Not So Fast
Seattle police gun (their motors) for aggresive drivers
Officer J. Dean Shirey has been a Seattle police officer for 32 years and a traffic cop for the past 15, but he’s having too much fun to retire. And the toys—er, tools—have gotten too cool. Two years ago Shirey’s sergeant, Steve Ameden, organized a special Aggressive Drivers Response Team, an elite Delta Force within the Traffic Division. Shirey, who looks like a cross between The A-Team’s George Peppard and The Naked Gun’s Leslie Nielsen, is its old man. Forget Crown Vics; ADRT officers drive six Harleys and 10 Dodge Chargers with 5.7-liter, 340-horsepower Hemi engines that do “160 out of the box.”
Aggressive driving is an unusual meta-offense. The law doesn’t mention it; when police nab aggressors, they ticket them for speeding or reckless or negligent driving. Scientists and drivers’ ed teachers have long known that faster speeds mean worse crashes; impact increases exponentially with speed, and a crash at 35 miles per hour causes a third more front-end damage than one at 30. Researchers are just starting to prove that speeding leads to more as well as worse accidents, though cops know it from experience. A 1993 Australian study found that every three miles per hour driven above a mean traffic speed of 37 doubles the driver’s risk of crashing.
Shirey can be a stickler; he once delivered a jaywalking ticket in the hospital to a pedestrian who’d gotten struck by a car, after determining the unlucky walker had crossed against the light. But no cop busts everyone driving over the limit. “Patrol officers used to generally ticket at 10 miles over. We [on the ADRT] use the speed limit plus 15 as the cutoff.” Shirey’s like a batter waiting for the right pitch. “While you go after the 12s and 13s, the 25s will whisk right by you.”
ADRT officers range citywide, but Shirey favors the West Seattle Bridge and Admiral Way’s long descent to it, prime speeder habitat. One day I accompanied him, and he pointed out excesses my untrained eye couldn’t spot: “Watch the van, he’s going to make a break. The black car and the white SUV are playing ‘push,’ making each other go faster. That guy’s doing about 58. I’ve been tested at estimating speeds. I’m good within five miles an hour.”
Those were all “precursors to aggressive driving,” Shirey explained, but not flagrant enough to chase down. Suddenly he got his pitch: A beige Honda flew onto the highway and cut across three lanes. “There’s our guy! He’s doing 80.” Shirey’s Charger leapt out of the chute, siren screaming. “There’s no way I could do this in a Crown Vic,” he said calmly. The Honda pulled over and Shirey approached warily; Hondas are car thieves’ favorite targets.
The driver was no carjacker, joyrider, or imbiber—just a young hospital attendant late to work. “A real nice guy, meek as can be.” Shirey let him off with a warning. “I told him, ‘You work at Harborview, you see the broken bodies. The next time you hear someone talk about aggressive driving, just remind yourself, That was me.’
“I think he got the message.”
See all intersections with traffic cameras HERE.
Published: November 2009
One road-smart reader has already noted a glaring omission from our “smart biking” tips, especially from the gear list in Tip #2. It seemed so obvious we didn’t bother mentioning it. As Tom Vanderbilt notes in ‘Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do,’ it even makes actuarial sense to wear a helmet in a car (if you can stand the funny looks). But at least a motorists have airbag, seatbelt, and the car itself between their skulls and the pavement.
I love all the insider tips in this package, and thought the “Great Race” was especially enlightening. Being a bus commuter (and fair-weather bike commuter), I do have one pet peeve: If you go to a movie, coffeehouse, grocery store or concert, you would not even consider cutting in line in front of those patrons who were there first. So why is it that bus riders seem to think it’s perfectly fine to reach the bus stop right as the bus is pulling up and jump on right in front of those who have been waiting for 15 or 20 minutes? It’s too bad there’s not a “take a number” system that rewards those who have been waiting in the cold.
Look way ahead, to the next stoplight and beyond, and ease up accordingly. Whether to employ the controversial “pulse and glide”—coasting with engine off, minus power steering and braking—depends on skill, conditions, and car, suggests Kinney. It works better with manual than automatic transmissions, which don’t lubricate with the engine off.