Traffic cop finds easy pickin’s near Ferris, Adams schools

What do y’all reckon is the average age of a speedster receiving a ticket? 19? 30? 45? Sixty or better?

Well if you guessed the first two you might just be wrong. Seems the speed demons around here are slightly more shopworn.

The speed limit posted from just south of Ferris High to the 36th Avenue block just north of Adams grade school is 20 mph from 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on school days. However most residents up here on the South Hill seem to forget the law applies to them as well.

After all, this is their neighborhood.

Starting as early as 8 a.m. the cop begins the ritual of catch and fetch. I can’t help but getting caught up in it all, sort of like watching a train wreck. … Ya know it is gonna be awful but ya can’t just help yourself.

One by one I see a spectrum of my lil society up here: His first “victim” is a repeat offender. Last year a lil granny swore up and down at him and then flipped him the bird as she pulled away.

Well, I guess she just likes harassing cops because she is back again. I actually am amazed that this time she is fairly calm, the operative word here is fairly, but she still has a tongue on her.

I can hear her here in the apartment just lashin’ him with an assortment of words I don’t usually associate with any female over 60.

Finally he gets the offense written up and she is off on her way. I can’t help but feel this day is gonna be a long one.

Very soon I prove to be right. He is pulling them over at an average of four to five an hour, which means he barely has time to write the ticket and return to position before he nails the next one.

Cars pull to the curb outside my window, and the process begins; vans, work trucks – bet that boss is gonna be happy – and cars of every shape size, make and vintage. The cop is always polite, methodical, and tolerant.

He takes care of business, gets folks on their way, and swiftly returns out onto Regal Street to reset the trap. Not enTRAPment folks, but rather a civil servant doing the job we hired him for as defined by the local laws.

I periodically hear his siren, and it does pulls my attention back to the viewing port; this is unusual, as most know they are caught immediately and pull over silently and he writes up another one.

What is entertaining is watching them silently berating themselves or justifying their actions to another adult in the vehicle. I don’t need to read lips to know either of those conversations, but it helps.

In the morning his main catch are primarily women, off on errands, unmindful of the speed limit. Mommies, grannies, and whatever classification you can think are out there with one foot on the accelerator and a phone to their ears or twisting around to herd children.

Lunchtime brings out the teenagers coming from Ferris, racing down to Mickey D’s for gutbombs. However, I am not sure that the fewer number represents kids who obey the law or are just well-versed in this cop’s particular habits.

The kids don’t suprise me, as they are all 10 feet tall, invisible, invincible, and bulletproof, but their numbers are much fewer than folks my age or better.

Come the afternoon, it is men, on business or going to afternoon jobs, etc. I have to smile as I watch a middle-aged gentleman in a Lexus getting his; for the most part I find this ilk to be boorish drivers anyway.

So important that they have a sense of entitlement to drive as they see fit. Makes my day when I see the parade of luxury vehicles quietly sliding onto the side street to face John Law.

The Mommy Patrols leave me slightly queasy, as these women are probably carrying preschool-age and infants in their huge SUVs. Somehow riding around in a 3-ton vehicle with kids strapped in the back, doin’ 45 in a 20 mph zone all while sipping their lattes and on the cell phones to boot, just plain ticks me off.

They would be screaming bloody murder if this was in their neighborhoods. They are sitting next to a building that is a grade school with 300 children relying on folks to obey the law. Ironic, huh?

I know that as we get older we are convinced we are safe drivers, but I think my generation simply lets down its guard and become sloppy drivers. We are distracted, information-overloaded via electronic devices and too confident in our habits.

The elderly always bother me, even if I am a mere 10 to 15 years out from that very title. Can’t help but be alarmed about granny or grandpa sitting behind the wheel of a tuna boat (what my kids always called the old LTDs, etc.) barely seeing over the wheel and flying down a very busy arterial.

Reactions times wither as we get older (like it or not). Eyesight is always a factor, especially when ya see them wearing those gawd-awful wrap-around sunglasses that are given to them after cataract surgery.

Lord-love-a-duck can’t imagine the peripheral vision that is lost with those things on, not to mention have they had both eyes done or are they on the one-down-one-to-go track?

Oh, I know, this all sounds preachy, but if y’all could see the sheer numbers this one cop deals with in one day, you would understand all of this.

Now imagine that times what, 25 motorcycle boys, not to mention all patrol cars out there each day, you get a rather good idea of the situation.

In just one day each month he writes somewhere between 30 to 45 violations, 10 months a year, one school area only.

Do the math.