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[–] 40 points 18 hours ago (5 children)

I went to court once because the morning after a party, I still blew just over 0.05.

While there, I saw a guy who had his lawyer dad there speaking for him. The guy was in stopped traffic, mounted a sidewalk, hit a child on their bicycle, and fled the scene, later telling his dad who called the police.

He got a 1 year suspension on his licence, no jail time, and fine like 900€. I remember hearing the person behind me say, "Fucking bullshit" as we waited for our turn.

In comparison, I got 300€ and a six month suspension, no record. I was told it would be worse, but it was clear that I was unaware that I may have still had alcohol in my system. Which is true, because I stopped and went to bed early, knowing I had to be up early to drive to the markets.

Apparently I could've also hit children and sped off the road to get around traffic for just 600€ more...

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  • [–] 5 points 7 hours ago (4 children)

    Yes, exactly, it's truly fucked up. We should put people in prison for traffic violations, because when you drive a vehicle and you don't follow the rules you risk killing people.

    Looking at your phone while driving? Going faster than the speed limit? You may kill somebody.

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  • Looking at your phone while driving?

    I'm a school bus driver. My coworkers frequently use their phones while driving the buses -- even though we have cameras mounted inside and they keep getting caught at it. Somehow nobody has gotten anything except a warning from the boss for doing it. I just do not understand how they're getting away with it.

    Some of the drivers also vape on the buses.

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  • [–] 2 points 5 hours ago (2 children)

    a sad thing is that just operating the vehicle is now often less safe than a decade ago

    i.e. you can get a distracted driving ticket for using your phone mounted on your dash for navigation (zooming out / panning), but you won't get one for adjusting touch screen climate controls on your super shitty unintuitive dashboard UI, a much more difficult task

    i.e. you can get a ticket for driving 5 km an hour over the limit, but you won't get one for having LED headlights so bright that they completely hid a pedestrian in a crosswalk at a four way stop and the oncoming driver nearly ran them over (I have seen this happen multiple times in my own neighbourhood)

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  • [–] 2 points 3 hours ago (1 child)

    i.e. you can get a ticket for driving 5 km an hour over the limit

    I'm a school bus driver and my superior once tried to tell me that it was legal to drive 5 mph over the speed limit. I laughed and said "what the fuck are you talking about?" TBF it's de facto legal to do it because you're extremely unlikely to get a ticket for it and you could argue in court that a recorded speed 5 mph over the limit is not statistically different from the actual limit, but that's not the same as actually "legal".

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  • [–] 2 points 1 hour ago

    lmao I don't think I've ever heard anyone argue that it's legal, only that it's expected or that it's standard practice. but oh boy do people ever complain about how speed cameras would ticket people for going "only 5km/h over the limit in a school zone" (context: my province recently banned all speed cameras and took them all down. yes, all of them. it's dumb as fuck)

    to add some clarity to my previous comment, I was thinking of a 60 km an hour stroad where it's designed for 80+ and you can comfortably drive 90 because it's two lanes each way with shoulders, divided, and a separated sidewalk that nobody uses because it's unpleasant as fuck. in that case, driving 65 in a 60 is just.. it makes no difference. the road is designed for 80.

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