well, it's actually 6 months old but i feel it's worth mentioning. i don't recall a thread in here about it. if there was, i apologize. the following is an email i just received and what the law states. FYI, I received this from a friend, relaying the experiences of someone else. Even though I do not know who the person writing the information is, I had a similar experience recently so know the basic information is accurate. I was stopped by La Porte police a few weeks ago after passing a stopped police car with it's lights flashing, but they were only giving warnings at the time so no ticket was issued. I have not seen any publicity on this, so suspect most people are not aware of the change. Foster All, Let my misfortune be a lesson for you. This is a long story, but a must read. This really happened to me yesterday (12/10/03). Yesterday, I was driving into town along the Southwest Freeway around 12:30 PM. I was in the far left lane doing the posted speed limit of 65 and going with the flow of traffic. When I got over the Bissonnett/Braeswood overpass, there was an HPD squad car parked on the left shoulder with the officer standing out in front of his vehicle pointing his radar gun at oncoming cars. Your inclination automatically tells you to slow down, whether you were speeding or not. Not a 1/2 mile down the freeway, there was another HPD officer that had someone pulled over on the left shoulder giving the person a ticket. I thought, man this was an obvious speed trap and kept on going. I had slowed down to around 60 at that point as now the posted speed limit was 60. About a mile up the road, around Gessner, another HPD officer had someone else pulled over to give them a ticket and literally in front of that traffic stop was another HPD officer (yes we are up to 4 cop cars now in about a mile) walking around to the front of his car. Just as I was approaching him, he pointed his radar gun at me and signaled for me to pull over. I was shocked, because I know that I was going the posted speed limit (60) as I immediately looked at my speedometer. The officer came to my window and said "do you know how fast you were going?" I said yes, I was going 60. He said "you were doing 58" and he showed me his radar gun, which read 58. I said okay. He said "you failed to slow your speed down by 20 MPH or move over to the adjacent lane when an emergency vehicle was stopped in the flow of traffic." I said, I did not know that was a law (of course that is never a defense) and he said it was and asked for my license. I offered that and my concealed handgun license to him (as I am required by law, being a CHL carrier), as well as the knowledge that I was carrying my pistol under the rear passenger seat. The officer wrote me a ticket that carries a $200 maximum fine for this infraction. Come to find out, this is a new state law as of September 1, 2003. >From the TX DPS website, the law reads: SB 193 requires drivers nearing a stopped emergency vehicle that has lights activated, unless otherwise directed by a law enforcement officer, to: Vacate the lane closest to the emergency vehicle, if the highway has two or more lanes traveling the direction of the emergency vehicle; or Slow to a speed not more than 20 miles per hour (mph) less than the posted speed limit when the posted speed limit is 25 mph or more; or Slow to a speed not more than five mph when the posted speed limit is less than 25 mph. A violation is a punishable by a maximum fine of $200. If the violation results in property damage, the maximum fine increases to $500. If the violation results in bodily injury, the offense is enhanced to a Class B misdemeanor.
Yes, exactly what we need..... more laws. I can honestly say that Freedom and Police are an oxymoron. This sickens me.
http://www.texasmotorists.org/new_laws/default.asp its for real.. good thing too, too many times have cops and motorists been injured by people speeding right by when they are stopped on the side of the road. I have always moved over when passing pulled over cars just as common sense...dont know why others dont.. which is why they passed the law.
I know this has nothing to do with traffic laws, but does any one know when the billboards are coming down? I heard a couple of months ago that the city was trying to get rid of them, or atleast bring them down a tad. Also, the new the trees look great. A little skimmpy, but hey it's a start. Don't mess with Texas
Jeff went into this in detail here... http://bbs.clutchcity.net/php3/showthread.php?s=&postid=1179456#post1179456
Good post macalu. I already know at least 2 times I could've gotten busted for this because I didn't know about it.
I heard about this the other day, and this law still doesn't make much sense to me. It would seem more likely to me that I'd get hit from behind by someone who doesn't know the law than get a ticket for not obeying it. Edit: I missed that ever important "or." My understanding of the law was that every lane on the freeway would have to slow down to 25 mph if a cop had pulled someone over. Nevermind.
They had something about this on Fox news last night. I suppose it won't make a huge difference most of the time because whenever an emergency vehicle is in traffic, the flow slows to about 5 mph as people stop and look, but it also appears to be something that can really be abused to get more revenue -- like here.
here is a story on NBC's local affiliate's (channel 2 KPRC) about it.. I'll post it so that everyone can see that the cops are starting to crack down on this.. http://www.click2houston.com/news/2760572/index.html?subid=10100242
That's why, even though I RARELY pay attention to current events, read every last news article that had "NEW LAW" in the title when the bills were passed.... It's not fun going 35 on the freeway even when there's no traffic around you, but it's better than getting a ticket.
if there is no traffic, just move one lane over and you arent required to slow down. If you have ever seen the videos of cops and the cars they have pulled over getting hit by passing cars...you would understand why this was passed. There was a lady that was killed last year in Pasadena by a 18-wheeler that slammed into them while they were pulled over to the side on 225. It happens more often than you would think..
