Yesterday, on a green arrow, I made a left hand turn on 800 South onto West Temple to take the southbound on-ramp onto I-15. If you’re familiar with this area, you know you must move to the center and the far-right southbound lanes, or else you will wind back onto West Temple instead of the freeway.
As long as I can do so safely, my practice has always been to immediately move into the center lane during my left turn. This time, a Salt Lake City police officer, standing on the side of the road by his motorcycle, waived me over. I thought maybe it was for a routine check of everyone to see if we had our rabies shot or something.
I politely asked what was wanted and he politely told me that I was being ticketed, because while making the left-hand turn into the center lane, I did not use my right-hand signal. In fact, while he was writing me a ticket, he waived over the next victim. I had no idea that that was the law. If it is the law, the law is an ass with an superfluous public servant riding it. (Superfluous, because in this case, he really could be doing something better with his time.) This law for making that left-hand turn is superfluous because 1) you’re still turning left while traveling to the center lane, 2) your signal has not shut off from the left turn and would be need to break in order to signal right, 3) if you signaled right and waited the required three seconds before moving into the next lane, you will be stuck in the inside lane to West Temple, and 4) since there is no intersecting traffic when making a left turn on a green arrow, there is no one who would benefit from your signaling. Signaling in these circumstances is an exercise in futility. However, maybe, just maybe, it’s a benevolent act of charity that can make our city wealthy.
Go to any downtown busy intersection with four lanes or more and watch how many vehicles (when making a left turn) cross through the inside lane to any of the outside lanes without using their right hand signal. It’s virtually everyone! What a great revenue-producing idea! I did this very same thing today. In 10 minutes, literally 40 vehicles violated that law. At $100 a pop, that’s $4,000 in ten minutes.
Think of the possibilities! This is probably happening in every busy intersection in the entire valley. Our men in blue, black, and brown could literally have the city raking in millions. Even better: They could out-source the job to me for free, and I’ll only charge 35 percent of the incoming revenue. Deal? Then the cops could be out there doing what cops do best: exercising at Gold’s Gym, and maybe even stopping or solving a crime.
Loren M. Lambert © June 25, 2014
As long as I can do so safely, my practice has always been to immediately move into the center lane during my left turn. This time, a Salt Lake City police officer, standing on the side of the road by his motorcycle, waived me over. I thought maybe it was for a routine check of everyone to see if we had our rabies shot or something.
I politely asked what was wanted and he politely told me that I was being ticketed, because while making the left-hand turn into the center lane, I did not use my right-hand signal. In fact, while he was writing me a ticket, he waived over the next victim. I had no idea that that was the law. If it is the law, the law is an ass with an superfluous public servant riding it. (Superfluous, because in this case, he really could be doing something better with his time.) This law for making that left-hand turn is superfluous because 1) you’re still turning left while traveling to the center lane, 2) your signal has not shut off from the left turn and would be need to break in order to signal right, 3) if you signaled right and waited the required three seconds before moving into the next lane, you will be stuck in the inside lane to West Temple, and 4) since there is no intersecting traffic when making a left turn on a green arrow, there is no one who would benefit from your signaling. Signaling in these circumstances is an exercise in futility. However, maybe, just maybe, it’s a benevolent act of charity that can make our city wealthy.
Go to any downtown busy intersection with four lanes or more and watch how many vehicles (when making a left turn) cross through the inside lane to any of the outside lanes without using their right hand signal. It’s virtually everyone! What a great revenue-producing idea! I did this very same thing today. In 10 minutes, literally 40 vehicles violated that law. At $100 a pop, that’s $4,000 in ten minutes.
Think of the possibilities! This is probably happening in every busy intersection in the entire valley. Our men in blue, black, and brown could literally have the city raking in millions. Even better: They could out-source the job to me for free, and I’ll only charge 35 percent of the incoming revenue. Deal? Then the cops could be out there doing what cops do best: exercising at Gold’s Gym, and maybe even stopping or solving a crime.
Loren M. Lambert © June 25, 2014
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