Speed.... Safety or Cash Grab??

[Toma]

Duh. lol

Ghosts of Druh? lol

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/Staples+Speed+crackdown+looks+like+cash+grab/9726307/story.html

[JRSC00LUDE]

CASH, CASH AND, CASH.

The "safety" argument is completely indefensible in the VAST majority of these crack....I mean shakedowns. Traffic police are taxation agents and no one will do a single thing about it, it'll just keep getting worse.

[speedog]

Why ghosts of Druh?

While it's becoming evident that she's an advocate of lowered speed limits in residential areas, I don't recall her (or council for that matter) ever asking the CPS to adjust their tolerance levels when it comes to nabbing speeders not have the CPS been more aggressive in ticketing speeders - certainly if there had been a noticeable crackdown in Calgary it would've been debated quite heavily in this forum.

Please do explain your "ghosts of Druh" reference.

[Toma]

lol.... I was also referring to the GARBAGE Bike Lanes and reduced speed lol

Cavemen need to go extinct.

We are in a booming, bustling, ever growing city, with more cars, more traffic.

Traffic "easement" is bullshit and archaic.

WE should be doing EVERYTHING possible to promote traffic flow, reduce congestion, get people home faster, safer.

[speedog]

Originally posted by Toma
lol.... I was also referring to the GARBAGE Bike Lanes and reduced speed lol

Cavemen need to go extinct.

We are in a booming, bustling, ever growing city, with more cars, more traffic.

Traffic "easement" is bullshit and archaic.

WE should be doing EVERYTHING possible to promote traffic flow, reduce congestion, get people home faster, safer.
Wow, 90% of the news article is in reference to aggressive ticketing on speeders and we were supposed to deduce that you were were referring to the other 10% of the article - wouldn't have ever guessed that.

[schocker]

Make it harder to drive around and penalize everyone driving, makes sense :rofl:
Triple ticket revenue in one year though :nut:
Instead of bike lanes, make dedicated fast lanes :rofl:

[rage2]

There was another article yesterday that was posted about increasing the speed limit on that stretch of road, with average speeds. Cops are just out there taking the last of the gravy before the change happens, which is sad.

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/City+council+decide+Scona+Road+speed+limit+increase+with+video/9719850/story.html

Current speed limit: 50
Average speed of vehicles: 61
Proposed speed limit: 60

[takkyu]

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[01RedDX]

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[Modelexis]

Sitting in traffic is just another government line, no different from waiting in line at the registry.

[schocker]

Originally posted by rage2
There was another article yesterday that was posted about increasing the speed limit on that stretch of road, with average speeds. Cops are just out there taking the last of the gravy before the change happens, which is sad.

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/City+council+decide+Scona+Road+speed+limit+increase+with+video/9719850/story.html

Current speed limit: 50
Average speed of vehicles: 61
Proposed speed limit: 60
Maybe we can make a list of roads that should be increased here :

Crowchild 80 -> 90
Stoney Trail 100 -> 110
Deerfoot 100 -> 110
Beddington Trail 60 -> 70
Shaganappi Trail 60 -> 80

[FraserB]

The city and police are too used to the revenue generated by photo radar to ever stop using it. They are pulling in about $40 million a year from it and won't want to give up any of that out of their budgets.

There are also enough people, mostly soccer moms and morons who can't drive, in this city that believe that photo radar actually increases safety. While the police claim it works because the lower than projected revenue shows a change in behavior, it's more likely that drivers are learning even worse behaviors. Go watch any intersection with a camera or park a car on the side of the road, people see the camera or what they think is a photo radar van and jump on the brakes in flowing traffic.

Is it a cash grab? Yes.
Does it increase safety? Not really.
Will it go away? No, most likely it will grow on a huge scale like Edmonton plans and/or they will lower the threshold for violations like Edmonton.

[speedog]

Deerfoot Trail at 110 would create more problems - problem areas like the 17th Ave/Memorial section and the Glenmore Trail section would no doubt have more accidents and more severe ones if the limit was 110. The problem with portions of Deerfoot is it's not designed well and there are far too many entrance/egress point placed too close together - the Memorial/17th Ave section is a nightmare at the best of times and bumping up the speed limit will just get more drivers into more precarious situations.

Yeah, many of us can and probably do 110 or more on Deerfoot already and even in these noted poorly designed sections but upping the limit to 110 would most likely create more problems than it would solve in these poorly designed sections - poor drivers aren't being legislated off of our roads and would be a greater hazard when faced with a 110 limit which they would either attempt to keep up to or become a hazard by driving along at their regular lower speed with a even greater differential between their velocity and the 110 limit.

Other roads - by all means some speed limits should be looked at. One of Calgary's more notorious roads with what is probably an extremely low speed limit would be Bow Trail - easily feels like a 70 road out west of downtown in either direction and yet it's set at 60 with CPS gladly plumping up the coffers. Now I don't know anything about road design with respect to safety/speed limits but that road certainly feels like it should be set to a faster and more reasonable speed limit - maybe all of the exits/curves in a short distance are the 60kph reasoning (distractions to some drivers?) but wasn't it at one time 70 before the LRT was there?

[schocker]

Originally posted by speedog
snip
Well in general, there are parts that could be 110 and other parts that should stay 100 on Deerfoot I agree. But it was just a general idea. Like crowchild where it is a mess near kensington is fine at 70 but once it opens up and straightens out 90 would be no problem

[FraserB]

Deerfoot and Glenmore isn't a design issue, it's a driver issue.

Merging onto Deerfoot off the ramps you always have people going 70-80kph for some reason, even though there is ample room to get up to a reasonable merge speed. Or you have people cut right in going nowhere near 100. Or cut across all lanes to get the exit they missed.

There was some moron reversing on the shoulder the other day by Deerfoot Meadows. Somehow this kind of nonsense is fine, but 80kph on Glenmore under an abandoned worksite needs 2 photo enforcement vehicles.

[finboy]

As long as we're talking increases, Blow out that playground zone on elbow trail :thumbsdow

[Canmorite]

Reading the comments on that article is maddening. "Just go the speed limit and you'll never have a problem." How low does the speed limit need to be before these idiots complain? :rofl:

[Sugarphreak]

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[16hypen3sp]

Originally posted by Canmorite
Reading the comments on that article is maddening. "Just go the speed limit and you'll never have a problem." How low does the speed limit need to be before these idiots complain? :rofl:

I too read the comments and you took the words right out of my mouth!

[codetrap]

There was 6 major speed traps today on hwy 2 today. Made it thought them all. Cruise control at 112. Not so for the guy in the white truck with the landscaping trailer. He got nailed twice!

[16hypen3sp]

I was told that you can do 120 on Highway 2 before the RCMP will come after you. I think it was said on an interview that Global did with an integrated traffic unit cop from around Red Deer.

I dunno...

Last summer I was driving northbound on the 2 towards EIA. I was stuck in a massive pile of traffic and guess who was at the front... an "undercover" RCMP SUV. We were about 30 mins south of Leduc and I couldn't take being in a parking lot that was cruising at 110 anymore. I had my radar detector mounted and active and it wasn't picking anything up. I found some space in the left lane, moved into it and began speeding up. I had to pass a few slower vehicles before approaching the officer at his 7 o'clock... I was committed to passing him at this point. Everyone behind me must have thought I had balls of steel to even attempt to pass a cop. I was moving at about 120 and he was moving at about 115. I slowly crept by him. While I did, all I could think about was "he's going to pull me over and tell me, you never pass a cop." Just as I pull by him, he speeds up so his drivers side window is beside my passenger side window and I can see him looking into my car as we cruised side by side. I don't exactly know what he was looking at, maybe my detector, I dunno. Then he slowed back down, I made the complete pass and moved into the right lane but I kept my speed at 120 and got ahead of all that traffic.

Yes it felt like I accomplished something that day! :rofl: