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Main Page Pike Boasts Most Tickets
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Posted by: SouthSideCobras

Pike boasts most tickets
By Thomas Caywood/ Boston Herald
Monday, April 10, 2006

As if the tolls aren't bad enough, drivers on the Massachusetts Turnpike are far more likely to get ticketed than on any other highway in the state under a unique arrangement that dedicates an entire state police troop exclusively to the Pike.

A Boston Herald analysis of state police ticket tallies over the past three years reveals highly uneven traffic enforcement with nearly a third of all tickets issued on the 138-mile toll highway.

"Am I surprised that they are trying to bilk more money out of the only commuters who have to pay a toll to go to work every day? Am I surprised that the state is trying to squeeze more money out of MetroWest?" Pike commuter Al Hamilton of Southborough said. "Not at all." ....................MAYBE AL SHOULD SLOW DOWN !

Patrolling only the Pike, state police Troop E wrote 213,670 citations over the past three years. The next most active unit, Troop C in central Massachusetts, issued 128,668 tickets over the same period, although its troopers are responsible for hundreds of miles of interstate and state highways.

State police spokesman Lt. Sharon Costine chalked up much of Troop E's towering ticket tally to extra patrols paid for by the Turnpike Authority and contractors. Other state police troops typically can afford to mount extra patrols only around holidays with state grant money, she said.

"It's not that we are not out there doing traffic safety on the other roads. We are," Costine said. "The Turnpike troop's focus is completely on traffic because they're not doing anything else."

That singular focus resulted in Troop E writing twice as many tickets as all but one other state police unit last year, figures show. The lopsided enforcement means either Pike drivers are unfairly targeted, or drivers on other highways are unfairly protected less.
Ivan Sever of the Massachusetts chapter of the National Motorists Association said he didn't see any reason other than financial why the Pike would need special police attention......................................... .

"It's not fair to other roads," he said. "It's not making other roads safer. It's singling out one road."

Anywhere else in the state, traffic fines imposed by staties are split evenly between the state and the community where the infraction occurred.

Not so on the Pike, where the Turnpike Authority pockets 80 percent of ticket revenue and the state gets the rest, spokeswoman Mariellen Burns said.

"We are entirely responsible for the cost of these troopers, and proudly so as they do an exemplary job of keeping our road one of the safest in the nation through their traffic enforcement strategies, which include a strong focus on trucking safety," Burns said.

The authority expects to spend $24.3 million to operate Troop E this year and collect about $5.2 million from the tickets they write.

Posted by: RPD931

I commute on the PIKE several times a week. And It's the ONLY route I've been stopped on - more than once. I've never been stopped anywhere else. However, Traffic is really the only focus for Troop E and at the same time I do NOT think that Pike users are singled out or unfairly targeted. And they do give a generous leeway on speed. If you get pulled over for speeding on the Pike, normally it's because you're travelling over 85mph. I think Troop E does a GREAT job. I firmly believe the Pike is THE safest highway in Mass. There are far fewer fatalities on the Pike than say 93 or 495. Any Pike troopers want to chime on this.

Posted by: BT1405

^^ I agree with you, if you can keep it under 80-85 you really arent going to get a ticket

Posted by: kwflatbed

I run between MA and Buffalo NY quite a few times a year and set the cruise at 80 and knock on wood I have never been stopped in MA or NY. As long as you don't drive like an ass you will not be bothered.

Posted by: Killjoy

I wonder how many of those "unfairly" targeted motorists were going at or below the speed limit? Here's a tip, don't break the law and you won't get a ticket!

Posted by: Delta784

If the troopers on the Pike wrote 21,300 citations instead of 213,000 in the same time period, there would no doubt be a story about the lax traffic enforcement on the Mass Turnpike. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Guys....as a general rule, the public doesn't like us. If you wanted to be loved, you should have become a firefighter or a teacher.

Posted by: RPD931

Quote:

Originally Posted by Delta784

If the troopers on the Pike wrote 21,300 citations instead of 213,000 in the same time period, there would no doubt be a story about the lax traffic enforcement on the Mass Turnpike. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Guys....as a general rule, the public doesn't like us. If you wanted to be loved, you should have become a firefighter or a teacher.

Well said Brotha'

Posted by: dcs2244

I was out there today, through the Troop C area...I was at 80...people were passing me. I think the pike guys give the lemmings plenty of leeway. Again, Troop E is essentially a highway patrol...so more issued citations would be the norm, compared to Troop B, C, F, or the others.

Relax everyone, just another slow news day at the Herald. Next week perhaps they can investigate why, at the scene of a building fire in Boston, all the cars parked in the area are missing batteries...the cables cut clean...

Posted by: frapmpd24

Good! I sure hope Troop E would have the most V's considering there is 138 miles of roadway from New York to Boston.

Just do some simple division based on the three year average of citations to put it into perspective

213, 670 divided by 3yrs = 71, 223 citations per year

71, 223 citations per year divided by 52 weeks = 1370 citations per week

1370 citations per week divided by 3 Barracks = 457 citations weekly per barracks

457 citations weekly per barracks divided by 3 shifts = 152 citations for a shift in a week

152 citations weekly per shift divided by 7 days = 22 citations per shift daily

For the purpose of this example, there are 3 Troopers working a shift per barracks. That is 9 Troopers throughout the three barracks over the 138 mile Mass Pike, leaving one unit per 15 miles of highway. If it is more or less, don’t hammer me here boys, it’s just an example.

That is about 7 citations per trooper during an 8 hr shift.

I see the paper forgot (oops!) to mention that the past three years GHSB has had atleast three campaigns a year (click-it or ticket; agressive driving; you drink, you drive, you loose, etc...). Plus the article does not even mention the fact that many troopers travel the Pike to/from work, and issue citations for violations on the Pike, which by the location of the stop, would be in Troop E territory, but the Trooper not being assigned to that troop. Based on those two factors alone, that decreases the number of V's an individual trooper is going to issue during normal duties. But why mention that!

Posted by: PearlOnyx

Unfairly targeted, heh, that cracks me up. Don't violate the state's speed laws, and you won't be "unfairly targeted". Simple as that. What a bunch of liberal whining!

Posted by: mtc

Quote:

For the purpose of this example, there are 3 Troopers working a shift per barracks.

Like we don't all know far better than that,, isn't it like, a desk and 12?

Bottom line, someone in the Herald 'family' got gigged on the Pike, and thinking since they pay tolls to use the road, they apparently think the laws do not apply to THEM.

Sure, troopers are assigned to the Pike, but there their directive is traffic enforcement, keeping the roadway clear, and traffic enforcement. Then, there's a concentrated effort on TRAFFIC ENFORCEMENT.

Posted by: EASTCOASTCOP

The Pike is nice to drive on since you can go 80 and still get passed!!! and not worry about tickes! has anyone ever driven through Route 2 in tempeton/gardner!!!! youll get a ticket for going 60 in a 55 in a heart beat..p.s central mass is second in the state for tickets! funny how their second in the state and its very quiet area.....watch your speed!...no breaks in templeton MA.

Posted by: HPD104

Quote:

Originally Posted by Killjoy

I wonder how many of those "unfairly" targeted motorists were going at or below the speed limit? Here's a tip, don't break the law and you won't get a ticket!

Thank you for saying that!!!!I say it all the time. I've yet to write a ticket to someone for going 50 in a 50!

Posted by: USMCMP5811

Senator sees red over tickets: Pike drivers unfairly targeted, lawmaker says
By Thomas Caywood
Tuesday, April 11, 2006

A Metrowest lawmaker is crying foul over lopsided state police traffic enforcement that targets the Massachusetts Turnpike more than other highways in the state.
“I’m certainly 100 percent for public safety and for our roads to be safe, but it’s not fair that, on top of the burden of tolls that the Metrowest community has to bear, that now we hear we get the largest percentage of tickets, too,” state Sen. Karen Spilka said. “That’s just not fair.”

The Framingham Democrat was responding to a report in Monday’s Herald that found troopers assigned exclusively to patrol the Pike wrote far more tickets in the past three years than staties elsewhere in the commonwealth.
Spilka, who represents thousands of Pike commuters in Metrowest, objected to the highly uneven traffic enforcement, with a third of tickets issued by the major state police troops last year handed out on the Pike.
“The folks that live in Metrowest should not have to shoulder the largest part of this burden, too. It angered me to read that,” Spilka said.
Patrolling only the Pike, state police Troop E wrote 213,670 citations in the past three years. The next most active unit, Troop C in Central Massachusetts, issued 128,668 tickets during the same period.
State police spokeswoman Lt. Sharon Costine attributed the disparity in citations to extra patrols paid for by contractors and the Turnpike Authority, which pays to operate Troop E and pockets 80 percent of its ticket revenue.
Other state police troops typically can afford to mount extra patrols only around holidays with state grant money, Costine said.
That doesn’t strike Spilka as fair.
“I have to assume people on all roads speed about the same amount. So it’s not fair to me that the Pike tickets should make up such a big portion of the total,” Spilka said. “If the Pike has its own police force, why shouldn’t 93 and 95 and all the major highways around here?”
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Posted by: TypeX

I don't see how she can claim that metrowest pays the burden for tolls as if its some sort of penalty. Fact: The Pike is a toll road. If you dont want to pay tolls then find an alternate route. Is it as convenient? of course not, but you have to pay a toll. Troops A, C and H dont close down every road and force metrowest drivers onto the Pike and into the jaws of the 'awful' Troop E.
As far as the actual amount of tickets maybe Troop E should announce they're taking a week off and not give any tickets because their hands are tired or something. I'd like to see what Karen Spilka's reaction is to the almost certain accidents and maybe fatalities caused by road rage, excessive speed, crazy lane changes.. etc, etc. Like the saying goes.. you dont know how good something is until its gone. (or something like that)

Posted by: RPD931

I think the arguement about the "Tolls" is that the tolls were instituted SOLEY for the purpose of paying off the bonds used to fund its construction back in the 50's (I believe). The Pike has been paid for, the tolls should be eliminated.

Posted by: mtc

Quote:

Originally Posted by RPD931

I think the arguement about the "Tolls" is that the tolls were instituted SOLEY for the purpose of paying off the bonds used to fund its construction back in the 50's (I believe). The Pike has been paid for, the tolls should be eliminated.

But it turned such a profit, they just HAD to keep it up!

Posted by: Delta784

Quote:

Originally Posted by RPD931

Ah, but the Mass Turnpike Authority simply floats more bonds, in order to keep enough debt to justify their existence. There was a citizen's advocacy group dedicated to eliminating the MTPA, but I haven't heard about them in a few years.

Posted by: Wolfman

Keep the tolls. Get rid of them and you'll wind up with another shitty MA highway.

Posted by: BlackOps

I think RPD931 writes more tickets in town than the entire State Police does statewide!

Posted by: RPD931

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlackOps

I think RPD931 writes more tickets in town than the entire State Police does statewide!

I'm working on it. But I'm not the one who made it back from Boston under 45 minutes

... Although it would have been sooner if the Statie didn't slow us down.

Posted by: KozmoKramer

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wolfman

Keep the tolls. Get rid of them and you'll wind up with another shitty MA highway.

At least the state will be consistent...

Posted by: Killjoy

Quote:

Keep the tolls. Get rid of them and you'll wind up with another shitty MA highway.

There's some merit to this statement, can anyone else explain why the pike is best maintained and plowed highway in this state?

Posted by: KozmoKramer

Revenue Killjoy - Revenue....

Posted by: SinePari

There aren't nearly as many fatalities on the Pike as Rts 2/24/91/93/95/495. That should be factored in...number of daily drivers vs number of serious crashes. I don't think anyone here will argue that aggressive traffic enforcement doesn't reduce crashes.

Every morning and night the service trucks put all their spot lights on and patrol the median and break down lanes for road debris and clean it up. It's also the best road when it comes to snow storms as their new plowers and sanders get out their early and often.

There's not much "police work" being done but as far as traffic management it's the best road in the country. I think it's money well spent. If MA Highway continues their full-court press to merge the MTA under them, as said before it would become another shitty highway in the commonwealth.

This is just another bitch session concerning the tolls. Make every citizen happy and put tolls on I-93 and Rt 3 coming from NH to help pay for the Big Pig. NH residents enjoy working for a MA company and only pay MA income tax, but a nice brand new road for them to commute to and from, paid for by us is retarded. Yes a lot of money is federal but eventually those roads will be paid and maintained by MA.

Posted by: Pvt. Cowboy

A little off topic, but on TWO separate occasions traveling down the Pike... I saw a dark blue 99-02 Mustang Gt, fully equipped with wig-wags, blue lights above the rear view etc... Saw him stop two cars both days I was on the pike... Is this part of a traffic enforcement unit?

Forgive my lack of MSP division knowledge, but is that CAT team? Ya know, they write SCH-CAT on the gigs? What does that stand for anyway?

Posted by: Tango

Quote:

Originally Posted by frapmpd24

Good! I sure hope Troop E would have the most V's considering there is 138 miles of roadway from New York to Boston.

Just do some simple division based on the three year average of citations to put it into perspective

213, 670 divided by 3yrs = 71, 223 citations per year

71, 223 citations per year divided by 52 weeks = 1370 citations per week

1370 citations per week divided by 3 Barracks = 457 citations weekly per barracks

Last time I looked there were 4 Barrack on the Pike.

Posted by: frapmpd24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tango

Last time I looked there were 4 Barrack on the Pike.

My bad, forgot about the Turnpike Extension

. How could I forget about the Tunnels, since it such a huge portion everyones taxes. So that brings those numbers down even further.

Another thought, did the paper even consider the fact that crashes are a large part of a major highway system, hence citations issued as a result of a crash investigation. The article was nothing but an excuse to fill the paper and try and scare people with a large number. The big scare number will scare the lemmings that don't think on their own, believe everything they read, and don't even think to question the facts or look at the big picture. They just read the paper and sip their coffee and believe the BS that is printed.

Posted by: no$.10

Quote:

Originally Posted by mtc

But it turned such a profit, they just HAD to keep it up!

Here Here

Just like the temporary excise tax!

Posted by: phuzz01

Quote:

Originally Posted by SinePari

Make every citizen happy and put tolls on I-93 and Rt 3 coming from NH to help pay for the Big Pig. NH residents enjoy working for a MA company and only pay MA income tax, but a nice brand new road for them to commute to and from, paid for by us is retarded.

I don't work in MA, I don't commute from NH to MA, and I wouldn't have any problem with putting tolls on I-93 and Rt 3 coming from NH...

BUT...

NH residents working for MA companies get whammed double on the taxes. NH has high property taxes (both state and municipal) to make up for no state income tax. MA has huge state income taxes, which keeps property taxes lower than they otherwise would be. So NH residents working in MA get hit with high property taxes in NH, and then high state income tax in MA. So I don't think you can argue that they are scamming the system in any way.

Posted by: Wolfman

I haven't heard of anyone declaring bankruptcy or going on government cheese because they had to hack up $2 a day on tolls. They spend more than that on their mocha-grande-frappe-lattes and the gas they waste as they go screaming down the highway at Mach 2. It's a non-issue. If you don't like the tolls take another road. Boo-friggin'-hoo.

If the tolls went away these lemmings would be bitching about the congestion (now that all the riffraff can get on the road), the potholes, the disabled vehicles growing weeds through the hoods as well as the mean old troopers who give them tickets when they go 90.

We need more toll roads in Mass!!!

Posted by: lawdog671

Have any of these "smarter than the average people" complaining about the number of citations issued factor in the volume if traffic on the Turnpike is like a 1000% higher than other roads in central mass? And as one who has used the Pike frequently I can honestly say that more than 95 out of 100 people driving it deserve full boat V's. Highest concentration of maniacs and kamikaze pilots, massholes and out of staters I ve ever seen. Show these people some of the crime scene and accident recon photos of these people in wrecks at 100 mph and see what their constituents think about their complaints of traffic enforcement. My two cents...

Posted by: SPD3

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pvt. Cowboy

A little off topic, but on TWO separate occasions traveling down the Pike... I saw a dark blue 99-02 Mustang Gt, fully equipped with wig-wags, blue lights above the rear view etc... Saw him stop two cars both days I was on the pike... Is this part of a traffic enforcement unit?

Forgive my lack of MSP division knowledge, but is that CAT team? Ya know, they write SCH-CAT on the gigs? What does that stand for anyway?

The MSP uniform division (called Field Services) is broken up into 8 Troops (A,B,C,D,E,F,H, and GHQ). The 5 standard geographic troops A,B,C,D, and H each have a CAT (Community Action Team) assigned to their headquarters that the Troop Commander can use to assign to various functions and locations at his or her discretion. The code on the citation for C Troop used by the CAT team is SCH for State, C Troop, Headquarters and then CAT to identify the section. In A Troop the code is SAH, in B Troop SBH, and so on, the acronyms having originated from the CJIS teletype codes. The turnpike and the airport (E and F respectively) are run as semi-autonomous public agencies and as such the MSP personnel assigned there are dedicated solely to those properties. The specialized vehicles you observed on the pike are used by E troopers for traffic enforcement and are only used on the toll roadway. Having never worked on the pike I am not aware of whether they have a centralized enforcement unit similar to the CAT's.

Posted by: Pvt. Cowboy

Quote:

Originally Posted by SPD3

Great stuff SPD3... thank you!!

Posted by: Killjoy

The pike does have various types of unmarked cars they use for aggressive driving enforcement.

Posted by: frank

Quote:

Originally Posted by SPD3

In A Troop the code is SAH, in B Troop SBH, and so on, the acronyms having originated from the CJIS teletype codes.

Interesting. I got stopped by a trooper in an unmarked cruiser about a year and a half ago that I thought was part of the CAT team (he was reassigned to a barracks during the whole budget crunch last year), and the gig said AHQ on it.

Posted by: SPD3

Quote:

Originally Posted by frank

Frank things may have changed but the agency code used to have to correlate with a LEAPS 3 letter agency code so that the RMV could catalogue the tickets accordingly, such as QUI for Quincy and BRA for Braintree. Larger departments were assigned multiple codes for different units but they still were associated with the teletype addresses of the LEAPS database. When I worked up that way the code for AHQ was SAH, maybe they changed it when they moved the troop headquarters to Danvers.

Posted by: SinePari

Quote:

Originally Posted by phuzz01

You forgot to factor in the other bennies for living in NH. Car insurance (a HUGE perk), which is why a lot of jack asses register (illegaly) their cars with a NH address, if they're not filling up at MA gas stations-then their not contributing to highway taxes, no sales tax, and BTW, most places in MA are on par with NH property taxes. If these things aren't true, then why to Massholes move to NH, and not the other way around?

It would be win-win with tolls on I-93 and Rt 3: The state gets their revenue, and for idiots who don't want to pay them and use the municipal roads as short cuts, the local PDs can nail them with all the violations they want...big bucks, no whammies!

Posted by: phuzz01

Quote:

Originally Posted by SinePari

You forgot to factor in the other bennies for living in NH.

I am not disputing the benefits of living in NH. They are the primary reason that I moved here. And as I said before, MA can put tolls anywhere it wants and it won't bother me a bit. But I still don't think MA is losing out on any NH residents working inside its borders. The state is more than compensated by its exorbitant income tax.

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