Well, I just got back from the Kirkland Municipal Court after a nervous 24 hours. A few of my friends have already been aware of what’s been hanging over my head since early February. Back on Feb. 9th, I had headed across the 520 floating bridge from the Seattle side over to Bellevue on the East side of Lake Washington to check up on an ill friend. This route was very familiar to me, having traveled on it to get home when I lived on that side of the lake for many years. I took the first exit – 84th Ave. NE – rolled up to the STOP sign at the intersection and stopped.

I looked both ways and then pulled forward slowly to get through the intersection carefully. This particular intersection can get pretty nasty at times with all the yuppies and soccer Moms driving their SUVs in their Starbucks-induced comas so you proceed with caution. As I pulled through the intersection, I looked over at the cop in the unmarked car on my left and smiled at him with a nod. Halfway through the intersection, he hits his lights and his siren and signals for me to pull over to the shoulder on the other side of the intersection. I rolled my window down as he approached my van and asked, "What did I do, officer?"

"You just went through a STOP sign!" he replied. At which point it quickly turned into a "No, I didn’t!" Yes, you did!" conversation. I told him that my record would reflect that I’ve been a safe driver for years with absolutely no infractions like this at all. He did turn out to be rather courteous after he ran my record while writing that ticket in his car and his parting advice was to go to court and contest it. But needless to say, he did issue me a ticket before sending me on my way.

And being who I am, I did fight that ticket. I sent it in and requested a contested hearing. Eventually I got paperwork in the mail that notified me that my hearing wouldn’t be until April 28th! So it’s been a long couple of months waiting and preparing for this thing. All I know is that I’m an absolutely anal driver when it comes to certain habits like coming to a complete stop at all marked intersections and using my turn signal even if there’s no one else around. When I first started driving, I had decided to train myself to fall into certain habits automatically so that over time I wouldn’t even think about doing them consciously. After a while, it all just becomes automatic. So when I say I always come to a complete stop at all STOP signs, I can say so with absolute certainty that I know I do. For anyone to question or deny it would be an absolute affront to my nature and my integrity. Let’s just say that I’ve learned over the years that some habits are simply good for you.

Anyway, back to the courtroom drama. I knew I had to present compelling and unquestionable evidence to the judge. And despite the theory that we’re all supposed to be equal in the eyes of the law, when it comes down to a cop’s word against even the most upstanding of private citizens, the cop generally tends to win. And I had to do it without attacking his integrity. Well, once again, technology came to the rescue. Google, to be specific. I needed reasonably detailed pictures of the intersection from all angles and from above. For some reason, I just didn’t quite want to go back and take a bunch of detailed pictures of the entire intersection. So I Googled the intersection and hit pay dirt!

Here’s the intersection as it looks approaching it after coming up the off ramp from the SR520 floating bridge (click the map images to enlarge):

Here it is as I would see it pulling up to the white stop line just in front of the crosswalk (note that the stop line is blurred because of the Google Maps picture-stitching software).

Note how the STOP sign on the left is correctly placed right alongside that stopping line and BEFORE the crosswalk. Also notice the other STOP sign on the right stuck on the corner on the distant side of the crosswalk. See that patch of sidewalk on the left side of the crosswalk in front of the STOP sign? That’s where the cop was sitting in his lowrider Chrysler 300 4-door sedan. (BTW – Snoop Dogg loves this car!) That particular model has a big-ass trunk which means a narrower angled rear window and huge pillars between the rear passenger windows and the back window that block a lot of your side vision.

That piece of sidewalk on the left was the only possible place that the cop could have parked his car as the rest of that corner was covered with shrubbery and tall grass. I pointed that out to the judge as well as describing the make and model of the police car. It became very clear that it would have been impossible for anyone sitting where that car had to be parked to have also seen me making a complete stop behind that stop line. But he could definitely see me pass that second STOP sign on the right that I drove past and it became obvious that this had to be the STOP sign that the cop’s signed affidavit swore I had driven through. This approach allowed me to stick to my view that I had indeed stopped at the STOP sign while the cop’s written testimony remained technically correct saying I drove past his STOP sign on the right. Sometimes a little bit of face-saving never hurts.

As icing on the cake, the final two Google Maps images I handed the judge were aerial shots – one with and one without each of the two STOP signs circled. When you look at the scale in the lower left corner indicating 20 feet, it’s obvious that these two STOP signs are not only not placed alongside each other like they’re supposed to be but the second one is visibly – and indisputably – at least 12 – 15 feet away from the first sign on the left! So are you expected to stop for each sign?

I had also contacted the Kirkland Public Works and Roads Dept. to inquire about sign placement and they agreed that STOP signs need to be placed in alignment to one another. And there’s another rule that ensures STOP signs aren’t too close to each other: STOP signs can’t be any closer than a block apart. Otherwise people would be going crazy with stopping-and-starting with endless STOP signs. So at the very least, these two signs were clearly not in compliance with road and safety regulations. And at worst, these two STOP signs have probably been a dirty little moneymaking secret for years for the Kirkland Police Dept. that no one talked about.

I think the judge was sufficiently impressed. He dismissed the ticket. Thank you, Judge Olson!

Chalk up another cool unintended use for Google Maps that would never have been possible as recently as 5 years ago!

[Editor’s Note: Robert cross-posted on RobertinSeattle.com. –mrh]