5 Dead in Wrong-way Crash on Lodge

[kryptonite]

I am not much of a drinker, but to me it is not exactly right to treat drunk driving like a a worse offense yet not also rigorously crack down on wreckless driving, etc. I am not certain but isn't it possible to prove that an individual was texting while driving? Why should penalties be so harsh for one type of major driving offense and less so for another?

In recent years the Canadian government found cell phone users and text messagers to cause far more accidents than drunk drivers.

I would think that speeding, texting, etc. should be treated with the same harshness that our courts treat drunk or influenced drivers. An accident or a death is not less tragic if a driver had been going 100 mph and sober than if they were driving 70 mph and intoxicated or high.

If you had to try to avoid a vehicle coming towards you at 100+ mph would you actually care if the driving were drunk vs. sober?

[Ray1936]

The nice thing about being an old fart like me is that I'm in bed at 10:00 p.m. each and every night. And I rarely venture out after dark at all.

Of course, there's nothing that says a drunk can't become a terror behind the wheel during daylight hours, either. Life can be a turkey shoot sometimes, eh?

[Detroitnerd]

To quote Ray from Trailer Park Boys: "Whaddaya mean by drunk driving? Do you mean, like, driving all over the road and crashing into things? Or just driving while intoxicated?"

[bartock]

I am not much of a drinker, but to me it is not exactly right to treat drunk driving like a a worse offense yet not also rigorously crack down on wreckless driving, etc. I am not certain but isn't it possible to prove that an individual was texting while driving? Why should penalties be so harsh for one type of major driving offense and less so for another?

In recent years the Canadian government found cell phone users and text messagers to cause far more accidents than drunk drivers.

I would think that speeding, texting, etc. should be treated with the same harshness that our courts treat drunk or influenced drivers. An accident or a death is not less tragic if a driver had been going 100 mph and sober than if they were driving 70 mph and intoxicated or high.

If you had to try to avoid a vehicle coming towards you at 100+ mph would you actually care if the driving were drunk vs. sober?

Granted, I do almost all my driving between 6 a.m. and 8 p.m., but nearly every car I see swerving, drifting in and out of lanes, slowing down, speeding up, and otherwise driving erratically is being driven by someone looking at a portable device.

[Occurrence]

This has to do with stupid drivers. I have driven drunk many of times back in the day, and never got on the freeway going the wrong way.

[kryptonite]

Absolutely. I have seen people reading magazines on their steering wheel on the interstate during rush hour. many drunk drivers may be safer on the road than the idiots texting and playing computer games, etc. while driving.

I would like to see various driving practices treated exactly as drunk driving is enforced. People texting are just as aware about what they are doing as a drunk driver who gets behind a wheel. A dead victim is no less dead if the offending driver were texting and sober than if the driver was legally drunk.

[Occurrence]

Problem with that logic is that we, as a society, tend to dislike "strict liability". .08 [[which might actually bounce back to .10 if the .08 law is allowed to sunset in 2013) may or may not affect everyone the same. Further, there is a HUGE difference between impairment at .08 and hammered at .15...or .20. Finally, getting popped for rolling a stop sign at an empty intersection and then having the cop figure out you might be a sliver over .08 because you had that extra glass of wine at your 35th wedding anniversary dinner, is a shitload different than being blotto and blowing down the highway at 100+ mph. That is why judges are supposed to use discretion and the guidelines are just that "guidelines". The particular judge who sentences people without taking into consideration the facts and circumstances of the arrest and simply throws the maximum at them is not doing her job. Nor is she solving the problem.

+ 1.

It's ridicules that people who blow .08 are placed in the same category are people who are near blackout drunk. It shouldn't be that black and white. Alcohol affects everyone differently. I'd rather be sharing the road with a drunken thick-necked lumberjack who drinks every night than some completely sober frail old confused people who don't know what the hell they are doing. DUI sentences should be done on an individual basis.

They always say how many accidents are caused by drunk drivers, but how many accidents are caused by bad drivers in general? You can't get numbers for things like that. That car going 8 mph under the speed limit could arguably cause just as many, if not more accidents than a drunk.

[Lowell]

Unfortunately neither article is very informative about the location and how the driver got southbound on the northbound. That part of the Lodge is wider and safer than the canyon through north Detroit. The pavement is newly rebuilt and in excellent condition.There is no way to cross the meridian around there, so maybe he got down the Ten Mile exit ramp. After Southfield the legal speed increases to 70; I say legal because it is difficult to drive on rest the Lodge under 70.

It is now said that the tragedy occurred btw. Telegraph and Lahser. The expressway along there is divided by a large median for a great distance that includes a big mound and the Rouge River. I now speculate that the driver entered from northbound Telegraph taking a right turn rather that flowing with curve to the left. This is not an easy 'mistake' to make even for a drunk. It makes me wonder if this was a suicide.

[kryptonite]

I live in the neighborhood. I am not aware of any way a person could easily head south on the NB Lodge from Telegraph. Maybe there is one spot on the median where service vehicles can drive into the median, but if I'm correct about that location it would still not be easy to proceed to the NB lanes. Like you said, they would have to go backwards on the exit ramp which would be very difficult.

However, it would not be difficult to do that at the point where Northwestern Hwy ends. I wonder if the driver actually drove quite a distance in the wrong direction before actually impacting another vehicle? It's so early in the investigation that little is known. And since the driver responsible for the deaths is also dead, we may never know.

[MikeM]

I was on WB I-94 past Jackson once and saw a drunk driver. I called 911 and coordinated with the Michigan State Police. They had me flash my hazards when I went by the patrol car and they nabbed him.

Wasn't there a lawsuit in Michigan about this in the past few years? An argument to the effect that a citizen report of a drunk driver was not sufficient probable cause for the police to stop a driver?

[Meddle]

also rigorously crack down on wreckless driving,

If everyone would drive wrecklessly, the roads would be far, far safer since there would be no wrecks.

[Meddle]

Wasn't there a lawsuit in Michigan about this in the past few years? An argument to the effect that a citizen report of a drunk driver was not sufficient probable cause for the police to stop a driver?

It isn't, but they don't make the stop without observing for themselves for some distance. You can call and report your suspicions and they take it from there to determine probable cause.

[Scottathew]

Live in metro Detroit long enough, and at some point you're going to have to drunk-drive. Be safe out there...

I hope you're being wickedly sarcastic.

There's absolutely no excuse to drink and drive. It's stupid and dangerous. More importantly, it's dangerous to others and not just the person doing the drinking.

[drjeff]

It isn't, but they don't make the stop without observing for themselves for some distance. You can call and report your suspicions and they take it from there to determine probable cause.

4 or 5 years ago I was driving west on I-94 near Telegraph around 11 pm and was passed by a guy weaving all over the road, driving erratically, and clearly a serious safety hazard. I called 911 and they seemed not to care at all. Didn't even ask for the license plate until I asked if they wanted it.

[Detroitnerd]

I hope you're being wickedly sarcastic.

There's absolutely no excuse to drink and drive. It's stupid and dangerous. More importantly, it's dangerous to others and not just the person doing the drinking.

I'm serious. Of course, I may be older than you. I remember when everybody's dad would take a road beer...

[kryptonite]

There is another possible explanation as to how the driver entered NB Lodge.

If the driver had turned right onto NB Telegraph from one of the Michigan Left turnarounds in the vicinty of the Lowe's/Toys R Us shopping center, he could have driven the wrong way on NB Telgraph a short distance to the Lodge exit ramp and if he entered the ramp the wrong way, that would have had him headed in the wrong direction on the Lodge.

[Meddle]

Believe me, there were a lot of times in the 70s and 80s where I don't remember how I got home. Never had a problem except one night when I scraped the side of the house backing in the driveway after a party at The Playboy Club.

But that was when cops would park your car somewhere and give you a ride home. Jail time was very rare.

That was before a bunch of frustrated Moms went MADD.

[Scottathew]

I'm serious. Of course, I may be older than you. I remember when everybody's dad would take a road beer...

My dad used to do stupid stuff, but he's been sober since I was born.

[Detroitnerd]

My dad used to do stupid stuff, but he's been sober since I was born.

Are you hinting that his conceiving you was an act of stupidity?

[Scottathew]

Are you hinting that his conceiving you was an act of stupidity?

LOL. I left myself wide-open for that one!

I was a little sh!t growing up!

[Detroitnerd]

LOL. I left myself wide-open for that one!

I was a little sh!t growing up!

Heehee. Sorry. I'm a stinker sometimes.

[English]

Live in metro Detroit long enough, and at some point you're going to have to drunk-drive. Be safe out there...

!!!!!
WHAT????
Detroitnerd, normally I love your posts, but I think less of you for this statement.

[Detroitnerd]

!!!!!
WHAT????
Detroitnerd, normally I love your posts, but I think less of you for this statement.

What can I say? I lived in New York for 11 years and never drove drunk. Then, in Detroit, it's not like there's an incredible mass transit system, mixed-use development and neighborhood bars on every corner. In Detroit, likely as not, you're at the bar -- hopefully a local one -- and you've been drinking, and you have to go home. If I feel I'm not impaired enough, which is most of the time, I'll drive home -- always very carefully. If I'm plowed, I'll walk or get a ride from a friend.

Luckily, at least I live in the Hamtramck area, where you don't have to go far. And, also, at least I drink a lot, to where it's very, very hard for me to get too drunk to drive. I can't imagine what it's like to be a lightweight partying on amateur night, living out in the burbs, and driving miles and miles home from some bar, especially with all those revenue-hungry police out there.

Should drinking and driving be illegal? Sure. But when are you drunk? Why do they lower the BAC to where you can be subject to such serious fines for -- what? -- two beers?

At some point, depending on enforcement, this whole thing becomes less about saving lives and more about using tragic deaths to justify a "zero tolerance" approach that may or may not save lives -- but generates huge amounts of revenue for the courts, the police, attorneys and nonprofit outfits like MADD. I think we're past that point.

That said, I'd like to see some intelligent, less punitive stuff to ensure fewer people drive after drinking, such as more mass transit, denser neighborhoods, and less restrictive zoning that allows for neighborhood bars within walking distance.

Anyway, please, don't think less of me, English. Maybe think more about the issue at hand.

[Islandman]

Please, there are many people on this forum that have driven after drinking. I'm not buying it.

Dnerd is being realistic and honest. Are all of you really saying that you have gone out for the night and not had a single drink?!? Oh, and if you have, when are you officially "not drunk" so you can say to yourself that you have not driven after drinking?

And for people to also say that having mass transit does not reduce drunk driving, that is also a bunch of BS. Most people [[yes, even drunk people), given the opportunity, would not drink and drive if offered convenient options. In a place like NYC this would be the difference between not feeling like waiting on the subway in the wee hours of the morning and jumping in a cab.

Face it, municipalities like Novi and Royal Oak [[just to name a few) are making tons of money on people drunk driving, yet have tons of bars/clubs everywhere. Why is it that you never see cop cars sitting outside of bars at closing time?

[Scottathew]

Dnerd is being realistic and honest. Are all of you really saying that you have gone out for the night and not had a single drink?!? Oh, and if you have, when are you officially "not drunk" so you can say to yourself that you have not driven after drinking?

If I'm impaired, I don't drive.

There's been three times that I've been too drunk to drive when I wanted to go home. One time I called my wife. The other two times I walked to Lafayette Coney, put down a couple coney's, walked over to work, watched TV for an hour, and once I was no longer impaired I drove home.

There's simply no excuse to being under the influence of alcohol and getting behind the wheel. In my mind this is simply a moral imperative.