A voice for keeping police details
Iron Bowl, originally from Singapore, explains why he's in favor of keeping police in charge of directing traffic around street construction:
... Police details is what makes Massachusetts roads so safe. As many people know, there are a lot of MASSHOLES in Massachusetts, and having a police cruiser, and a police officer, definitely helps slow traffic, making it less dangerous for the workers.
In Singapore, I've seen untrained construction workers try to control traffic, Though the Singapore drivers are much more tamed, it is very likely to see drivers ignore these road workers and cause a massive traffic jam or accident.
Directing traffic is not as easy as it seems. Even in a bright orange vest, I personally have many close encounters with cars almost hitting me while I'm helping with traffic control at an accident scene. ...
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Keep details, kill Quinn
Rather than getting rid of details, which do keep cops in the streets and on the roads, let's ditch the Quinn Bill. It costs a lot of money and - by definition - keeps cops off our streets.
Details: oriented?
Wouldn't the police be more effective on the details if they were, you know, facing traffic? Ever? Instead of watching the construction?
Well, of course
And also if they weren't glued to the detail, forbidden to move unless a major life-and-death situation happens. Most people know that a detail cop is only supposed to do things directly related to the detail, and s/he won't move or even radio for backup if someone, say, blows through a red light 20 feet away. We have an ongoing construction project right near work, and people do all kinds of asshattery like this right in front of the detail cop, who just watches.
I was in Belmont a few months ago, parked in a parallel parking spot so I could run into the bank before seeing my next client. I came out to find an idling semi-truck double parked, blocking my car completely into the spot, with a detail cop standing across the street. The person making the delivery came out, and I asked him to move so he wasn't blocking my car. He said he had to run four or five more loads of stuff into a business. I pointed out that he was double parked in front of a no-idling sign. He walked off. Eventually moved his truck 30 minutes later after I was late for work. In the meantime, I asked the cop if he could please enforce the "no idling" sign and/or the double parking law.
He first tried to rationalize that there's no other way for the guy to make his delivery. Sure there is -- your company needs to use a car or van when delivering to somewhere where there's no legal way to park a semi-truck, or require their customers to have a loading dock. Laws aren't suddenly inapplicable if they're inconvenient. I pointed this out to the officer, and he acknowledged that there's a double-parking law and a no-idling law, but told me he was working the detail so he couldn't ticket the person. I asked if he could ask him to move, and he said no, he was working a detail and couldn't do anything else.
I asked if he could radio for someone else to, he said he wasn't allowed to, because it wasn't part of the detail. He told me to call 911 if I wanted an officer to come. Really? Seriously? I should tie up 911 and another police officer because this officer's job duty doesn't include needing to say "hey, move your truck?"
Police details are needed because of bad drivers?
I believe Massachusetts and its ever-growing brigade of proud Massholes is the only state that requires police details. Doesn't that say something? Are there more accidents in other states at construction sites? I know the police unions have blocked the stoppage of police details, which I can understand. But seriously how many times do you see a cop not even facing the construction (as the above poster pointed out).
Will someone start a Web site that shows pictures of all the cops not doing their job at sites? But I can see sometimes at small police details why they're not minding the traffic.
I must add that I see a lot of cops doing their job at the police details.
Keep them on the primary
Keep them on the primary roads, and get rid of them on the seconday ones.
Agreed
When we were repaving the Airport Road at Logan, we had a whole army of state troopers in cruisers for details. And, we needed every one of them.
Not quite the same as a water line repair on a cul-de-sac in __________ (insert sleepy suburb of your choice here).
Perhaps, actual traffic volume numbers or populaiton density of an area could be used to set the bar, but the system, as is, is wickid retahded.
Police details rarely needed
I have frequently seen in Dorchester where I live and other places in Boston where I work, police details on side trips where they cop is reading a book, shooting the breeze, and not doing anything particularly helpful or useful.
I think that the main reason police are so up-in-arms about the threat to details is that it allows them to make extra money. My thoughts on this are: #1 - I want the police to be alert when they are doing their regular police work, not tired from the shift they've put in doing construction details and #2 - in this economy, there are other people who could earn a decent living doing this work.
The police in MA need to let this go. In fact, have more police officers work on regulating the dangerous driving violations I witness every day - that would increase revenue to the city's coffers and serve the public good.
Recently...
...I saw two Boston police cars blocking the 93 on-ramp at Congress St, which makes me believe that at least two cops were working a detail. One too many.
two too many
two too many