Two weeks ago we had a freak late April snow/hail mix one morning on my way to work. The roads had a light accumulation, just enough to be a problem if you were not paying attention. While driving up 84th Ave N.E. heading towards Marysville the speeds slowed with traffic. I noticed what was causing the backup; a motorcyclist was in the front driving at around 40MPH. I wondered what kind of person would wake up, see snow falling and sticking to the road and decide to ride a motorcycle to work
Once I made it to the intersection of 84th and Highway 9 it became more clear- it was a Lynnwood Police Department motorcycle unit- about 35 miles from his city limits. I thought this was interesting for two reasons. 1- Why is he riding in such crappy weather? 2- Why does the city allow him to ride the department’s bike home?
Assuming he does this every day he works it would amount to 70-80 miles per day. I’m willing to bet he has a hard time putting 80 miles on that bike when he is actively on traffic enforcement. (sitting shooting radar for hours, pulling people over 1/8th of a mile from the violation point, turning around and repeating the process dozens of times a day.) Seems ridiculous for the department to allow employees to take the bikes home with them to me. I can understand a K9 unit needing his vehicle to go to his residence, but a traffic motorcycle? And to potentially have the majority of the miles put on the bike in his commute? Lynnwood is pretty much broke right now with a $22 million budget shortfall, seems like they should be watching EFP (every friggin penny).
Recently the Herald has written a couple of excellent articles- “Lynnwood traffic cameras have brought in $4.7 million” and “Lynnwood not smiling about traffic camera coverage” on the red light camera revenue stream in Lynnwood. Lynnwood has responded that the red light cameras were put in as a result of people complaining about traffic congestion in Lynnwood. So the city decided to put up red camera lights to improve traffic? How about forward planning your traffic flow before you allow development of every square inch of the city to mall, commercial, strip mall, and condos??
Take a trip to Lynnwood on a Saturday morning and just try to drive around the mall, up and down 196th. Enjoy up to an hour in your car to get maybe 4 miles. The red light cameras have not improved the quality of driving in Lynnwood at all. Traffic gets worse every year, the city goes further in debt, taxes go up the city has become the butt of jokes in Snohomish County.
I try to avoid Lynnwood whenever possible due to the horrible traffic, high taxes, vehicle prowls at the mall, the red light cameras and the arrogant irresponsible attitude the city continues to display. I would encourage others to do the same.
© 2011, Bill Gillam. All rights reserved.
The issue I have with the Red Light Cameras in Lynnwood is that at least for "right hand turn without stopping on red" they seem to be setting a lot of people up as the white line you need to stop before is worn out in most cases and people naturally roll forward of it before coming to a stop as they need to be slightly in front of the car to their left to safely see the traffic coming from the left. I think if you go and watch who get's the most tickets it's the people who roll over the line when coming to a stop in the right hand turn lane.
They need to do a better job of keeping the white lines as visible as possible by spending some of that revenue on road maintenance. Not to mention it creates a hazard to those crossing the intersection in the crosswalk when drivers don't know where to stop and cross into the crosswalk or worse block the crosswalk.
I have'nt been in this situation before but I can only imagine how difficult it and dangerous it must be to drive a motorcycle in the snow. I wonder if by wearing motorcycle backpacks if it will act almost like a safety feature if you do have a accident?