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What’s the Matter with North Dakota?

Buried in this story about a lawsuit in Fargo that apparently led to reduced traffic fines is this rather startling fact:

“A comparison of fines shows speeding up to 5 mph over the limit in Fargo costs $75 compared with a $5 state fine. Failure to have a vehicle under control brings a $100 fee in Fargo compared with a state fee of $30, court documents say.”

A $5 fine? What good is enforcement if a.) It can’t pay for itself and b.) Fines are so low as to be laughable — the roadway equivalent of a “foul language” box in the office or some such.

The brave Norma Rae figure in this drama, by the way, who liberated Fargo-ites from the cruel onslaught of onerous traffic fines under which they’d suffered, has been “ticketed twice for speeding, twice for not wearing a seat belt, and once for failing to have her vehicle under control, court documents said.”

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This entry was posted on Thursday, July 17th, 2008 at 12:33 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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Traffic Tom Vanderbilt

How We Drive is the companion blog to Tom Vanderbilt’s New York Times bestselling book, Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us), published by Alfred A. Knopf in the U.S. and Canada, Penguin in the U.K, and in languages other than English by a number of other fine publishers worldwide.

Please send tips, news, research papers, links, photos (bad road signs, outrageous bumper stickers, spectacularly awful acts of driving or parking or anything traffic-related), or ideas for my Slate.com Transport column to me at: info@howwedrive.com.

For publicity inquiries, please contact Kate Runde at Vintage: krunde@randomhouse.com.

For editorial inquiries, please contact Zoe Pagnamenta at The Zoe Pagnamenta Agency: zoe@zpagency.com.

For speaking engagement inquiries, please contact
Jenna Meulemans at the Knopf Speaker Bureau.

Order Traffic from:

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Drive-on-the-left types can order the book from Amazon.co.uk.

For UK publicity enquiries please contact Rosie Glaisher at Penguin.

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