Why?
Policeman: "Your windshield is cracked. I'm going to impound your vehicle"
Driver: "Here's 500 pesos"
Policeman: "Oh, you should try to get that fixed."
- Thread starter Dolores
- Start date
Government defends public-private partnership for vehicular inspections
Policeman: "Your windshield is cracked. I'm going to impound your vehicle"
Driver: "Here's 500 pesos"
Policeman: "Oh, you should try to get that fixed."
This has more to do with cleaning up the image of the DR for foreign investors "see look, contrary to popular belief we're not a bunch of crazy unorganized lawless savages on these roads" (and no I'm not trashing Dominicans) than it has to do with road safety or attempting to retire old vehicles.
Whether or not the syndicates get a pass will be a pretty good indicator regarding how much power they do or do not have now a days.
Whether or not the syndicates get a pass will be a pretty good indicator regarding how much power they do or do not have now a days.
We aren't in Florida. The Police could certainly not be in charge of this here.
They wouldn't be in charge of anything that they aren't basically in charge of right now. At road blocks they are already handing out tickets for many different violations.
Same driver goes to vehicle inspection station.
Inspector: Your windshield is cracked. You can't pass inspection.
Driver: Here's 500 pesos. I promise I'll get it fixed tomorrow.
Inspection "detective" catches driver with cracked windshield and new revista.
Detective: How did you pass inspection with a cracked windshield?
Driver: It wasn't cracked then. It just happened yesterday. Here's 500 pesos.
It's a DUMB idea that won't work and will do NOTHING to improve safety.
You said it should be the responsibility of the police, hence they would be in charge instead of inspection stations for removing all of the unsafe vehicles from the road.
Inspections stations absolutely can work to remove such vehicles, but they might not do that here even if it is there express goal.
No. You misinterpreted what I said. In Florida and the overwhelming majority of the states, police just issue tickets for the majority of safety violations. The police here can easily do that at all of their road check points. They already do.
The police here have no problem hauling away motos. I don't see why it would be any different with vehicles but would have to be limited to gross violations.
You said yourself that, when there were inspections in Puerto Plata, your car was never really inspected. You just paid for the revista.
In the UK, the traffic police don't routinely inspect cars for safety. They have equipment in their cars that flags up plates if the car doesn't have insurance and if it's not tested. The testing stations are strictly inspected to make sure they are doing tests correctly. It all keeps police work down to a minimum.
That's the bottom line. If the inspection stations are the real deal, they can and will make a difference.
It really is no good comparing the DR with the USA or UK .I have never driven in the USA but I know they drive with a certain degree of respect for others as they do in the UK and also both countries have good public transport . In many countries the place where you have your car serviced is also authorised to give a certificate of road worthiness and it seems to work well > I very much agree that this plan is just another layer of opportunity for corruption,
So, are you saying that it's perfectly ok with police in UK that a car might have a broken/missing tail light/headlight, tail lights, brake lights or headlights not working, windshield is cracked, tints are too dark, tires are bald, or it's belching out smoke from the tail pipe, that it's ok with them? None of those things are a violation of the law in the UK?
What drstock says is correct. In the UK there are thousands of testing stations for what is called MOT and these are normally within an existing motor service business. Every year an owner is obliged to obtain a certificate of road worthiness before paying his annual tax for the sticker on the car. In the small city of Canterbury,Kent with a population of less than 160,000 there are about 60 such testing stations. However ,the law clearly states and motorists are often advised of this, that it is the responsibility of the car owner to maintain his car in roadworthy condition. An owner can lose his drivers licence or be heavily fined if it is found that his car is on the road in a condition that is not road worthy . It is true that there are not road blocks but if a driver is pulled over for any reason at all ,there is a great possibility that the car will be checked.
I did not misinterpret. You must have misstated your point.
I understood you think the police are all that is needed to enforce the laws and there is no need for inspections of vehicles like many other places in the world.
I don't agree since there are so many decrepit vehicles on the roads in the DR that should be removed. The Police obviously don't care, but actual inspections might actually remove those long past their useful safe life.
(Whoever said that public transportation was great in both the UK and USA never spent much time in various parts of the USA. We Americans like our cars, public transport outside of major cities, not so much. )
I didn't misstate it at all. I clearly said that vehicle inspections were canceled and it was left to the police to issue tickets for safety violations for things that would be checked at inspections lie broken windshields, headlights/ tail lights/brake lights, etc. Here's a direct quote from a local newspaper at the time.
"A: In 1981, then-Gov. Bob Graham and the Legislature halted motor vehicle inspections after complaints about long lines at state-run inspection stations.
Graham was quoted at the time as saying the nearly $20 million spent annually by the state to run the stations could be better spent on law enforcement. The idea was that the job of inspections would fall to officers on patrol that could stop cars on the road if they saw faulty equipment."
I would like to see all the decrepit vehicles removed, but I don't see inspection stations improving the chances of that happening much. You said yourself that when you went to the inspection station your vehicle was never inspected - you just paid for the revista. The number of decrepit vehicles did not decrease at all when those inspections were operating.
All it would take to remove these decrepit vehicles from the road is a mandate by Abinader to do so and the police could easily do it w/o the need for another inefficient government bureaucracy that's going to gouge millions of Dominicans 3000 pesos and waste half a day in long lines just to remove a relatively smaller number of decrepit vehicles.
When Abinader decided he had enough of motos with no placas, matriculas. and drivers with no licenses, he lowered the boom, the police began checking, confiscating, and handing out tickets and now hundreds of thousands of motos and their drivers meet the requirements. It can easily be done.
I'm not questioning if there are testing stations in the UK, I'm asking if the items mentioned in my post are infractions in the UK and if the traffic police or highway patrol there will give you a ticket if they see one of those infractions.
yes they most certainly will. However, in my experience which is in the south west and south east ,the traffic police are much more concerned about driver behaviour, such as speeding or driving erratically or using your mobile while driving .
While bad driver behaviour is very important and is the largest contributing factor to accidents here in the DR, highway patrol here is very limited, so it's hard to do much about it. Vehicle inspections won't change that either.
Many of the other safety items are important, too. Several times I've been behind trucks that had to stop fairly quickly, but w/o functioning brake lights, I came uncomfortably close to rear ending him. Same with motos at night with no tail lights and headlights. I've come close to hitting a couple of them.
The safest way for me to drive on a DR highway with poor lighting at night such as going from the Capital to Santiago is to follow a vehicle at a safe distance that has visible tail lights. This way nothing is in between me and if someone gets there somehow I will see him. Just driving "naked" as i call it is a no no at night.................
Maybe the government can also add a public-private partnership to teach others how to drive safely at night 🇩🇴 the way some have described here. 
An inspection will catch a vehicle with no lights.
It gets fixed.
Until the system fails and the vehicle has no lights again.
Does not help the drivers on the road to see the vehicles that do not have them.
I know I don't ‼️
An inspection will catch a vehicle with no lights.
It gets fixed.
Until the system fails and the vehicle has no lights again.
Does not help the drivers on the road to see the vehicles that do not have them.
Do you actually want a highway patrol in the 🇩🇴 that can *&@! with you over equipment violations at night ❓
I know I don't ‼️
I think the government should sponsor highway safety public announcements on tv to address some of these issues.Maybe the government can also add a public-private partnership to teach others how to drive safely at night 🇩🇴 the way some have described here.
An inspection will catch a vehicle with no lights.
It gets fixed.
Until the system fails and the vehicle has no lights again.
Does not help the drivers on the road to see the vehicles that do not have them.
Do you actually want a highway patrol in the 🇩🇴 that can *&@! with you over equipment violations at night ❓
I know I don't ‼️
I was just saying that, for the most part, there is no highway patrol here to address bad driving behavior and there probably won't be for a long time. Too expensive. There are pros and cons.
Just in the last couple months for the first time ever, twice AMET had a road check point at night in Cabarete. I'd be willing to bet that will slowly increase in the future. Is AMET out at night in SDE?