Traffic cop dedicated to an unpopular job

Sergeant Dave Best writes a speeding ticket on Tamaki Drive, "one of our favourite hunting grounds." Picture / Glenn Jeffrey

Sergeant Dave Best, of the Auckland police strategic traffic unit, makes no apology for ensnaring motorists in speed traps on his central city patch.

"I'm not ashamed of doing my job - I'm proud of what I do," he tells the Herald after a day of supervising traffic patrols that have been trawling Tamaki Drive and other speed trouble-spots.

He recalls at least four fatal crashes along the busy waterfront road in three years, before police began cracking down on traffic exceeding 60km/h.

But he is aware of only a minor injury on the road since the new enforcement regime began two or three years ago.

Although the speed limit on Tamaki Drive is 50km/h, Mr Best says police rarely used to issue tickets to those driving below 70.

Drawing the line at 60km/h is in step with national guidelines for static speed cameras, which offer an unwritten tolerance of 10km/h above the official limit for cars and 5km/h for trucks.

Mr Best says it used to be common to find people racing along the waterfront at 100km/h or faster, but vehicles exceeding 70 are rare nowadays.

"People wonder why we are so tough on this beautiful four-lane stretch of road, but I've seen cars which have gone into the tide or rolled into trees - and half of Auckland comes out here on a fine day, jogging or cycling."

Although the seven constables working in Mr Best's unit normally select their own patrol beats within a tight 9 sq km section of central Auckland, from College Hill to Khyber Pass Rd and the waterfront, he had four cars operating along Tamaki Drive when the Herald went along for the ride.

"It's one of our favourite hunting grounds," he admits, adjusting his Stalker radar unit, which has antennae in the front and rear windscreens of the car.

The unit can take digital speed readings of every passing vehicle in both directions, but Mr Best picks his targets well to ensure he does not endanger himself or other traffic while making u-turns to catch them.

"I'm married with children - I'm not going to do a dangerous u-turn in traffic just for the sake of someone travelling at speed. We'll catch them later anyway."

Despite his perception of slower traffic along Tamaki Drive these days, the road still appears to offer easy pickings to police.

Just seconds after tuning his radar, Mr Best stops a souped-up Mazda clocked at 65km/h and driven by a teenager on a restricted licence.

"Oh no, I've lost my licence," says Matthew Dallow, 18, after learning he faces 25 demerit points for driving a car with manual gear change on a licence for automatics only.

The unemployed engineering worker already has 75 demerit points, which he later discloses to the Herald are for reaching 147km/h on a motorway with several passengers in an unregistered vehicle, and the latest batch means his licence will be suspended for three months.

But Mr Best decides to let him off a ticket for a third offence, carrying a passenger who is not a dependent relative and who turns out to be the Mazda's owner.

Mr Dallow already faces a $400 fine for the licence breach and $80 for speeding, so the sergeant resists slugging him for another $400.

"I'm doing my job. He got caught, but there is no need to be inhumane about it," he says.

"I've already put $500 on him, but he's unemployed so what good would it do to throw the book at him?"

Mr Best hopes to have got across the safety message without unduly alienating the youth, who thanks him for the concession.

Minutes later, Mr Best comes across a patrol that has stopped a middle-aged woman in a four-wheel-drive who was doing 65km/h.

She tells the Herald she is on holiday and is used to 60km/h urban limits in most of her native Queensland.

"I think 50km/h is far too low."

She looks affluent enough to pay the standard $80 fine for what she says is her first speeding ticket.

But another woman, a pensioner, says she will have difficulty paying the same amount for hitting 63km/h in a moment of inattention.

"It's really made my day," she says.

Mr Best sympathises with her plight, but says he must be even-handed, "otherwise how do you justify fining a young guy driving at the same speed?"

"If someone runs out in front of a car, the damage is the same whoever is driving it."