passing.? So, eventually it was my turn.? Rather than pass on the right I flashed my blue lights and she stopped in the middle of the f'ing left lane.? I guess she didn't understand to get the fuck out of the way and pull right.? I can't believe there was no pile up.? I finally got her into the median, yes, the median. ? So here I am, way out of my jurisdiction with some hill billy douchebag from Vermont.? I was so pissed I wanted to tear her a new ass, which I did, but I made sure I calmed down before I went over to her.?

I asked her what the hell she was doing.? "I'm not from around here".? Yeah, "No Shit, evidently there's no freakin highways in Vermont". ? So I yelled at her for left lane camping and got her back on the road, fortunately nothing bad happened or I would have been in a bind.?

Wasn't that on I-91?

[Catman]

Wasn't that on I-91?

495 out near Berlin MA

[dazzleman]

495 out near Berlin MA

Yes, that's right.? I was mixed up on the road.  I was thinking of something that happened on I-91 with a different friend of mine.

[Raza]

What?

[hounddog]

What?

He said, "rolleyes"


Is that better?


:P

[hounddog]

Hounddog, I understand your rant, but you might be preaching to the choir here.? I think most car enthusiasts are a bit more likely to pay attention to the road than the rest of the dolts out there.

Pirate, I know I have already quoted and responded to this but I think I will again. 
This has turned into a fairly oft read thread, which means that it has people thinking about it.  And that, my friends, is never a bad thing.

[TBR]

In Texas you have to move over or slow down to half the speed limit. Frankly, I think this law is dangerous in itself, especially when you have some scum bag jursdictions setting up traps to get people who don't do what they are supposed to. You certainly should move over or slow down when possible, but in heavy traffic, high speed limit conditions it can be a dangerous thing to do.

[hounddog]

In Texas you have to move over or slow down to half the speed limit. Frankly, I think this law is dangerous in itself, especially when you have some scum bag jursdictions setting up traps to get people who don't do what they are supposed to. You certainly should move over or slow down when possible, but in heavy traffic, high speed limit conditions it can be a dangerous thing to do.

I think most of the laws make some allownances for safety.  If you can not move over, at least here, you are allowed to simply slow to a "safe speed."  Which, by the way, is not 65 mph.

[TBR]

I would concur, but there is nothing safe about quickly slowing down to 35 in a 70 and that is what the law in Texas mandates.

[James Young]

Given the presumption that a primary goal of any traffic stop is overall public safety, it naturally follows that when a stop is made that we do not degrade public safety or endanger the life of the LEO making the stop. 

It has made sense to me to distance myself from any activity at the side of the road and I have done this for my entire driving career.  Bondurant School taught this technique well before it was codified.  Despite those precautions, I have been forced off the road three times by ?stopped? patrol vehicles suddenly pulling out into traffic in an unsafe manner.

I?ll let the various departments and their supporters design the exact technique ? distance between patrol and target vehicle, angle-parking, which side of target to approach, distance from marked edge-line, etc ? so that exposure is minimized and the players are protected by the cars.   

With all that said, the primary responsibility for the officers? safety is with the officers themselves.  The most disturbing thing in the video was that the officer?s back, butt and legs were over the roadway.  It should be common sense to protect oneself by staying out of the lane of traffic, even without regard to extant law.  I expect a loudspeaker command (or the new reverse-reading LEDs) to move farther off the shoulder might have saved this young man some pain. 

If any potential stop would be made in a dangerous spot ? extremely limited sight lines, narrow shoulder, obstruction such as sound wall or railing close to roadway limiting area to pull over ? serious thought should be given to not making the stop in the first place. 

The idea of slowing traffic so dramatically on freeways --  a minimum of 20 mph under the posted limit, which is already set at the 50th to 65th percentile (Texas Transportation Code, Sec, 545.157) -- is counterproductive since the most dangerous thing one can do is suddenly stop or slow down, which is why we have minimum speeds on most of the system.  A sudden change in the pattern would create more danger for no significant benefit.

[TurboDan]

By the way, in one of the more stupid ways to catch speeders (the dumbest I've seen, by far, is the guy who runs out into a lane of traffic moving at 80MPH to clock a speeder), some NJSP cars have pulled over to the side of the road with their lights on, positioned at an angle so it appears as if someone is pulled over.  They then try to use radar to get someone speeding, with the car half in the road and everyone swerving to avoid it.

[hounddog]

Given the presumption that a primary goal of any traffic stop is overall public safety, it naturally follows that when a stop is made that we do not degrade public safety or endanger the life of the LEO making the stop.?

It has made sense to me to distance myself from any activity at the side of the road and I have done this for my entire driving career.? Bondurant School taught this technique well before it was codified.? Despite those precautions, I have been forced off the road three times by ?stopped? patrol vehicles suddenly pulling out into traffic in an unsafe manner.

I?ll let the various departments and their supporters design the exact technique ? distance between patrol and target vehicle, angle-parking, which side of target to approach, distance from marked edge-line, etc ? so that exposure is minimized and the players are protected by the cars.? ?

With all that said, the primary responsibility for the officers? safety is with the officers themselves.? The most disturbing thing in the video was that the officer?s back, butt and legs were over the roadway.? It should be common sense to protect oneself by staying out of the lane of traffic, even without regard to extant law.? I expect a loudspeaker command (or the new reverse-reading LEDs) to move farther off the shoulder might have saved this young man some pain.?
If any potential stop would be made in a dangerous spot ? extremely limited sight lines, narrow shoulder, obstruction such as sound wall or railing close to roadway limiting area to pull over ? serious thought should be given to not making the stop in the first place.?

The idea of slowing traffic so dramatically on freeways --? a minimum of 20 mph under the posted limit, which is already set at the 50th to 65th percentile (Texas Transportation Code, Sec, 545.157) -- is counterproductive since the most dangerous thing one can do is suddenly stop or slow down, which is why we have minimum speeds on most of the system.? A sudden change in the pattern would create more danger for no significant benefit.

So now this is the officer's fault?? He should have known better, or what??   To even suggest this is his  fault is just plain ignorant, and clearly smacks of more anti-police rhetoric from you. 

And, you do understand this law is designed to protect ALL emergency workers right?? Not every emergency worker who has ever been killed on the side of the highway because some idiot was unwilling to inconvenience himself by moving over and slowing down has been police officers.?

[Champ]

So now this is the officer's fault? He should have known better, or what?

I think he is trying to say is, if the officer had gone about this a different way - he would lower the chances for getting hit in the first place.  Use the loudspeaker to have the people move over farther, or possibly a little up the road to a safe(r) spot.

[TBR]

I think increasing awareness that you don't have to pull over immediately would really help things.

[Champ]

I think increasing awareness that you don't have to pull over immediately would really help things.

I can agree with that.

[James Young]

So now this is the officer's fault?? He should have known better, or what??  To even suggest this is his? fault is just plain ignorant, and clearly smacks of more anti-police rhetoric from you.?

It is a joint responsibility and I encourage the enforcement agencies to develop techniques that minimize the danger to themselves, the stopped motorists and the motorists on the roadway and then I urge the officers to actually utilize those techniques.  This guy was standing on the roadway, an indefensible stance.  He missed the opportunity to direct the stopped motorist to a better point to pull over.  If that makes it his fault, then so be it.

?Anti-police rhetoric??  Not quite.  I am quite openly anti-police malfeasance and anti-police arrogance.  You do your job as a professional, based on science and evidence, rather than whim or greed and I?ll treat you as a professional.  You do anything less and I merely tell the truth about that behavior.

Perhaps you missed the part where I suggested that the various agencies develop techniques to assure safer stops

While law enforcement ranks way down in the most dangerous jobs according to workers comp analyses, the greatest improvement in their safety record must come from within their own ranks.  Just late last year and early this year, the State of Oklahoma had two troopers and two motorists killed in three separate incidents because they (the three troopers) made sudden and otherwise unsafe U-turns on the turnpikes.   All three were found to be at fault. 

Perhaps it is time to reevaluate the efficacy of patrol techniques and officer behavior, vis-?-vis the nonexistent safety benefit from traffic stops

And, you do understand this law is designed to protect ALL emergency workers right?? Not every emergency worker who has ever been killed on the side of the highway because some idiot was unwilling to inconvenience himself by moving over and slowing down has been police officers.?

Understood.  Just before I left for Montana, there was an OKDOT worker (non-emergency) killed when he walked out in front of two dump trucks to retrieve some debris.  The first swerved to miss him, the next did not.  No charges were filed.  Stupidity is not unique to only motorists.

Moving over is not an inconvenience; it is preventative. 

[hounddog]

It is a joint responsibility and I encourage the enforcement agencies to develop techniques that minimize the danger to themselves, the stopped motorists and the motorists on the roadway and then I urge the officers to actually utilize those techniques.? This guy was standing on the roadway, an indefensible stance.? He missed the opportunity to direct the stopped motorist to a better point to pull over.? If that makes it his fault, then so be it.

?Anti-police rhetoric??? Not quite.? I am quite openly anti-police malfeasance and anti-police arrogance.? You do your job as a professional, based on science and evidence, rather than whim or greed and I?ll treat you as a professional.? You do anything less and I merely tell the truth about that behavior.

Perhaps you missed the part where I suggested that the various agencies develop techniques to assure safer stops

While law enforcement ranks way down in the most dangerous jobs according to workers comp analyses, the greatest improvement in their safety record must come from within their own ranks.? Just late last year and early this year, the State of Oklahoma had two troopers and two motorists killed in three separate incidents because they (the three troopers) made sudden and otherwise unsafe U-turns on the turnpikes.? ?All three were found to be at fault.?

Perhaps it is time to reevaluate the efficacy of patrol techniques and officer behavior, vis-?-vis the nonexistent safety benefit from traffic stops


Understood.? Just before I left for Montana, there was an OKDOT worker (non-emergency) killed when he walked out in front of two dump trucks to retrieve some debris.? The first swerved to miss him, the next did not.? No charges were filed.? Stupidity is not unique to only motorists.

Moving over is not an inconvenience; it is preventative.?

Whim and Greed?  You just do not stop with anti-police bullshit, do you?
As for him missing any opportunity to do this or that, you saw less than a minute of the entire stop, yet you manufacture an opinion the police officer was at fault.  Let me guess, Rodney King was brutally beaten by wayward police who had no reason to even hit him with their PR-24's.  Right? 

WHAT ABOUT THE IDIOT WHO HIT HIM?  Does he bare no responsibility here?  Sometimes, it is a very bad idea to encourage someone to put their car back into drive.  (the whole fleeing from police thing.)  You have never spent one day on the road, so I can completely discount you opinions here. 

Anti-police rhetoric is definately your bag.  Testilying?  Greed?  Those are not police bashing, self-serving, egotistical, base-less, low blows? 

[James Young]

hounddog writes:

Whim and Greed?? You just do not stop with anti-police bullshit, do you?

If facts are ?anti-police bullshit,? then I plead proudly guilty.? I have already listed many of the jurisdictions that openly justify traffic enforcement for revenue purposes yet cannot show any connection between elevated enforcement and improved safety measures.? Washington, DC just announced that as of 1/31/07, that they had collected $217 million from their RLC program in its just over three years of existence.? Synthesize this with the arguments to install them in the first place ? they wanted the money and said so ? and you have whim and greed.

Stopping a car with a burned out license plate light just to ?take a closer look? is whim, completely unjustified by the intrusion on civil liberties.

A $100 billion a year speed-control industry says greed much more loudly than you can excuse it.

Let me guess, Rodney King was brutally beaten by wayward police who had no reason to even hit him with their PR-24's.? Right?

Don?t guess.? I?ll tell you what I?ve said since that night.? Rodney King is a very limited individual, incapable of synthesizing the kind of information ? known and perceived ? that you and I do routinely.? In harsher terms, he is an idiot with self-destructive behavior.?

The original report of his car was from a female Chippie who said he was exceeding 120 mph on the 210.? He could not have gone down the backside of Hoover Dam at 120 mph in his Hyundai with four adults aboard, so the original report was suspect.

Should he have provided his license to the LEOs on-site?? Without a doubt.? Failure to do so escalated the situation.? I don?t excuse his behavior.

The question that the police must answer as to their response to his intransigence is whether or not the behavior seen on the Halliday tape is the kind of behavior that the American public wants to see from the professionals hired to protect the public.? Clearly, their behavior was out of control, an emotional response to a perceived threat to their authority.? Just as clear is the near universal condemnation of that behavior.?

Technical question:? Assuming that you have seen the entire tape, at what point did any of the officers attempt to put cuffs on King?? Look very carefully.

Note also that the police attacks on RK were hardly unique.? The minority communities had been complaining for decades that they were being mistreated by LAPD and other SoCal enforcement agencies and several had died from their encounters with the police.  With the Halliday tape, they now had proof.

Sidebar:? This affected me personally.? I was in charge of a hotel in the LA area when we received three straight arson threats on the night of the riots.? ?We called 911 only to have them tell us they were busy.? So, we took precautions and one Molotov cocktail resulted in the loss of a small decorative tree.? I remember standing on the roof with my radio and my .357 mag and smelling the fires.? Two days later, when LAPD received word from our owner in Paris (France) that we had some CBS executives (from NYC, not the West Coast studios on Beverly) in house, they showed up right away.? One can only surmise that they are more afraid of bad PR than intervening in bad behavior.

That was a watershed day for enforcement:? ?the thoughtless treatment of citizens for decades, combined with the recorded treatment of a citizen a few months earlier, combined with a sham trial, resulted in riots that cost billions in economic and uncounted human damage.? The continuing theme is bad enforcement behavior but officers just seem to never get out of their isolated little world so it continues.

But I digress.

WHAT ABOUT THE IDIOT WHO HIT HIM?? Does he [bear] no responsibility here?

Certainly he bears responsibility and should be held accountable for his part.? My point was that the necessary steps to prevent or at least diminish the exposure by increasing the distance from the regular travel lanes? were not undertaken.?

On my drive through Eastern Colorado and Kansas yesterday, I saw a few stopped vehicles and noted that in all cases the distance from the painted edge-line to the closest vehicle point was at least as wide as an ordinary car and that the troopers angled their vehicles at about 30 degrees with the front closer to the lanes than the rear.? Some of them had the drivers outside, away from the lanes.? Sight distances are several miles out there so it is very easy to give wide berth to

? Sometimes, it is a very bad idea to encourage someone to put their car back into drive.? (the whole fleeing from police thing.)? You have never spent one day on the road, so I can completely discount you opinions here.

While you don?t know anything about me, you can discount whatever you like whenever you want to.? I further doubt that you ever considered giving fair consideration to observations contrary to your formulated point of view.? That does not change the facts.

I once saw an LA County Deputy Sheriff use his loudspeaker to ask an impeder to move over to the right (not to stop her but to just let traffic get past her).? God, I love LA.? I'm sure the loudspeaker could instruct the driver to exit at XXXX street or at the next emergency turnout.

Anti-police rhetoric is definately your bag.? Testilying?? Greed?? Those are not police bashing, self-serving, egotistical, base-less, low blows?

The truth is a harsh master.? I merely take those things that your brethren do, the various jurisdictions say, and the independent academic work reveals, point them out as obvious and you cry ?anti-police.?? ?Testilying? is a term that came from officers in several jurisdictions, not from me.

I suppose those 200+ men who have been exonerated of serious ? usually capital ? crimes because of false testimony are in an anti-cop conspiracy from their prison cells?? Get serious.

While my pointing out the obvious may be self-serving, even egotistical, it is hardly baseless.? LAPD used to routinely dismiss complaints about police malfeasance as ?cop bashing.?? The only unique thing about the Rodney King beating was that George Halliday recorded it and they could not deny what was on the tape.? Absent that tape, RK would have just been chalked up as ?another [minority] resisting arrest.?? And then you wonder why people distrust you.?

Here is a question for you;? I expect no public answer, only a truthful answer to yourself:? When you encounter unethical or immoral behavior on the part of a fellow officer, what do you do?? Do you immediately confront it?? Do you take it to a superior officer?? Do you let it pass because you may need to ?count on that guy?s backup? sometime?? Do you rationalize or excuse it??

[Raza]

By the way, in one of the more stupid ways to catch speeders (the dumbest I've seen, by far, is the guy who runs out into a lane of traffic moving at 80MPH to clock a speeder), some NJSP cars have pulled over to the side of the road with their lights on, positioned at an angle so it appears as if someone is pulled over.  They then try to use radar to get someone speeding, with the car half in the road and everyone swerving to avoid it.

New Jersey cops need a good punch in the throat.  What the fuck is their problem?  Were they not loved as children?

[IrishGuy]

Last time I was pulled over the officer waited to hit the lights until I was coming up to a rest stop. I signaled that I saw him and pulled into the area.

Now what I imagine happens often is the "client" pulling over right away even though they are 100 ft. from the rest stop.

[dazzleman]

By the way, in one of the more stupid ways to catch speeders (the dumbest I've seen, by far, is the guy who runs out into a lane of traffic moving at 80MPH to clock a speeder), some NJSP cars have pulled over to the side of the road with their lights on, positioned at an angle so it appears as if someone is pulled over.? They then try to use radar to get someone speeding, with the car half in the road and everyone swerving to avoid it.

Connecticut has a variation of this that I don't think is as bad.

The speeder will be clocked by an officer in a car at the side of the road.  A little further down the road, an officer standing on the shoulder points to the speeding car to tell the driver to pull over.  Another car waits a little further down to pull up behind the driver, and issue him/her a ticket.

I would think it might be easier to beat this type of ticket in court since issues could be raised about identification of the car, since the ticket is issued by a different officer than the one who clocked the speed of the car.

[Raza]

Connecticut has a variation of this that I don't think is as bad.

The speeder will be clocked by an officer in a car at the side of the road.  A little further down the road, an officer standing on the shoulder points to the speeding car to tell the driver to pull over.  Another car waits a little further down to pull up behind the driver, and issue him/her a ticket.

I would think it might be easier to beat this type of ticket in court since issues could be raised about identification of the car, since the ticket is issued by a different officer than the one who clocked the speed of the car.

That's how I got my ticket.  They pulled roughly 5-6 other people in the time it took them to write my ticket alone

[dazzleman]

That's how I got my ticket.? They pulled roughly 5-6 other people in the time it took them to write my ticket alone

Yes, it's definitely an assembly-line mass production approach to giving out tickets, as opposed to having a single car clock, pull over, and ticket the drivers.  The staties can give out a lot more tickets in the same amount of time this way.