Garda check points

pm.

I travel the country and over the last week or so I have seen 6 check points for tax and insurance probably nct too.. Seen at least 1 car being confiscated at almost all checkpoints.. It's great to see imo

Did anyone else notice an increase in check points

irishgeo

pm. wrote: »

I travel the country and over the last week or so I have seen 6 check points for tax and insurance probably nct too.. Seen at least 1 car being confiscated at almost all checkpoints.. It's great to see imo

Did anyone else notice an increase in check points

Isn't it the Christmas crack down for drink driving. Great to see.

Ciano35

pm. wrote: »

I travel the country and over the last week or so I have seen 6 check points for tax and insurance probably nct too.. Seen at least 1 car being confiscated at almost all checkpoints.. It's great to see imo

Did anyone else notice an increase in check points

Yeah I didn't meet a single checkpoint in nearly 4 years, but in the last month I met 3. And 2 of them were in the same place within 3 days of each other.

TheBody

I drive around 40,000 km per year and I've been driving on a full licence for around 15 years. I've never been breathalysed and I only recall going through one checkpoint in all that time!!

I don't know why I never seem to meet checkpoints.

frozenfrozen

TheBody wrote: »

I drive around 40,000 km per year and I've been driving on a full licence for around 15 years. I've never been breathalised and I only recall going through one checkpoint in all that time!!

I don't know why I never seem to meet checkpoints.

that's mad, I'm only driving a few years and have been through easily 15 checkpoints or more. Never breathalysed but I don't do much driving around mornings or nights so would be outside the usual windows for them.

Paulw

A lot more checkpoints in the last few months. Mostly dealing with these gang killings, but while they're there, they check tax, insurance, etc. I've seen a good few cars confiscated.

Great to see. Now, if they would only catch people using phones when driving.

fg1406

I do 90% of my driving in a large town and the gardai here go through phases where they will for 3 weeks in a row have a checkpoint in one spot in town and then disappear for a year. None yet since the Christmas period began. I wish there was more or at list a more visible presence on the roads as the behaviour of some drivers on the road is appalling.

MEGA BRO WOLF 5000

Take the car for not having NCT or worse insurance. Taking the car for lack of tax is pure stupid. On the spot fine way better job imo. Taking someone's car just lines the pockets of the tow truck lads, nobody else.

tayto lover

5 last week.
2 in 10 miles on the same trip.

pm.

I didn't notice them with a breathalyzer at any of the check points, but it looked to me like there were not taking it lightly. Two of the check points had armed guards and the all had a minimum of 6

StereoSound

It's great seeing check points, I love when you see those ****ters being scraped up off the road because of no NCT In years.

Donal55

3 around Athlone last week. Checking lights as well by the looks of things at one of them.

wotswattage

Are they really that effective? Manys a car I've seen do a U-turn when they see a checkpoint and nobody ever follows them, likewise a few weeks ago I came across one under a bridge on a dual carriageway and saw several cars just suddenly dart up the off ramp and avoid the checkpoint... If it were me again I'd go up the off ramp I probably spent 5 minutes in the queue to get breathalysed!

Stheno

About 8 in the past six weeks

One_Of_Shanks

Stheno wrote: »

About 8 in the past six weeks

8 in 6 weeks? Jesus that's some going! Were they all for tax/NCT or what?

johnnyryan89

A lot of check points around Limerick City this month, talking a minimum of at least five a day. Think they even had one on one of the main streets in the city centre last Sunday or the one before that and done every car on that street for parking on double yellows.

Stheno

One_Of_Shanks wrote: »

8 in 6 weeks? Jesus that's some going! Were they all for tax/NCT or what?

I think three or four were due to crime there was an attempted gangland shooting in our area so those checkpoints had armed plainclothes cops on them.

The rest were tax/insurance

Since august I'd say i hit one a week

amcalester

Hugh Mungus wrote: »

Take the car for not having NCT or worse insurance. Taking the car for lack of tax is pure stupid. On the spot fine way better job imo. Taking someone's car just lines the pockets of the tow truck lads, nobody else.

IF they haven't paid the tax what makes you think they'll pay the fine.

newacc2015

Hugh Mungus wrote: »

Take the car for not having NCT or worse insurance. Taking the car for lack of tax is pure stupid. On the spot fine way better job imo. Taking someone's car just lines the pockets of the tow truck lads, nobody else.

If someone has been bothered to pay their car tax for years, why would they bother paying a fine? If you impound their car, they will definitely pay their road tax. I know who told me their friend hadnt paid his road tax in nearly 5 years. He got stopped by the Gardai and had his car impounded. He had to pay well over €3.5k in back taxes. If you dont want to pay line the pockets of tow truck guys, pay your car tax in the first place. It is not that difficult.

IMO it is very easy to avoid Gardai checkpoints if you live within the canals (well up until the gangland shooting started). I have only once seen a check point in between the canals. I imagine the gardai dont want to make the bad congestion worse by checking cars

iwillhtfu

Paulw wrote: »

A lot more checkpoints in the last few months. Mostly dealing with these gang killings, but while they're there, they check tax, insurance, etc. I've seen a good few cars confiscated.

Great to see. Now, if they would only catch people using phones when driving.

I don't now why they don't employee a guard on a motorbike to trawl the major arterial routes for this.

A guard driving from Portlaoise - Dublin a rush hour would burn through several ticket books before he hit Dublin.

As before though driving 20 years now 30-40k per year nationwide and I've been breathalyzed once and been through 2 check points all in the last 4 years. I have yet to see one this year.

The no tax issue I could pass on as personally I think it should be fuel based but the mobile phone/make up use is beyond ridiculous.

nice_guy80

The gardai pay increases have to be paid for

nice_guy80

newacc2015 wrote: »

If someone has been bothered to pay their car tax for years, why would they bother paying a fine? If you impound their car, they will definitely pay their road tax. I know who told me their friend hadnt paid his road tax in nearly 5 years. He got stopped by the Gardai and had his car impounded. He had to pay well over €3.5k in back taxes. If you dont want to pay line the pockets of tow truck guys, pay your car tax in the first place. It is not that difficult.

IMO it is very easy to avoid Gardai checkpoints if you live within the canals (well up until the gangland shooting started). I have only once seen a check point in between the canals. I imagine the gardai dont want to make the bad congestion worse by checking cars

They run checkpoints between 11am and 2pm

bigroad

What do all these Guards do for the rest of the year.
When the Christmas season comes around,do management go into a warehouse somewhere and release a few thousand Guards.

Last time i saw a checkpoint was about 2 years ago- I drive all over the country

nice_guy80

Deleted User wrote: »

Last time i saw a checkpoint was about 2 years ago- I drive all over the country

I do about 500 miles a week
I've seen two in 2016

Grueller

I do about 30000 km per year. Breathalysed only once in around 20 years. That was on a Good Friday. Catholic Ireland is apparently well dead.

BettePorter

Can't believe all of those who say they only see one or two in few months / years. In the north east here i'd meet at least 3 a week.

Grueller

iwillhtfu wrote: »

the mobile phone/make up use is beyond ridiculous.

This. Two pet hates are texting/online while driving and applying fcuking mascara. No eyes on the road at all while doing this ****.

nice_guy80

BettePorter wrote: »

Can't believe all of those who say they only see one or two in few months / years. In the north east here i'd meet at least 3 a week.

that's cause Gerry Adams and his buddies are driving around in blacked out vans

Stheno

nice_guy80 wrote: »

that's cause Gerry Adams and his buddies are driving around in blacked out vans

And its regular enough that the m1 southbound is closed to force people through an off ramp looking for illegals usually around dundalk

Noveight

I do up to 600km on a busy week and can only remember meeting 2-3 checkpoints this year.

Haven't seen a customs checkpoint dipping for diesel in quite a while.

Jude13

Been through four checkpoints in the last 8 years (Im only in Ireland 4 weeks a year).

Only breathalysed once, it was on the way out of electric picnic and I got excited when I seen a guy in a high vis with a box of stuff, I thought he was handing out t-shirts or something, thank god they didnt check my eyesight.

The others were on an uphill section before arklow, I was on my way to wexford, they looked like ERU as they had guns so I would say it was gang related.

iwillhtfu

Stheno wrote: »

And its regular enough that the m1 southbound is closed to force people through an off ramp looking for illegals usually around dundalk

I've been through that multi agency checkpoint. It's actually quite a good set up. I know you get the lads shouting about a checkpoint on a motorway but this one is more of a diversion. When I passed through they had the paddy wagon/ERU/customs/social

Noveight wrote: »

I do up to 600km on a busy week and can only remember meeting 2-3 checkpoints this year.

Haven't seen a customs checkpoint dipping for diesel in quite a while.

I hear regular reports of them up around Monaghan/Cavan dipping for diesel. I've passed through one heading for the border on the N2 seems to be a regular spot

languagenerd

It's kind of crazy all of you saying you've never been breathalysed/hardly ever seen a check point in all your years of driving - I've only been driving for about 8 months now and have already been through 2 check points and breathalysed once. Now I realise why everyone laughed when I mentioned it in work the next day...

Just regarding phone use, the Garda Twitter said they fined 8 drivers for it at one check point in Dublin last week. Would like to see more of those from now on - it's terrifying how many drivers have their eyes totally off the road for long periods of time, especially when a driver in the UK was recently convicted of killing a whole family because he was scrolling through Spotify for 6 minutes and didn't notice the cars braking in front of him. But here, there's very little chance of being caught so there's no deterrent at all.

OldMrBrennan83

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Dravokivich

Well, the last check point I'd been though last week, they weren't looking at the discs. The Garda was looking at who was in the car.

madds

Dravokivich wrote: »

Well, the last check point I'd been though last week, they weren't looking at the discs. The Garda was looking at who was in the car.

Checkpoint this morning coming off M50 Exit 16 at Cherrywood at 9:30am. Looks like they were looking for someone in particular but had pulled a couple of vans over, probably for tax disc reasons. Caused a major backlog back onto the M50.

ironclaw

Had an interesting conversation with an American friend the other day and it got me thinking about why we fine so quickly here. They were organising a rally with the emphasis on buying junk cars, rally them on public roads and raise money for charity. Now, issue is you can't do this if the tax or NCT is out (Well, the American equivilent) however in New Jersy you can as the DMV will issue you a temporary 10 day cert, meaning you can drive the car to get it repaired etc.

Hence, why don't be just hit people with minor on the spot fines, give them 10 days and then have a whopper fine and points at the end if they don't? I actually wouldn't mind handing over €50 if it slipped my mind to tax the car or the NCT was out by a few days. Would urge me to go sort it. Likewise if you fail the NCT, you can pay a small fee to drive the car to be repaired for a week or so. Win win for all really as you will only be fining and applying points to people who just arn't bothered.

pm.

Patww79 wrote: »

I didn't see one for years but had two in the space of a week recently. When I'd no tax of course.

What did they say to you?

OldMrBrennan83

This post has been deleted.

CalamariFritti

ironclaw wrote: »

Had an interesting conversation with an American friend the other day and it got me thinking about why we fine so quickly here. They were organising a rally with the emphasis on buying junk cars, rally them on public roads and raise money for charity. Now, issue is you can't do this if the tax or NCT is out (Well, the American equivilent) however in New Jersy you can as the DMV will issue you a temporary 10 day cert, meaning you can drive the car to get it repaired etc.

Hence, why don't be just hit people with minor on the spot fines, give them 10 days and then have a whopper fine and points at the end if they don't? I actually wouldn't mind handing over €50 if it slipped my mind to tax the car or the NCT was out by a few days. Would urge me to go sort it. Likewise if you fail the NCT, you can pay a small fee to drive the car to be repaired for a week or so. Win win for all really as you will only be fining and applying points to people who just arn't bothered.

Afaik they won't take your car in the first two months without tax, just issue a fine. I think thats fair enough. Takes care of the 'forgetters'. But there are people who haven't paid their tax in years. If you're not taking their car they will just continue to not pay tax and not pay the fine and drive on.

Fred Swanson

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gitzy16v

Fred Swanson wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

I drive very regularly,on most of our roads,all over the country,at all times...
I agree,checkpoints are rare,certain areas..yes..or certain reasons(mostly serious)..yes...but theres is nothing to suggest that the guards have any control over the roads.

foxy farmer

The tax insurance NCT disc could be off any vehicle. They just look at the dates. Never seen any garda to compare the reg plate and the discs. They stand on drivers side and just look across the bonnet. Just because the dates are valid doesn't mean the disc is correct.

Micky 32

Interestingly, a friend was telling me that where he lives in a quiet village in Ireland ( I won't name it) . The Gardai came out of nowhere to set up a checkpoint for most part of the week nearly everyday in the same spot. The locals were all delighted about this, especially with the rise of house break ins . However by the end of the week the mood and the faith in the Gardai kinda changed because all they seemed to do was just dish out fine after fine to motorists, a fine tooth comb over the cars. To add insult to injury ( whatever the saying is) whilst one of these crime busting checkpoints were going on and handing out fines, a house literally a stone throw from them was ransacked. They were never caught either...


Just sayin.........

MojoMaker

If they're dishing out fine after fine it means there were problem cars after problems cars. Maybe the locals were annoyed because they didn't expect to be held to any standards for their car ownership? :rolleyes:

Micky 32

They were for the smallest of things. but i'm sure your car has been 100% over the years ;-)

ironclaw

Micky 32 wrote: »

They were for the smallest of things. but i'm sure your car has been 100% over the years ;-)

Define small though?

Your tax is out, you clearly didn't think ahead, budget for it or remind yourself about it. Its a pretty standard responsibility to take on as an adult. Same with your lights, how hard is it to stop by an auto-factors or drop it into a garage for 10 mins for someone to fix it? Tyres, ditto.

Honestly, if someone isn't willing to take on those tiny responsibilities, then I don't really want to share the road with them as it shows a fairly lacks attitude to life and taking some ownership of it.

Micky 32

ironclaw wrote: »

Define small though?

Your tax is out, you clearly didn't think ahead, budget for it or remind yourself about it. Its a pretty standard responsibility to take on as an adult. Same with your lights, how hard is it to stop by an auto-factors or drop it into a garage for 10 mins for someone to fix it? Tyres, ditto.

Honestly, if someone isn't willing to take on those tiny responsibilities, then I don't really want to share the road with them as it shows a fairly lacks attitude to life and taking some ownership of it.

You're not getting it ...

ironclaw

Micky 32 wrote: »

You're not getting it ...

If its sarcasm, fair enough, but if not, I'm curious as to what a 'small' infraction is and why it should be ignored?

Micky 32

ironclaw wrote: »

If its sarcasm, fair enough, but if not, I'm curious as to what a 'small' infraction is and why it should be ignored?

I meant in the point of my post. I'm not on about the infractions themselves, if being honest i doubt a whole lot of fines would have been dished out as most from that area would be respectable and law abiding. According to my friend the impression the gardai gave was they came in and checked everything and anything on cars clearly looking for fines and filling qoutas. It seemed that was their main aim, didn't care about the house invaded by scumbags .The locals felt no sense of added protection when they were there. No but you are right, my apologies for my silly posts i'll delete them because i too wouldn't like to share roads with A car with it's tax up a week.