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Allegheny County (PA) Pittsburgh City Police Speed Traps

From The RadioReference Wiki

City of Pittsburgh Police Speed Traps

Organized speed enforcement falls under the pervue of the Traffic Unit, which is part of the Special Deployment Division. Certain areas within the City are identified based upon known traffic patterns or resident complaints. Those areas are then targeted for enforcement.

Generally speaking, speed traps are set-up and executed by motorcycle officers.

The City Police are limited to VASCAR for speed enforcement. VASCAR is a manual method of speed timing (see link below). A radar detector is useless against VASCAR.

The speed enforcement teams almost always use Channel 12 (458.3625, CTCSS 186.2) for communicating between the speed timing officers and the take-down/citation team working down the road.

Speed enforcement team communications are easy to discern. They invariably consist of a vehicle description followed by a number (speed), "Blue Dodge Charger... 51.2".

Channel 12 is a simplex channel rated at a mere 2 watts of power. If you start to pick up these type of communications, you are in close proximity to the area of operation.

Additional reference materials:

City of Pittsburgh Police Channels

VASCAR Information

Pittsburgh Speed Traps

One Man's Foray Into Traffic Court

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