Clay Evans weighs in on the 50% increase in speeding tickets issued in Boulder this year. As anyone familiar with Clay’s liberal stances could predict; he claims “it’s not about the money”. Of course, I disagree.
Clay claims/implies that the number of cars speeding has increased dramatically…
Tickets for drivers going 8 to 9 miles an hour over the limit have gone up by about 230 percent, from 288 to 666. Those exceeding the limit by 10 to 19 mph have increased by 46 percent, from 4,021 to 5,901. The lone bright spot: Those blazing along at 20 to 39 mph over the limit have actually gone down by 1.4 percent, from 204 to 201.
I maintain that the enforcement has increased dramatically. Is that necessarily a bad thing? No it isn’t, and goodness knows there are plenty of people who deserve speeding tickets.
What troubles me is I’m busy seeing “setups”. One that particularly comes to mind is sitting through 3 light cycles on Pearl street between 28th and 30th going east. During this space, traffic is throttled down to one lane and just before the light at 30th street is allowed back to 2 lanes. After sitting through 3 light cycles it’s not surprising that folks are a little antsy. Of course, the speed limit on Pearl Parkway (Pearl St. turns into Pearl Parkway after 30th going east) is 35 mph. So being in the 2nd row, I didn’t notice anyone taking off particularly fast, but a little bit of frustration can easily get one over 35 mph on Pearl Parkway.
Who’s waiting for you as your approach the exit to Foothills parkway but a Boulder motorcycle “officer of the law”. No, it wasn’t me that got pulled over, but it left one hell of a bad taste in my mouth. So no wonder I believe it’s 90% about money and 10% about safety.
Also, I wonder how the percentage of warning issued has changed as a function of the number of speeding tickets written.
