Speed Trap

The feeling one gets when they receive in the mail a hefty ticket for speeding is extremely bad, but the cop-dodging experts at Cobra have come up with a terrific tool. Cobra's XRS R9G is the first US laser and radar detector that utilizes GPS Navigation to warn drivers of known speed trap cameras. Cobra is keeping track of traps all over the US, and anyone that purchases the $449 device can also load updates from the Cobra website. Cobra is also working towards usi

Few moments in life are less welcomed than when a sprightly sprint in your automobile is cut short by flashing red lights in your rearview mirror. In that moment, you know that you're out well over $100, you'll have to take time off work for court, and your insurance is likely to go up by 10 percent or more.

Let's set the scene here. You're a homeowner on a street with a chronic speeding problem. Short of "accidentally" dropping a box of roofing nails in the street, there's not much recourse. You could pester the local constabulary to park one of their radar trailers in your neighborhood to remind folks they're speeding; or better yet, station one of their servants there on a regular basis to write tickets. That won't be much help if one of the egregious speeders is part of the thin blue line that s

A blind man was recently caught by a speed camera doing 98 mph on public roads in Spain. The man had lost his sight in a car accident in 1996, and, as he explained to the court, wanted to drive just one more time. So, just like the last time we heard about a sightless driver, the man had his wife sit shotgun and dole out verbal directions on which way to turn the wheel.

Though the isle of Britain isn't that large in terms of square miles, it still contains 24,000 potential speed traps (about the same number in Ohio, we think). The Rossini Navigator and Camera Spotter is a satellite navigation unit that has each one of those traps plotted on its digital topography and will audibly warn a driver if one is fast approaching. The unit also does the whole door-to-door, turn-by-turn navigation thing, but the addition of such comprehensive camera spotting technology mo

New Scientist magazine reports that researchers at the University of Tennessee and Batelle Institute have applied for patents on a system that detects the speed of a passing vehicle based on its exhaust note.