Jalopnik: never speed in virginia...3 days in jail...

Don't get me going...

CW

 

Insane... You only get how deal with this crappy crap once you grow up and continue to drive the roads around VA. It really makes owning these cars pretty retarded here.

 

Yet allowing drivers in VA to do 80 mph on I-95 with nascar spacing in the left lane is sooo much safer. Ridiculous.

 

That's a different issue, but I don't disagree with you.

If there's ANY space between you and the car ahead, someone is going to try to fit in between, even if there's not enough room. It is Max Max/Road Warrior on the Beltway. Everyone for themselves.

The meek may inherit the Earth, but they're not going to get to their destination on time...

CW

 

I just don't go 80 mph in Virginia, period. One of many reasons I try to avoid the state whenever possible and give my business to Maryland or DC.

 

I live in VA. It's pretty easy to avoid this, just don't do more than 10 over the posted speed limit and you will not get pulled over, let alone end up in jail. The guy was doing 93 in a 55, what did he think would happen? There are many states where if you're more than 25 over you risk a night or two in jail, not just VA. This guy was doing almost 40 over.

 

I think the driver is best qualified to determine what is safe under the conditions (weather, time of day, traffic conditions, road surface, etc.), as opposed to some traffic engineer or legislator who may have other motives on their mind. Traveling at high rates of speed on an empty eight-lane divided highway is not the same as barreling through a school zone when classes let out on a two-lane road.

Traveling at high rates of speed is not reckless in and of itself, and courts in other jurisdictions have upheld that.

CW

 

If I recall correctly if you are a resident of VA you get it the worst. Speeding tickets in the thousands of dollars. Stuff like this being thrown in jail. Out of state you get the usual fine but jail I don't think I so.

He said he had been living in DC so I wonder how that falls in VA eyes is he a resident of VA? I'm not sure how DC works.


Anyway I do about 9-10 over in Va. I'm from Michigan and have been pulled over countless times in my life all over usually for me it was Ohio and North Carolina, I got a 84 in a 55 back in 97 in NC had to pay a fine and lost my license for three months. Only once have I been pulled over in Michigan and I got out of the ticket. Usually cruse down I-77 so pretty quick in and out not to many troopers on that stretch of highway. Pulled over a lot in Ohio when I was a young US Marine and would get out of tickets always. It's nuts how many times I had been pulled in ohio chasing after some girl. Haha

 

True. In MD it would have been Neglegent Driving and would have just been a large fine (ask me how I know).

 

I agree with you. What the "Real" threat on the roadways are, are the drivers that treat driving an automobile as their secondary focus. Primary focus is doing everything else other than driving the car, and paying attention to their surroundings, flow of traffic etc...


Jim

 

Bwahahahahahah!!!! Love this line!

This assumes an intelligent driver, and not all of them are.

 

It does, and they aren't.

But, isn't that the point of the process of obtaining a DL? Through training and certification/licensing, you are presumed to be competent/intelligent enough to operate a motor vehicle.

CW

 

I also agree with the assessment that at 93, he would be excessively over the speed limit in most states. I think the issue here though, is that the penalty is heavy handed and that the speed limits in VA tend towards the very low end of the spectrum.

I'm a recent transplant from LA where 80 is the de facto limit, and everything I've encountered in other states is either similar or only slightly lower.

A heavily enforced 55mph limit seems unreasonable, but the roads here are not as good either so it may be somewhat justifiable. (i.e. Why do we not use reflective paint to mark lanes? I can't see ANY of them during heavy rain. We only have 2 lane "freeways" in each direction, whereas most in CA were 4-6 in a direction.)

 

just checked, you can get imprisoned in New York for going 11mph over the limit

 

Its a Money Grubbing Scheme plain and simple. Prosecutors know Defense attorneys.
Ex -Assistant County Prosecutors leave to become traffic defense lawyers. Using their former contacts to negotiate down the sentences and the fines. They have found a way to warrant a $1500 fee. Prosecutors get guilty pleas and big fines but no jail time or Points violations for out of State violators . Its a mutually cooperative Blackmail. Jon in Delaware

 

Just curious, but how many drivers do you know who've been actually been imprisoned for doing 11mph over the limit in NY?

The way the code/statutes are written is so that there's "up to" some maximum penalty. Judges, however, don't normally (if ever) impose the maximum, and certainly not on something as petty as this is, elsewhere.

General rule of thumb in NoVA (Fairfax Co.): jail time over 90mph. Generally, one day per mph.

CW

 

Wait, I read the signs entering VA. They say "Radar detectors illegal". ...if they state that but nothing else, aren't murder, rape and speeding all fair game?

Really, VA gave me a ticket driving a car registered elsewhere for non-OEM looking exhaust legal elsewhere. What did they want me to do, put it in the glove compartment when I crossed the state line?

VA is for lawmakers.

 

I don't care if the limit is to low, the highway is empty, or if the police are wearing swastikas & jackboots; 93 in a marked 55 is just plain stupid...
- no sympathy here.

 

Enjoy jackboots on your throat up North, eh?

CW

 

I always thought it was amazing that with these practices of the Gestapo in Va, they still insist on holding the National and most of the FCA events there.

 

The case I was referring to earlier was State of Nebraska v. Carman. 128mph was not reckless without more.

Nebraska Judge: 128 Miles Per Hour Not Reckless Driving

CW

 

I live in VA and find MD patrolling and ticketing to be much more draconian and unsafe (they love the stand in the highway routine).

I refuse to read the article but, 93 in a 55 is dumb and I suspect the driver was not the most humble.

Same crap is an option in every state.

 

Ah, yes, Virginia the home state of most of the Founding Fathers and framers of the Constitution and
Bill of Rights which is now little more than an open police state.

From Florida but while living in New York for a year in 1990, I had many opportunities to
travel through Virginia in I-95. On the first drive up through Virginia, one thing you notice
right away are the signs warning that radar detectors are illegal the minute you drive across the
N.C./Virginia state line.

The Virginia State Trooper presence is unmistakable in Virginia. I had been warned by friends to
take it easy weeks before my first trip and the warnings were well heeded. I have never seen a
state where troopers are hiding behind nearly every bridge abutment, bush or tree the way they
are in Virginia.

There was even an article in Automobile Magazine (I think it was) that in many instances in Virginia,
road side work crews with tractors cutting the grass alongside the highways were
actually working cops equipped with radar guns and radios, I personally witnessed this.

On one occasion driving north on I-95, pretty much all alone minding my own business, I spotted a
Virginia State Trooper barreling straight towards me out of the wide grassy median. Not sure what this
technique was, attempting to startle me into making a mistake but I held my composure and my line.
Once he got on the northbound lanes, he held position behind me for a while and then peeled off but
not before my heart rate increased as the entire episode was very intimidating because of course all
of us guys with Florida plates are transporting illegal drugs.

As for the radar detector law, I've seen reports that the police have detectors to detect if you have a
radar detector in your car. This, along with being equipped with listening and scent devices (more closely
associated with CIA operations than state police) so they may hear and detect any sordid aromas coming
from cars

I mean, really, who comes up with all this stuff?

BHW

 

Since radar detectors aren't you should be using Waze gps on your phones. It has the ability for other users to report police and other road issues in real time. It works great for me here in Philly and I personally think its a better gps than g-maps or apple maps.
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