Last year, when I rented office space on Tan Vinh, Q4, the CGST had a money-making ticketing spot opposite my building. Each time they set up shop they were looking for motorcyclists using the wrong, opposite direction, lane that drivers were passing in.
One persistent law-breaker was a Foreign man who went the whole length, at high speed, in the wrong lane and who ignored the police whistles, and even the police truncheons.
One day, there were more police there than usual and they had a white jeep, which they parked on a side road facing Tan Vinh.
A spotter CGST guy was at an intersection where the traffic from Q7 turned off to head up to Tan Vinh. As the guy approached the ticketing spot, which he ignored as usual, the Jeep drove into the Tan Vinh intersection and 'accidently' contacted the motorcycle - the driver fell off. He was arrested, handcuffed and his motorcycle impounded.
Police in Thanh Hoa Province have a better way. They have resumed the controversial use of nylon fishing nets to catch illegal motorbike racers and speeding motorists during this 2012 lunar New Year of the dragon.
If suspected racers and those who drive dangerously in the north-central province do not obey traffic police (CGST), the latter will throw fish nets at the rear wheel of the motorbike.
Police say such methods are not dangerous like many tend to think. The net will get tangled in the rear wheel, hence will gradually slow down the motorbike, they say.
According to Thanh Hoa provincial police, this is a safe method for both violators and other traffic users.
The police started to use fish nets from 2011 October and there have been no deaths or serious injuries to those caught in the net, they advised. But this controversial method was halted for a while after the public raised suspicion that the nets could cause violators to fall down which was very dangerous as they were travelling at high speed.
Colonel Le Van Nghiem, head of the Thanh Hoa CGST said many opposed the method because they thought police cast the net onto the heads of racing violators - subjecting them to life-threatening dangers when the truth is they only threw the net onto the rear end of the fast-travelling bikes.
The measure has been approved by the Thanh Hoa Province Police Department and is applied only to drivers who illegally race, drive at excessive speeds, or zigzag on streets; not to those who commit normal traffic violations, Lieutenant Colonel My Duy Xuan, head of the city traffic police team, had earlier announced.
The tactic is used only once racers or others driving dangerously do not stop their vehicles after they have been signaled to do so by traffic police officers.
