Traffic police officers yesterday said they had begun using “decoys” to avoid potential complaints and enforce the law at the same time.
While the National Highway Police Bureau said it retires highway police cars every five to eight years, the cars are not actually “retired,” since they are being used as decoys.
Chen Ying-chieh (陳英傑), deputy for the bureau’s Second Division, said they take apart retired vehicles, except for their exterior and police lights. Officers park the vehicles at locations where most speeding drivers are caught and turn on the police lights.
“Most drivers will slow down when they see police lights. That’s what we want,” Chen said.
The deputy said heavy traffic volume on highways made it dangerous for police officers to pull over speeding motorists, adding that drivers also tend to get angry when they receive a speeding ticket.
“Irritating drivers and going through the appeals process is not what we want to do. Making sure the traffic is under control while everybody is safe and driving within the speed limit is what we are aiming for,” Chen said.
He said “many” decoys had been deployed on the nation’s highways, but did not provide numbers or locations.
“If you are not speeding or doing anything illegal, you will never have to worry about where they are,” he said.
Taipei City Police Department Traffic Corps chief Fang Yang-ning (方仰寧) said that in cities, officers had set up checkpoints with speed cameras. However, some of those cameras did not have film or memory cards.
“If a complaint by a driver is valid, the officer could get a demerit. This makes our jobs difficult,” Fang said.
Fang said that reminding drivers to slow down was more important than issuing tickets.
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