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Charlotte Amalie
Friday, March 29, 2024
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Traffic Laws and Compliance by Both Citizens and Government

Dear Source:
I am glad to see that Commissioner Lewis ensured that his officers were
in compliance before he set out to enforce this amongst the general
population. However, he needs to also ensure that the rest of the
Virgin Islands government is in compliance.
Another law that the police department and the Government need to ensure that they are in compliance with–before it is continued to be enforced amongst the general population–is having the license plates mounted on the front of all vehicles. Citizens are being ticketed for this infraction, yet numerous police department vehicles, both government owned and privately owned, are not in compliance. The same goes for numerous V.I. government owned vehicles.
My third and fourth points need to be aggressively pursued by both the
VIPD and the V.I. Legislature. The way the law is written pertaining to
seat belt usage, if the driver of a pick-up truck is not wearing his
seat belt, he can be ticketed for this infraction. However, this same
driver can have twenty passengers riding in the back of the same pick-up
truck without any seatbelts whatsoever, or even seats for that matter,
and that is perfectly legal. Try getting away with that in any of the
fifty states or any of the other territories. It just won't happen
because it is illegal and it is unsafe.
Puerto Rico, like many other cities and states, is already banning the use of the "pocket bikes" or "mini-bikes". It is only a matter of time before someone here gets killed on one of these, just like has happened in Puerto Rico and elsewhere. On numerous occasions, I have been driving on the Melvin Evans Highway in hours of darkness and I get startled when all of a sudden there is someone on one of these pocket bikes with no lights, no reflectors and no helmets right in front of me. Like the pick-up truck and the seatbelts, I can get a ticket for not wearing a helmet on my Harley, but it's okay for me not to wear one on one of these dangerous pocket bikes.
Nelson Rivera
St. Croix

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