Check Stop Tweets

[Mike Vernon]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Wow this makes absolutely no sense, maybe you can claim innocence under admirality law and pay any find that you get with a rock.

Thanks man! You rock too!

[Tailgator]

Originally Posted by Mike Vernon

I have seen the Langdon Check Stop. They hide it under the guise of a Fish and Wildlife Conservation Check yet they pull over Volkswagon Beetles. Would be a tight fit for a poached Deer!

Also why do they have Check Stops on the out skirts of the city for traffic travelling into the city? Doesnt make any sense. Waste of tax dollars IMO

I've heard it said they do this because a lot of habitual drunk drivers skirt the city streets then come back into town via the highways because "no one would ever think someone coming into town would have been drinking". And from what I've heard they catch a lot....

[valo403]

Originally Posted by Mike Vernon

I think the government should give everyone a criminal record if you have a drivers license. That and tax everyone $5,000. Lets face it, in this witch hunt pre-crime they have now almost everyone is or has been a criminal at some point behind the wheel.

You have a newsletter don't you?

Just an FYI, when you get an "impaired" or "DUI", you actually get charged (usually) with 2 offences. Impaired driving and impaired driving over .08. The first charge is based on subjective grounds consisting of police observations. The second is obviously the objective "machine test" as you guys point out.

Technically, you can get the first charge but not the second. For example, you are driving like you drank a brewery tank at Elsinore Brewery yet you blow under the .08 limit.

[DownhillGoat]

Originally Posted by Mike Vernon

Also why do they have Check Stops on the out skirts of the city for traffic travelling into the city? Doesnt make any sense. Waste of tax dollars IMO

Here's my completely baseless theory:

People coming back from the ski hills. You've got in the thousands per day at Louise/Sunshine hauling back from the hills, and more often than not, are either drinking at lunch, drinking on the lifts, or drinking on the car ride back home. A checkstop at the edge of the city tags all of them. On busy days/event days at the hill, there are often RC's set up at the hill exit with a checkstop on the way out of the hills, and there's no alternate routes to tweet about there. However being in more remote locations, it's pulling a lot of manpower out of the way.

Secondly, the outskirts of town targets a ton of people with few options. Any decent checkstop is going to be in a high-traffic area, with little viable way to access an alternate route. If you're rolling into town on the #1 or #2, what are you going to do if you see a checkstop? Cut across 3 lanes of traffic, drive thru the ditch, and head the opposite direction to avoid it?

As fundmark had pointed out, there was a checkstop at the top of Cochrane hill. They do this every year prior to the Chirstmas season, generally in the daytime, more of a precation/PSA than a checkstop. There's [basically] 2 ways out of town, and if you're halfway up that hill, you're not turning around. The second place they stop is the 22, on the way in or out of town.

Is it a PITA if you're going somewhere in a hurry? Yes. Does it stop probably three-quarters of the traffic in that time frame? Absolutely. Which in my eyes makes it effective, not a waste of tax dollars.

[getbak]

Are there any good stats available regarding Checkstop effectiveness?

All I could find from Google was a story from the Herald last December (that's no longer online) that talked about the "enhanced" (daytime) Checkstops last year, and it said that between December 8 and 23 last year, on Checkstops run between 12:00 and 8:00pm, there were just over 5,000 vehicles stopped. This led to 36 24-hour suspensions (which would now be 72 hours) and 5 impaired driving charges.

I also recall seeing a stat from the evening Checkstops (that I can't find now to verify), where if you did the math, it worked out to about 3 impaired charges a night.

It seemed like it would be better to just have those cops driving around and stopping people who were driving suspiciously.

[valo403]

I'm not sure how you can quantify deterrence from statistics like that, and seeing as a major purpose of checkstops is to make people say 'you know what, I'm not going to drive' looking at it strictly based upon those numbers doesn't make sense.

[moon]

I am certainly no expert but I would imagine that checkstops are set up as much to scare people from driving drunk in the first place as they are to catch people driving drunk.

As you mentioned the stats on how many they catch all seem to indicate that it is fairly low but the number of people that likely decide not to take their car or to not drive after having a few because of the threat of checkstops is likely a decent number.

I don't think this service or even checkstops do a ton to curtail the "super drunks" or habitual drunk drivers that are the biggest threat on the road so while it seems morally wrong to do I don't think it is curtailing a ton of drunk drivers and certainly not the "scariest" of them.

[moon]

Originally Posted by Mike Vernon

Also why do they have Check Stops on the out skirts of the city for traffic travelling into the city? Doesnt make any sense. Waste of tax dollars IMO

Maybe I have spent too much time in Lethbridge but I imagine it would happen in Calgary as well. There are a ton of people coming from small towns/farms to the city to go to the bars there and that will pre-drink prior to going to the bar. These people also drive a lot more since a cab will be expensive, hotel expensive and public transport is not an option.

[polak]

Yeah alcohol gives you confidence.
No drunk person is scared of driving poorly and getting pulled over. Everyone thinks they drive like a superstar when they're hammered.

What they're scared of is a random check.

[Jake]

I went through a check stop once in Calgary in 20 years living there... I have gone through 5 or 6 in the last month alone in North Van. Calgary needs more of them. I hope the account tweeting out check stop locations is deleted.

[Resolute 14]

You guys just have odd luck then. I either pass by or through about 3 or 4 a year. Commonly, Centre Street between 61st Avenue and Glenmore after Flames games.

Saw the daytime checkstop last week set up at Barlow by the Deerfoot Inn. Kind of a silly spot since they were set up northbound before the turn into the casino. They were set to catch the people entering, not leaving.

[DownhillGoat]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

You guys just have odd luck then. I either pass by or through about 3 or 4 a year.

I'm at least stopped at 2 a year, not counting the hills.

[Ducay]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

Saw the daytime checkstop last week set up at Barlow by the Deerfoot Inn. Kind of a silly spot since they were set up northbound before the turn into the casino. They were set to catch the people entering, not leaving.

Is there really an acceptable direction if you're at a Casino midday? Either direction is equally as sad and likely to have a DUI.

[metallicat]

You can't defend your stance on hating checkstops because they infringe on your rights. That's absolutely absurd. If they stop you, it takes what? A minute for them to let you go. If you slow down and get waved through, you lose mere seconds of your day. The only reason I can see why people hate checkstops, is because it prevents you from being able to drink and drive without worry about hitting a checkstop.

I sincerely hope that anyone who tweets checkstop locations and aids drunk drivers in avoiding said areas, never has to deal with the loss of a family member of a loved one due to a drunk driver.

[moon]

Not to be Captain Obvious but I don't think it is that odd that some guys see more checkstops than others considering most people tend to drive on the same general routes and the checkstops are set up in specific areas that they target.

It kind of supports what we see here in that some seem to see a ton and others see none. Not a lot of middle of the road stories in this thread in terms of seeing checkstops, i.e. 1-2 a year in Calgary for 10 years of driving.

[FlamesFanStrandedInEDM]

I dont see this much different from the radio advertising speed traps.

Now. If they are tweeting while driving impaired....thats rough

[moon]

Don't the police not mind the advertizing of speed traps as the goal is to reduce speeding in those areas and telling people where they are do that?

[DownhillGoat]

Originally Posted by Ducay

Either direction is equally as sad and likely to have a DUI.

[flizzenflozz]

Originally Posted by moon

Don't the police not mind the advertizing of speed traps as the goal is to reduce speeding in those areas and telling people where they are do that?

You can't think that's the main impetus for setting up speed traps by the police department.