Mt Pleasant, Iowa Speed Traps

By and large police position themselves before construction vehicles making motorists aware of potential hazards and protecting workers. Stopped vehicles are appropriately marked.

Lee County was different. Two police cars hid behind a single poorly marked stopped vehicle, lights off, out of sight and the “stopped vehicle” appeared to be just a broken down dump truck. The only thing not visible were two Sheriff vehicles hiding behind the truck. No workers, lights, signs, flares, cones and other signage associated with a stopped construction vehicle. I hope you can understand I saw many, many farm vehicles better marked.

One Sheriff pulled me over and issued a ticket for failing to slow down even though I was traveling below the posted limit. The other Sheriff pulled over another vehicle just behind me and the truck never moved. I went up the road a bit and watched the process repeat over and over.

The intent of this law is to protect both highway workers and motorists and in my opinion that should be the same for the use of police time and equipment.

Sadly, I can only think of one reason why police would hide behind a poorly marked dump truck on a rural 4 lane highway.