May 28, 2001
OK, I've calmed down enough to (I hope) write about this rationally.
A couple weeks ago, during the intermission of a Penguins game, I was driving to McDonald's to grab myself some drive-thru. On Browns Hill Road (leading down the back of Squirrel Hill) and the Homestead High Level Bridge (crosses the Monongahela into Homestead) traffic routinely travels between 45 and 65 mph.
The posted limit is 25. So to be blunt, everybody speeds on the road/bridge all the time. It's just a fact of life. I'd never even seen a cop on that road, until that night. I look up, there's a cop car filling my rear view mirror. Long story short, I got a ticket. $94 fine (not as bad as it could have been, since I had a clean record).
But here's my gripe: Why the hell is the speed limit so low? If this were a residential street I could understand, but there's nothing there. It's almost a mile of road with three intersections followed by a mile-plus-long bridge. At a minimum, the speed limit should be 45. I'd still have been speeding, but the potential fine wouldn't have been as bad. The only reason I can think of is to drum up revenue for the city/county/whoever gets the money. In my never-humble opinion, that's just BS -- these laws are supposd to exist for public safety, not to pad the government's coffers at the drivers' expense.
OK, so I'm still a little angry about it.
Donut, anyone?
