Is there anything the average motorist hates more than police radar? While some citizens see radar “guns” and those who wield them as a necessary evil– police surveillance that saves lives– most drivers view the technology as a “sin tax,” an ineffective safety device, a waste of police resources, an invasion of privacy and/or a major violation of the Constitutional prohibition against “indiscriminate search.” While the battle for and against police radar (and now laser) rages on, TTAC has invited me to discuss the technology and your legal rights. We begin with some deep background.
Back in the early 60’s, police measured driver’s speed via “S-band” radar. These early devices used a huge antenna mounted on a tripod. It printed a paper read out on a rolling sheet of paper, like a lie detector. The S-band radar unit was a cumbersome contraption that only worked in good weather. And keeping the analogue tubes running was a tricky business– never mind trying to get the waves to live at microwave frequencies. Although the system [eventually] offered its police practitioners a reasonable ROI, it was a major PITA.
With the advent of transistors, radar moved to the 10 Ghz “X-band.” New solid state devices assured greater frequency stability at higher frequencies. The antennas got smaller. For the first time, police could mount a radar device on their car– although they were still restricted to continuous transmission from a stationary position.
Early Escort radar detectors worked a treat, picking-up the X-band signal a mile or more before it had the strength to bounce back to its police handler. And there were few, if any, radar “falses” from door openers. The detection – detector arms race began.
The next advance on the police side: a 24 Ghz “K-band” device with a smaller antenna with a new mode: ”instant on.” This feature made the radar detector less useful (it still triggered when someone up ahead was zapped). K-band radar guns were very expensive when they first appeared– so the older X-band guns were also rigged for “instant on.”
The next advancement: moving mode. For the first time, a radar device could separate the primary reflection (ground speed) from the second reflection (target speed). (This development mystifies a lot of drivers, amazed that the cop “was coming from the opposite direction.”) With the smaller. squad car-borne K-band antenna, any police car was a potential "threat" to a speeding driver. The modern radar enforcement era was born.
Today’s state-of-the-art radar devices have moved still further up in frequency, to the 34-36 Ghz Ka-band. (The Ka band is much wider than X or K, making the radar detector’s job harder, as it’s really just a glorified scanner.) Police radar antennas have miniaturized to the point where they’re hand-held devices with soda can-sized apertures. The entire speed detection device is now small enough to permanently mount in a squad car; many police departments use front AND rear antennas.
Whereas the primitive radars of the 70’s could pick out target vs. ground speed as they were going in opposite directions, today’s radars can pick out a target going in the same direction as the patrol car. State laws vary in whether or not this mode has “judicial notice” (i.e. would be accepted in a Court with the usual minimal Police testimony). But the bottom line remains the same: a police car behind you or in front of you can now get a reading. This mode is less frequently used, but it’s increasing, as the older units are retired and new ones enter active duty.
Police radar devices are sold through a public bidding process at the State level. Your local law enforcement agencies often buy at the negotiated State Police price. Many agencies, though, do not. If your state does not have an “official” radar device, you are facing a variety of threats.
Here in New York, the State Police use a state-of-the-art Ka-band radar gun called (of course) the Stalker. Local agencies still have a lot of the Kustom Signals KR series K-band units; they have less money than the State and the units last a bit longer in regular use. Ye Olde X-band is mostly gone; the units have obsoleted out.
The newer radar units have variable power outputs, so that the officer can make the unit’s “zone of influence” smaller. Many of them allow the relevant law enforcement agency to lock out certain functions (e.g. the moving modes) if the law in their state does not support their use.
Fortunately, most police are not gadget geeks. They tend to run their radar guns in full power mode, in standard stationary or “instant on” modes. Still, there's never a shortage of sheep to shear. Speaking of which, next week’s installment will focus on countermeasures– sorry, effective ways to check your speed before you get a ticket.
[Casey W. Raskob, Esq. is a NY-based lawyer who runs speedlaw.net]
A lucrative misrepresentation says speed is the casual factor in great numbers of traffic collisions, injuries and fatalities. If that were really the case super highways would be the most dangerous places on earth. They aren’t. Cutting in and out of traffic, following too close and driving too fast for traffic or weather conditions are the real causes, but nobody has invented a device to measure these as handy and profitable as the radar speed timing device. The dirty little secret? In real world radar guns, while accurate, are hopelessly misleading.
A radar speed timing device determines speed by calculating the return time of an invisible radio beam reflected from a distant object to the transmitter-receiver. Trainee radar operators are told the signal locks onto the lead vehicle. Not so. The signal is returned from the largest object within range, often a mile or more. The speed of a big rig traveling even a great distance behind a car will be measured but in all probability the car driver will be charged with the offense. The radar operator, lacking the foggiest notion what is actually being clocked, will sincerely testify he observed the car traveling faster than the permitted speed.
Radar speed timing devices are subject to a host of errant radio signals including garage door openers, poorly shielded two-way radios and many other RF sources. Shaking a large key ring down signal of a radar speed timing device will rocket the reading off the chart. In fact radar operators confirm device calibration by striking a tuning fork. Certain frequencies produce 30-mph and 50 mph speed readings. Speed radar guns have tracked apartment buildings at 90-mph notwithstanding everybody knows few can go anywhere near that fast, even downhill!
Radar speed enforcement has virtually nothing to do with traffic safety. If it did most radar traps would be situated in high accident areas and school zones, but that is not typically where they are encountered. The logical conclusion: radar speed enforcement is primarily revenue generation. In fact, radar speed timing devices produce a financial bonanza for governments, manufacturers, and insurance companies and are widely and fraudulently accepted by an unquestioning civil service judiciary.
Another profitable fairy tale holds beverage alcohol impaired drivers are the cause of a tremendous percentage of fatal traffic accidents. This is untrue for much the same reason – the invention of the breathalyser.
Casey,
Thanks for the info. I was wondering about the ability of the radars to discriminate targets. Early radars would often lose a small slow target if a larger and faster one was in it’s area. This would lead to a situation on a freeway feeder where the police could give anyone a ticket for going 55 on the feeder because they were really picking up the cars on the freeway, not in their sites. I assume lidar doesn’t have this problem, but have the radars stopped having this fault?
You left out the hardest to avoid device: light-based (aka “laser”) speed measurement devices. Their beam is basically pencil thin, and has near-instant reading for the officer wielding it. Detectors can tell you that “you just got a ticket!” and that is about it.
BTW I’ve written up my own “HowTo” about ticket avoidance here http://chuck.goolsbee.org/archives/416
–chuck
Thanks for the column! Looking forward to more of it!
I figured most police departments had moved on to laser as it seems more accurate.
I think laser can only be used in clear weather.
These speed tax laws get on my nerves. Why can’t the move speeds to what everyone in traffic moves at now instead of trying to enforce some draconian cash grab scheme.
Just to clarify Gardiner Westbound’s description a little: A radar “gun” has sends out a beam of microwave radiation at a fixed frequency. If the radiation bounces off of a stationary object it comes back to the radar gun at the same frequency. If it bounces off something moving the frequncy is either higher (if the object is coming towards the gun) or lower (if the object is moving away from the gun). How much higher/lower depends on the speed and that’s how the police get their number, they’re measuring a frequency difference.
Now when there are more than one moving object, how do you get a speed? The older detectors would just lock on the strongest signal and report that one, then it was up to the officer to determine which signal was the strongest (probably that big truck that you just passed) and all was well. Later more advanced circuity allowed multiple locks and the lock reported to the officer was the fastest signal (now you couldn’t hide in your Corvette while passing the big truck). But both of those methods didn’t hold up in the courts well enough, because smart people (like Casey) would argue that the officer doesn’t know who reflected which signal. Now there’s a little cross hair on the radar gun and the officer aims is at a particular object and a small aperture in the gun only selects the reflected waves along that axis. So that’s _mostly_ fool proof now. The only thing you need to worry about is a faster moving thing along your axis, which is still not perfect. (Then you have laser which is IR and has an even smaller aperture for better selection – but water absorbs IR, so it can’t be used in the rain, or even when it’s too humid)
I once got nailed for doing 35 in a 25, although I was just getting off of a red light letting the clutch out in first gear going no more than 5 mph. What happened? Well as I was accelerating off the light, someone was coming behind me pretty fast. The narrow Ka radar went through the windshield (glass doesn’t reflect microwaves very well) and reflected off the large metal hood of the truck behind me. I got lucky and the officer didn’t show up to my hearing and my case was dismissed, I don’t know how the judge would have dealt with that explanation. But as Casey will probably state in a future article, always fight them!
A lucrative misrepresentation says speed is the casual factor in great numbers of traffic collisions, injuries and fatalities. If that were really the case super highways would be the most dangerous places on earth. They aren’t. Cutting in and out of traffic, following too close and driving too fast for traffic or weather conditions are the real causes, but nobody has invented a device to measure these as handy and profitable as the radar speed timing device.
I agree that speed isn’t the cause of many accidents. However, doesn’t greater speed make a given accident more severe? I don’t necessarily like radar enforcement, but I don’t really see an issue with it. If the speed limit is 70, I’ll do 70 or risk getting a ticket.
Personally, I think the speed limits themselves need to be studied more. There are many roads where the limit is too low, and a few where it is too high (at least in my experience).
How would you handle setting a speed limit for someone driving a 2007 Porsche Cayman versus someone driving a 1972 Ford LTD with blown shocks and cheap tires? What about people of different ages?
I do agree that the accuracy of these devices should be studied and improved, but I don’t know if it’s a good idea to do away with them.
One of the best ways to avoid a speeding ticket:
Drive something that looks like a cop car.
I used to drive a 92 Chevy Caprice Classic back when most departments were driving the same. Never got bothered. If I start having trouble again I’ll be shopping for a Crown Vic in one of the popular unmarked car colors.
The only problem with driving a Crown Vic is everybody around and in front of you slows down to five below the speed limit, making it quite difficult to speed in the first place.
The only problem with driving a Crown Vic is everybody around and in front of you slows down to five below the speed limit, making it quite difficult to speed in the first place.
Until get close enough to take up most of their rear-view mirror. Then they slide over into the other lane to let you by. :)
Two lane roads can be another matter.
chuckgoolsbee: You left out…
Two words: 800 words.
Chuck: Great article! Loved the pictures…sitting here in my cubicle in freezing cold Denver, they really had me dreaming about a road trip…
I usually drive about 5mph under the speed limit. I’ve noticed that cars zooming by me are stopped at the light as I approach the light. Then they take off again accelerating out of view. Many times I see them circling the parking lot, looking for a space, when I pull in.
IOW, speeding really doesn’t save much time – a minute or two. Unless of course you’re drving from NY to CA, then speeding could save several hours.
I have no sympathy for speeders because mostly it’s a useless activity which isn’t saving any significant amount of time.
Electronic speed enforcement, I was thinking this article was going to discuss how future cars top speed on a certain road will be controlled by the government via your car’s computer and required GPS sensor in your new vehicle. It will happen, its just a matter of time, it will be sold, like red light cameras, based on saving lives and you will be considered an evil bastard for resisting it.
@moawdtsi
Australia are already planning to trial this…
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=78950
Radar trapping is a lot like fishing. They find a good spot and only fish there. There are certain know locations around town where the spot is prime and they are there more often then not.
The city could bring in millions of dollars per month if they so desired. At the beginning and end of the school year, it’s printed in the newspaper in advance that the city police will have an increased presence and theirs always some thin reason. During this time, they really bring in the money. I see it as just another form of taxation.
Another favorite pastime of the local police is hanging out on Craigslist posting false escort ads and busting people looking for some companionship. Never mind the real crimes going on. Tickets and fake call girls are where the easy money is at.
My Escort 8500 X50 is useless against laser. I was going through a tunnel and had a laser pointed directly at me, and my detector didn’t even make a sound. Fortunately, I was on the phone at the time and doing the speed limit, so I didn’t get pulled over. To think that being on a cellphone while driving (and I drive a stick) saved me from getting a ticket
It seems like every state cop in NY state leaves their Ka band on constantly. I pick them up on my Escort from over a mile away. It makes my life a lot easier driving through through NY to the Canadian border
Dynamic88: noticed the same thing. Where there’s lots of lights and stops signs, there’s no point in speeding. On some boulevards, the lights are actually synched to allow you to sail through them at 35 mph. If you go faster, well, you’re racing for the right to wait at a red light.
But highways are a different story. Going from Toronto to Montreal in 4hrs45 mins is a huge time saver.
re: thetopdog
So talking on the phone while driving is actually SAFER than not talking on the phone since one drives slower…
Never mind the real crimes going on. Tickets and fake call girls are where the easy money is at.
I don’t know about the “fake call girls” story, but I can’t tell you that many of the major drug busts my brother is involved in begin with a traffic stop. The people are often just the “lower level” operators, but can lead to the major players.
Timothy McVeigh was caught on a traffic stop, so I wouldn’t accuse the police of not going after “real crime” just to fill the coffers.
Even I wouldn’t try to claim driving while talking on the phone is safer, but it did allow me to avoid a ticket that day.
On the other hand, I honestly feel like I’m a safer driver when I speed. I’m much more focused on the road, the car, other cars, etc. If I’m in traffic and forced to drive the speed limit, it’s very easy to zone out and not pay attention to what’s going on, especially on long trips
The suggestion to “just raise the speed limits to what traffic is going at” is ludicrous. If traffic now moving at 70 and you raise the limit to 70 the trafiic will move to 75 and so on until people either can’t or won’t go faster. Might as well just remove th speed limts altogether.
I was in college when the first X-band units were bought by the local police department. They used to sit at the edge of our parking lot and ‘shoot’ down the straightaway, getting people coming into town, but not slowing up fast enough.
Now, this parking lot was next to the Electrical Engineering department — add a couple of 19 year olds with some surplus government low power X-band microwave transmitters and an antenna and you might see where this was going.
The cop would get the thing all aimed down the road (the receiver horn hung on the car window, and the cop sat inside to read the display). We’d hang the antenna out of the window, pointed at the radar receiver, and when cars would come down the road, we’d pulse the transmitter on and off. The cop would inevitably get out of the car, check the horn positioning and get back in. We’d do it a few times until he usually and left.
TexasAg03 :
January 25th, 2008 at 12:55 am
Never mind the real crimes going on. Tickets and fake call girls are where the easy money is at.
I don’t know about the “fake call girls” story, but I can’t tell you that many of the major drug busts my brother is involved in begin with a traffic stop. The people are often just the “lower level” operators, but can lead to the major players.
Timothy McVeigh was caught on a traffic stop, so I wouldn’t accuse the police of not going after “real crime” just to fill the coffers.
Using that argument, the police would also catch more criminals if they could bust into any house and search it for no reason.
My mom got a ticket while passing through Oregon a couple of years ago. The cop said that she was doing 80 in a 60 zone. The thing is my mom had been passed by another car almost immediately before she came around the corner, and the cop pulled out behind her with his lights going. Try to convince a local Sheriff’s deputy with a highschool education that the car in front of you that had just passed you and was obviously increasing the distance between your car and theirs when the cop pulled out must have been the faster car. It was out of state so she had no real choice other than to pay the large fine or ignore it and hope that the Idaho police don’t have a reciprocity agreement with Oregon resulting in the yanking of her driver’s license. By the way, my mom is a typical old lady who usually drives too slow, IMO.
thetopdog :
January 24th, 2008 at 11:27 pm
It seems like every state cop in NY state leaves their Ka band on constantly. I pick them up on my Escort from over a mile away. It makes my life a lot easier driving through through NY to the Canadian border
As part of my job, I am required to take a driver’s safety training course every other year. Thes courses are typically taught by a retired CHP officer. These guys patrol California’s highways with what seems to be the main purpose of handing out speeding tickets and stopping drug trafficking. During one year’s training, the retired officer started talking about radar detectors and how useless they were with modern radar units (and of course laser units). He said his favorite thing to do was leave his radar unit on constantly when he stopped for lunch at this restaurant located at the top of a hill next to the freeway. That way, he said he knew their would be few speeders as the radar detectors would be squawking away. When he wanted to actually catch speeders, he would use the instant on mode and pick out cars that he judged to be speeding then just confirm it with the radar.
As we all know, most-though maybe not all-police officers will allow a little upward creep above the posted speed limit depending on the location and road conditions.
I bought an Escort 8500 X50 last year after determining that if it save me from a single ticket, it’d be worth the money.
I’m still not sure it has.
I can pick out which traffic lights run radar with their photo systems, and the construction people practically bathe in it.
The cops? Not so much. I’ve only encountered one with constant-on radar, and I’m pretty sure he left it on by accident. With most of the signals I get in K and Ka band, I can never find the cop, so I assume they’re erroneous.
The one thing I have learned from the Escort is first, how few cops there actually are, and second, how many just sit and do nothing. Nearly all the cops I pass on the side of the road never trigger the detector. I submit that my dark green Malibu isn’t a cop-magnet, but I drive it fast enough that I assume a cop would tag me if he was paying attention.
The ones that are out for tickets shoot laser. I’ve had a handful of those alerts, usually on the outskirts of a city, and they’re terrifying. The detector goes apeshit, and from what I’ve been told, the laser unit has nearly instant-read capacity. If that’s true, the detector has no point. But, I’ve also never been pulled over after a laser tag, so it’s either picking up a bounce, or the 20 MPH I drop in two seconds puts me just under the wire.
I’ve evaded more tickets by paying attention than the Escort has netted, but at this point, I wouldn’t do an extended roadtrip without it, even if only for psuedo-peace of mind.
The only redeeming factor in all this is that everyone seems to be driving faster. A cop friend informed me that on I-85 in Georgia, they don’t start paying attention until you pass 85 MPH. That’s 30 over.
I drive one of those trophy cars, and therefore usually do the speed limit because I know I get noticed. I checked out chuckgoolsbee’s blog and have been doing most of what he recommends when I to go over the limit, or for that matter when I’m not speeding. Good advise there Chuck. I think following distance is more of a safety factor than speed. I hate tailgaters, and will risk speeding to get out of their range when I have the opportunity.
I totally agree with the point that speeding fines are simply revenue generation. The majority of tickets I have gotten occurred on an open interstate with me being the lone car. I’m not sure who or what I was endangering by going 80 instead of 65. Now I can totally support speeding enforcement in high congestion areas or school zones. These are the types of situations where speed kills. What kills on the interstates and 4 lane roads? The tailgating, unnecessary braking, and aggressive driving. As well as those damn people that are adamant about their position in the left hand lane. Can’t drivers understand that passing on the right and weaving across lanes in dangerous. By always moving to the right if you are not passing, you create simple process where you know where the guy behind you is going to go. I really wish this offense of left lane riding were more enforced, it is a law in many states but not one that is enforced to my knowledge.
chuckgoolsbee
Nice write up/article. Thanks.
I have two methods (both very similar) that has worked at least 10 times. I have received one ticket since 1988 in the USA. We used to trip the speed cameras in Italy for fun b/c the ticket always came in the form of a registered letter that we were supposed to pickup at the local Italian post office. Never picked them up, never got a ticket.
Anyhow…
Like a previous poster wrote – speeding over short distances has never netted me any real time. 10 minutes city to city maybe so the older I get the more likely I am to cool it. Frankly I have better things to do with $250 and higher insurance costs.
When I have felt like I needed to speed – I have always drove the speed limit until some brave soul passed me. Then I hang back a couple of miles and pace them at the higher speed. I have witnessed about 5 or 6 of these “Rabbits” (I call the car I’m chasing a rabbit) get pulled over. Once the officer didn’t hit the lights until he past the rabbit and was beside me. I pulled over b/c I thought I was caught!
Another version (2nd method) is to simply do this with a radar detector. Has worked very well except I got my one speeding ticket this way. I was “chasing” a knot of rabbits on I-81 in VA going south one day. I let them get too far ahead (they were running about 80 mph) and we were traveling through some hills. They apparently got off the interstate somewhere leaving me alone running about 80 mph. I came over a hill and there was VA’s finest shooting radar in my direction. Instant on of course. My radar detector which usually would beep faster and faster as I approached a radar gun skipped all that and went berserk. I just pulled over and hid the hardware. Took my ticket and went on.
Really there is a place for everything. Dense traffic or country highways with blind hills and driveways isn’t the place to go fast. Empty rural highways where you can see for miles with big road shoulders – lay on the steam.
I miss being able to get on the Autostrada and run 100 mph for a few hours in my 1984 Rabbit Convertible. I tried it here (TN) for fun and frankly the American driver doesn’t know what to do with themselves when a fast car catches up with them around here. If I flash my high beams at them there is a 50% chance they are going to get pissed off and hold on to that left lane b/c they can. A flashing left blinker in the left lane means squat (useful in Italy).
A good number of the cars are best left running at 70 mph because they are not capable of running any faster safely due to either equipment or driver deficiencies. An SUV or minivan running 90 mph? No thanks… Give ’em some space to crash everybody!
So I’ve learned to be patient.
What I WOULD like to see is slower commercial traffic. A 60,000 lb truck running 80 mph is dangerous for everyone around it. I’d love to see them restricted (computerized) to 65 mph. Let them have full power to climb hills but speed limited to 65 mph or lower. I’ll pay the slightly higher costs at the store if that is what it would mean. I’d also like to see the bumpers under the trailers that the Italian truckers were required to have. These were large plastic or fiberglass bumpers that kept anything front going under the trailer. I think if the American fleet of vehicles begins to shrink (high fuel costs) this would be doubly good.