Photo radar, red light cameras, school zone enforcement.

They sound like great ideas. Maybe they are. and maybe they are a bald face cash grab.

On Saturday August the 25th I was going north on Waverley St. north of Seel Ave. I was doing 5kph over the posted speed limit. Wednesday September 5th I received a fine of $705 for driving 25kph over the hidden speed limit as it claimed it was a construction zone.

Truth is it WAS a construction zone. But on that day and every day since then it wasn’t a safety zone of any kind. The signs were  turned backward, the pylons were off the road, zero workers, zero equipment,  2 lanes of traffic doing the same speed.

Here is a picture I took on the 5th of September of Waverley and looking north of Seel Ave. Where the ticket says the offence occurred.

A Guy Sleeping in a Van but Not By the River

As you can see there is nothing related to construction in this area. It is a technicality. The zone is still there just on paper. Someone was late removing the safety devices is all and someone, who might be paid a commission on the tickets, set up their van (and probably had a nap). The picture on my ticket shows a car beside me and I know from that day, that there was quite a few of us all going with the flow of traffic.

Maybe it started with good intentions.

It may have started as a good idea. Catch red light runners and fine them. Instead it  turned into fining people for driving too fast (speeds no cop would pull you over for but a robot can tax you for) and when that didn’t generate enough income, they resorted to changing laws, hiding signs and tricking people.

2 years ago they reduced the speed limit around some schools to 30 kph from the already slow and safe 50 kph. Did they do it because there was a rash of kids getting hurt near schools during daylight hours? Nope they just saw an opportunity to increase the cash flow.

To add to the trickery, the most likely time for a ticket issued by a guy sleeping in a van is holiday Mondays when school is not in session. Just more Trickery!

Investor’s Field

In other news the Province of Manitoba and the City of Winnipeg in two separate action just forgave $182,000,000 in loans to the consortium that built a giant state of the art stadium (with shitty drainage) for a losing team in a bush league to play 8 football games a year.

I don’t mind being taxed at a super high rate and have my after tax money pay more taxes on everything I do but I do mind being ripped off and having the already rich get a $182 million gift.