Trafficking Safety

51st street sees its normal amount of congestion in the morning as people commute (which, in Saskatoon, is a 12 minute drive at most) to their jobs but today it was unusually backed up. Why? Because the Saskatoon police had a check stop set up and were pulling cars over for inspection. What they were looking for, according to stories leaked to radio stations, were “safety violations”. As Source approached the check stop she observed a car having its wheel well inspected. For unsafe mud? Upon reaching the check stop she happened to be waved through without inspection. Safety profiling? That’s a new one.

There are so many things wrong with this police action. Let’s break them down.


Personally, this irks me because I can’t count the number of non-moving violations I could rack up in a sting like this. Busted out signal lights, no parking brake, faulty power steering, cracked windshield, non-functional wiper blades. Not to mention body damage and enough bullet holes that my truck could assist in a reenactment of the Battle of Batoche. They’d probably see what a threat I was to public safety and draw their guns and yell at me to exit the vehicle. Then I would stand there with my hands up while my idling truck slowly rolled into a police car.

For all the shameless ways a city makes money by fining its well-meaning citizens for violations Jesus himself probably committed in his time (leaving his sandals in a no sandal zone), this would stoop to a new low, unworthy of any city council elected by its people. This grabasstic cash cow would be eclipsed by the GDP lost by people being delayed on their way to work.

Okay, so it’s not about vehicular safety. And if you’re like me you’re probably thinking the cops received a tip or an ongoing investigation has led them to an attempt at seizing a car loaded with drugs. But during morning rush hour? I guess I’d feel bad for Bill who’s dutifully bringing the hash brick in his briefcase because it’s his week for “Bong Friday” at the office.



We don’t quite have the knack the American government has for manipulating the press with “everything is alright, go back to sleep” propaganda but this is still a pitiful attempt. We also don’t have that all purpose, hot button “T” word that can be used to front random, privacy-violating police action. This may have been more like, (police chief on phone to press core) “I dunno, tell ‘em it’s uhh, it’s uhh, safety something-er-other.”

Did I miss anything?