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Hi All,

Welp. I am driving home today about a 1/4 mile north of the Itasca, IL police department and I got pulled over.

The same style of police car patrols up and down some days. Officers in that style of car have passed by me approaching and passing on several occaisions while I have had the ASUS EEE PC computer running MYCANSCAN in the left front window. One pulled a youee next to me the other day, and it had two officers in it. Today, apparently, something was different. And the officer pulled me over. He wanted to know what it was, and I told him it was additional gauges for the car. I showed him where it reads out RPM, and battery state of charge, before he cut me off verbally in mid sentance. He asked me why I needed to know RPM "Was I towing" he asked. Oh boy. Pickemup truck owner - predjudicial judgement in play" I thought. I told him that the engine is more efficient at some RPM's. He then commented that the laptop was blocking my vision. I explained the blockage is about 2 feet in a small area.

He said he was going to ticket me for obstruction of windshield. He goes back to the car and does all the work. I get my license back, but he points to the the $75.00 fine. I tell him I will see you in court, sir. He explains that court costs are $200, and even if you win you still pay them. Well, that has not been my experience. The faulty party pays, at least in the old days. Besides, the Mycanscan setup is $600. So, he is telling me I can't use it and BTW, if you fight this you will be out $200, but in fact I will be out $600.

Then I ask him if he has ever pulled anybody over with a dashboard mounted GPS. "Those things block vision much more ". Oh, oh. He had not thought of that, and eats his lip hard. When we leave he follows me out of town.

Any recommendations how I should proceed? I drive in this area as its near my work. I have had State Troopers do the slow roll by and check things out on at least two occaisions and not get pulled over. The officer clearly had the right to pull me over when he saw a laptop on my dash board. I have no problem with that. But when it was obvious that it was running a car monitoring program, that should have been it. I believe this might be Anti-Prius motivated. But it could very well not be, as well. Clearly, the officer did not consider that dashboard mounted GPS units have not been declared illegal, and people have not been pulled over for them.

Clearly the amount of visual obstruction is less than if I had decided to buy an F150 Pickup truck. The letter of the law might be what it is, but the spirit in this situaion, as the Prius has such a sloping hood line, and high seating position is clearly on my side. Any jacked up pickup truck could be claimed to be similarly illegal, as the higher cab position blocks even more of the nearby road than a standard pickup truck. Hell, even a Chrysler 300, or a Dodge Charger (which the officer was driving) has less visibility near the car than my Prius with the EEE PC.

If it were me I would take it to court. I would bring up all the points you have made. I would also look into the law about having an obstruction in the windshield and the law about how your not allowed to have video display in the in view of the driver while in motion unless its displaying car specific information like RPM. If your ticket is for the obstruction then you might be out of luck unless you can make the point about the GPS navigation. It really depends on what the law says about these situations.

My CAN-View screen is down below the main MFD so as long as I dont get caught watching porn when I have the screen switch to my car computer the police have nothing to go on in my state.

Hi Force,

Welp, the EEEPC is a somewhat limited PC - 800 by 600 pixels. There are newer ones that have more resolution.

I considered mounting the EEE PC there. But I felt it was unsafe to always be glancing down. Traffic here is probably a little more intense than in Wheelersburg. One needs to keep one's eyes on the road.

I just noticed the officer mistated the position of the EEEPC on the ticket. He said it was in front of me. When it it was tight up against the left front A pillar. If its in front of me, it blocks the speedometer, etc. Although that is not an issue, as the MYCANSCAN also has a speedometer readout, I still want to see those built-in indicators.

ooooops.....

Well if the ticket is wrong then you my have a good case but the judge might interpret where you have your EEEPC as being "in front". I would have a picture of your setup ready to show the judge if you get that far. I would take a picture of your setup from your eye level so you can show the judge exactly what you see. Since a lawyer is a bit much for this case make sure you know the laws word for word and don't assume anything.

Important to make really sure the judge understands you weren't sending e-mail or surfing the web on the thing while driving. It just displays parameters of the car without any intervention on your part.

I see no reason why the ticket would be enforceable. If Nav screens and engine-management programs are fine and the drivers LoS wasn't obstructed, why would yours be?

Hi lightfoot,

Nope. In fact I drive two-handed. Always have. Gives better evasive maneuver control of the car, whether its power steered or not.

Besides, emailing would require a radio link. I do not have a cellular card or cell phone. I know, cellular phone products engineer, and does not even own a cell phone! And where I was pulled over is between a large field, back nine of a golf course. No wifi there.

The MYCANSCAN uses color ques to give approximate values of the indicators. In this way its safer than the SCANGAUGE. Because one does not need to actually read the number to know when the RPM crosses over 2000 RPM. If one is watching the road and notices the green to red change, that tells you your probably up above 2500 rpm. Safe. Its kinda based on "Encounters of the Third Kind" , one might say, without the music. Although the Zaurus version has sounds its makes.

In Illinois, they can ticket you for anything in the front window. Stuff hanging from the mirror, stickers, tint over about 6" from the roof books laying on the dash, etc. It is usually a means to pull over a car if something else is suspected.

This is an excerpt that I sent to the college my wife works for when they got a funky security sticker for everyone to apply to the front windshield.

(625 ILCS 5/12-503) (http://home.pcisys.net/~bpc/auto_law/tint/tint_il.html)

Sec. 12-503. Windshields must be unobstructed and equipped with
wipers.
(a) No person shall drive a motor vehicle with any sign, poster,
window application, reflective material, nonreflective material or
tinted film upon the front windshield, sidewings or side windows
immediately adjacent to each side of the driver.

That law would only apply to tint or sticker type material. You would need the law that applies to obstruction of the drivers view with video screens, gauges, and other objects. If those object are not specifically mentioned in the law book then the officer was wrong to give the ticket.

Also I'm not a lawyer. I just know what I have read about and seen on TV.

Hi All,

Well, you know if my town required a license sticker, as many towns do around here, the sticker might very well have blocked the view of the road more than the EEE PC. Instead my town has a gasoline tax.

Nope, I do not think anything else was suspected. This town has to pay for their three new Dodge Chargers and all the gas they use. They are very active during rush hour. Which is why allot of the speeding goes on at 7 in the morning. The only thing that will stop them is gas hitting $10 a gallon. And then they will either have to park or sell them. There are allot of hot rodding SUV and Minivan drivers through this town. Very unsafe sometimes. I see people do 50 down this street all the time where its 35 mph limit. Right in front of the police station.

That particular section that I posted pertained to stuff like stickers and tint. If you dig through the Illinois law near that section, it lists more items.

Hi All,

I believe this paragraph might apply.

(c) No person shall drive a motor vehicle with any objects placed
or suspended between the driver and the front windshield, rear window,
side wings or side windows immediately adjacent to each side of the
driver which materially obstructs the driver's view.

So the term "materially obstructs" was not violated. As I have commented on, other cars have less visibility than the obstruction caused by the EEE PC, without any modification. So, the obstruction caused by the EEE PC is not material then ? Comments ?

unfortunately you just became part of that cities budget. based on msirach post you will lose if you go to court. I've written hundreds of citations and this one isn't questionable based on the law. It sucks but small towns gotta pay for those new shiny chargers if not they will have a LT. wanting to know what they did all day. Get a ram mount for that laptop and not worry about getting cited again.

Hi All,

Ok, "materially obstructs" is not a legal term in legal dictionaries, but is common in law.

So we are left with dictionary definitions:

American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This ma·te·ri·al·ly (mə-tîr'ē-ə-lē) Pronunciation Key
adv.
With regard to the physical world.
With regard to matter as distinguished from form.
To a significant extent or degree; substantially.

So #3 is what we are talking about.

As other cars have less visibility of the road than my Prius with the EEE PC in place. And those vehicles can be operated safely. It seems that the obstruction caused by the EEE PC is not material (to a significant extent, degree, or sustantially).

Hi Glider,

That is a good idea. The officer mentioned he has his computer mounted down. I replied, "Yes, I know". I worked on police vehicle computer systems (early ones back in the late 80's).

That might have gotten us off on the wrong foot.

We did trials on computer screen colors for the most readability. The company I worked for got a custom plasma panel color for the best performance. I also remember the local cops (as in 20 miles from Itasca) almost driving into stuff, while trying to read the computer from another company. Until they were instructed to only use them while parked. And this was another reason I put the EEE PC up on the dashboard.

Just my $.02. I noticed you said in one post that it is on the passenger side, and on another post you said the left side of the car. Please note that the passenger side would be the right side, right? Wouldn't want to add any confusion in front of the judge on a point like that.

Just my $.02. I noticed you said in one post that it is on the passenger side, and on another post you said the left side of the car. Please note that the passenger side would be the right side, right? Wouldn't want to add any confusion in front of the judge on a point like that.


Hmm. Can you point out where? I cannot find it. The posts are numbered.

But your very right. In a court of law you make a first impression very fast. And traffic courts run at warp speed, so the impression is doubly fast. This is something I am not good at, and will consider before I take it to court.

My uncle was a lawyer. One advantage is if the court is run really really fast, the judge just takes facts and regurgitates law, law he knows by heart. There is rarely any discussion after both sides present their cases. There is no getting to know anybody, except the officers and states attournies.

Take pictures of just how "materially" your sightline is blocked.
It sounds like your EEE doesn't take up much more than my retro
gauge panel, which sticks up maybe a half-inch visible and really,
just comes flush with the wipers at my head height. Point out
what hazards could or could not be in the "obstructed" space and
determine whether they're relevant at normal traffic speed or if
something was already that close, you would have hit it already.
.
Fight this one tooth and nail, because someone has to make the
distinction between applications that help people drive better
versus the idiots that try to watch porn on DVD as they're driving.
.
_H*

If allowed for traffic tickets, you could try the trial by jury route. But I think a lot of states no longer allow this for most traffic tickets.

However I imagine the costs would be even worse, and the judge would rule against a lot of your motions.

donee, I'm guessing you got pinched on Prospect Road? I travel daily through EGV, Itasca, Bensenville... guess I'm going to have to keep a weather eye for the Itasca cruisers more than for any of the others.

First, never tell a cop "see you in court" - this means they will take notes and prepare to tell the judge how horribly obstructed your view was. Second, never, EVER talk to cops, PERIOD. But don't take my word for it:

Why You Should Never Talk to the Police (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8z7NC5sgik)

Dixonge, that was highly informative -- thank you for posting it!

Hi Slowhands,

Yep, that is the place.

Hi Catgic,

Well. we will see. I think right now a BOYCOTT_ITASCA_BUISNESSES.COM might be called for. If the goal is to immorrally through the police department legally steal money, then the sales tax they recieve from buisnesses within their city limits needs to be similarily reduced. There are many illegal drivers in Itasca. Many not from Itasca.

When I drove through Itasca, before I had the MYCANSCAN there was this large SUV that came from south of Irving Park, and pulled into the police department about 6:45 am. It was driven impecably, I might add. Could there be a rogue predjuditial element in that department? Could they have read all this malarky put out by anti-Prius commentors? This is the kinda thing that gets out of control, of course, as the Petersen case in Bollingbrook points out. With the MYCANSCAN I am able to get better mileage on the highway. Without the MYCANSCAN I might be pulsing and gliding back through the residential streets of Itasca.

But, I doubt it. This officer seemed sorta young. I think his mistake was to not sit in my driver's seat and see that what he is accusing of me is obvious false. His comment was I knew you had blocked vision when he saw the computer on the dash board. Well, any first year college physics student can come up with a scenario where that is not true. The problem is he did could not know if I had block vision from that observation, or if any blocked vision was material tot he safe operation of the car. All cars have blocked vision by their very design.

Still, such uncorrected actions by a police department needs some kinda response. At least, that is what they taught us the founding of this country was all about.

Actually, I can kind of understand why you got a ticket. If you are going to have a laptop, you need some sort of mount like this one:

http://www.cybertrucker.com/

(something to think about when being tailgated by a semi.)

Actually, I can kind of understand why you got a ticket. If you are going to have a laptop, you need some sort of mount like this one:

http://www.cybertrucker.com/

(something to think about when being tailgated by a semi.)

The problem with this is airbags. The side impact airbag that comes out of the A pilar would impale the EEE PC into my head. Where the EEE PC is when I was pulled over, it would be trapped by the side impact airbag towards the windscreen.

It appears to make the situation legal, as the law limits the placement of the object in front of the steering wheel. With this device one could position the EEE PC to the left, and behind the steering wheel. It would also make steering problematic. The constant refocusing to look at the nearby PC, to the far away traffic would severly impact my 3D perception response time as well. With the PC against the glass of the windscreen, there is very little refocusing, as the screen is about 3 foot from my eyes. This is the design concept of the Prius instrument panel, repeated. As I previously noted, the color change nature of the MYCANSCAN allows one to not even have to focus on it to get visual clues to the Prius operating condition.

BTW these were the type of laptop mounts that caused a few accidents in my home town's police departement, I alluded to above.

Gershon, take a look at the bottom third of http://www.vassfamily.net/ToyotaPrius/CAN/cindex.html . This is what the MYCANSCAN looks like in use.

At one time people were ticketed for having rear view mirrors. Now rear view mirrors are required by law. To get cars cheaper, I think in 20 years, there will be a laptop suppled with the car that displays the instruments, has music capabilities, has GPS capabilities, and you will just drop it into a hole in front of the steering wheel. This will be cheaper than what is provided by cars now, and have greater functionality. The only custom thing will be a keyboard overlay. We are already talking about making fuel economy indicators mandatory. The only way a manufacturer could keep up with such changes is a programable dash panel.

does the screen block any vision out of your windshield? Any part of the roadway not visible?

Hi ...glider,

The screen blocks about 2 feet along the side of the car, about 1 foot away from the car. This is a guestimate. I will probably need to put a bunch of chalk lines on the ground and take a picture to be sure. Forward of the front of the car there is no blockage.

As the Prius has a sloping hood, one cannot see the Prius hood from the drivers position. The front edge of the dash obstructs the vision. In a traditional car, the long horizontal hood would obstruct the vision. I believe that the traditional car , such as an Impala, would have less veiw of the road due to the long hood.

Waldo? Heck Lawtey is worse, and Starke is not far behind.
Those three towns are the worst on 301 through Florida.

The only time my Valentine One is needed when I drive to Florida.

Hi All,

I did some mapping out of the vision blockage due to the EEE PC, A Pilar, and dashboard, from my seated position. Unfortunately, I cannot figure out how to post the picture on here, without posting it somewhere else first.

I laid out a 13 foot wide lane, in a parking lot. I centered my 7 foot wide (mirror tip to mirror tip) vehicle within the lane. Then I used blue tape to mark out the blockage.

Within the 7 foot wide path of the vehicle, there is a 6 inch wide by few feet long blockage to the left eye, only. To my total vision, there is no blockage in the path of the car, but the dashboard.

For my total vision the blockage within the lane is a triangle formed by the lane edge, and a point just less than 3 feet in from the lane edge starting at 13 feet and extending to the edge of the lane at 27 feet.

To get some idea how this is in real life, 30 mph is 44 feet per second. 40 mph ( the speed limit where I was pulled) over is 58.7 feet per second. 3/4 s of a second was what I was taught is human eye to action reaction time. At 40 mph, the car will travel 44 feet in 3/4's of a second. Any intrusion into blind spot, could not be reacted too before the car was 31 feet past the nearest extent of the blind spot at 40 mph, and 20 feet past at 30 mph.

Additionally, these points are the blind spot on the ground. Anything taller than zero height would have less of blind spot.

Hi All,

Here is the image:
http://www.cleanmpg.com/photos/showfull.php?photo=8319

Donee, use the gallery link in the green menu bar to the left to upload your photo to our gallery. Once you have done that you can embed the image in your post.

If i were you and you go to court and explain this never say there is a vision blockage or its over and you lose.

The judge will probably not even want to hear about any of this. I would just show him a picture of your dash and explain very briefly what your doing and leave it at that. If the judge sees its not a big deal your out of there. Good luck post updates on the outcome.

I've been down that selfsame 301 through those towns with my
big ol' retro panel, GPS, proto-boards, and wires strewn all
over the dash and never even *saw* any cops let alone get sniffed
by them. That's not to say it would never happen.
.
A camera view from where your EYES normally are in the car would
be more useful than a shot along the roofline. Set up the camera
and get it rough-aimed, jog your head to the side and move the
camera back to between where your eyes just were, and fire away.
.
If the towns want more revenue, why don't they just pick off
the left-lane high-speed conga lines and charge them all with
reckless endangerment? Plenty of that goin' on even on 301,
no need to go all the way out to the interstates. Sorry, gunnin'
for Priuses sounds pretty weak to me, whether they're modded or not.
Florida has plenty of them. One could only hope that the police
department in question is thinking of getting hybrids for patrol
cars and are interested in the features and ergonomics?
.
_H*

Hi Catgic,

The court date is set, and I am still preparing my defense. The issue is how to communicate to the judge in a concise , quick manner that the blockage is not material (signficant or substantial). This is a difficult thing to do as, the picture I posted and the response to it demonstrates. Specifically, the ground mapped blockage does not demonstrate the practical blockage to things that are up above the ground. Which is much smaller. And as its OK to drive over worms, the picture does not demonstrate the lack of a material nature to the blockage. The size of the ground blockage looks large, but the blockage to actual other things on or aside the road is tiny. If the judge has not had any 3D drawing background (likely), he/she might infer the ground blockage is the same as the for practically tall objects.

I am working on a way to demonstrate the true practical nature of having the EEE PC on the dash board however, and wont say anything more at this time

One thing about the Prius is the forward A-pillar. What one would usually need the forward edge of the A pillar to see in a usual car (where my EEE PC was), cannot be seen in a Prius because of the A-pillar is further in front of the driver. One has to look around the left of the A-pillar. For example, in making a left turn, the blockage of the A pillar is towards the corner. The roadway , down road, and across road are on either side of the A pillar. So, one has to look around the A Pilar to see where one is guiding the car. This might be why I got pulled over. The officer thought I was looking around the EEE PC.

What probably drew the officer's attention to me, was the defensive driving I needed to do to avoid putting myself in a position that the driver in front of me might have hit me. That driver straddled the lane divider as he entered the south bound lanes from the west bound lanes (changed lanes in a turn). I had been alerted by his/her previous driving actions, to be careful behind him. And the sharp edged geometric pattern I drove to stay behind him/her was probably construed as clumbsy sight limited driving.

You will need to prove your vision wasn't blocked based on that law. Every thing you say needs to prove that point.
Praise the officer for trying to improve public safety...attack the interpretation of the law from that officer. "My vision wasn't blocked based on _____________"

Good luck.

Hi All,

I am an inocent driver !

CONGRATULATIONS!

Can you give any details?

Congrats! I hope you give us details to the outcome.

Hi Force,

I will put more on in the near future. But, EEE PC is not free and clear. The judge apparently did not want to set precedent I guess. But, as I said early on, the officer made a mistake. He did not evaluate vision blockage at all. Only assumed there was blockage, and that any blockage is illegal. Which its not. The judge ruled in my favor as I was getting the evidence out that showed the calibrated camera shots from my eye position, after making the first point regarding the officer not evaluating vision blockage. He never looked at them though, except for the one with me and the tape measure next to my head, sitting in the car.

The officer was still cocky. So, I will need to watch out. I offered to show him my pictures afterward, but he walked away with a comment that it was over and I had won blah blah. Not a good looser, not interested in justice. As I said before the dangerous driving in Itasca is a problem. He is proabably a little jaded, consequently.

The city atorney changed the statute of the charge just before the bench trial, but he changed it to the one I had prepared for. Somewhere on that ticket, the statute was indicated. I never noticed it, and just perpared for what seemed most probable based on the wording. Luckily, I had prepared for what they brought to the judge.

Hi Again,

An odd thing happened one friday I was out for Pizza with people from work. When I came out of the pizza place, there was a silver Prius parked next to mine with a big GPS receiver - guess where - right where I had my EEE PC. Later on I was out for a walk and saw a Taxi mini-van go buy with a similar big GPS - guess where - right where I had my EEE PC.

So, I looked up GPS's and found the Garmin 7200 and 7500. These have the same size screen as the Surf2G EEE PC I use - 7 inches. I mentioned that at the trial.

Donee, glad you were able to convince the court of your 'not guilty' condition :D So far, no one has pulled me over for the SG on top of the dash... but it is only about an inch or so high.

Hi Slowhands,

That is the thing. From the outside of the car it looks like the screen is very high. But from my head height (Prius has upright, Ford calls this "Command" seating), and as the screen cannot reach to front edge of the dashboard, because of the slope of the windshield, only 2/3's of the screen is above the dashboard vision limit. The city atorney tried to imply the whole height of the computer was vision blocking in the trial. But in fact its only about 4 inches - similar to many GPS units / mountings.

Consequently, there is no blockage to anything taller than about a 1 1/2 feet in the next lane over. Turn signals, brake lites, etc are all visible. And the edge of the screen is outside of the vision of the path of the car.

Think about it this way. Take your hand and hold it about nose high at full arms length. There is significant blokage of vision. Now bring your hand 1 foot away from your face at the same height - big change in vision blocakge. An observer from a distance of both hand positions cannot tell the distance of the hand from your face, and thus cannot estimate vision blockage. The officer did not realise he was observing an optical illusion.

The bigger visibility issue in the Prius is the side-impact air bag mounted into the upper 1/2 of the A-pillar. The Driver side A-pillar blokcs vision directly toward where a pedestrian would be on the far corner, when one is in a left turn lane. I learned early on to tilt left and right for safety, driving my Prius. In my Saturn SL2, my longer Torso put my eye level centered on the rear view mirror. Which blocked my vision significantly. In the Prius the rear view mirror lower edge is at my eye level.

Remember, the Prius has that long dashboard, with the lip torwards the driver.

The problem for me is how to get the screen to appear to be out of my vision from outside the car, even though it already is from the inside of the car.

I have shorter legs, and a longer torso. So, I fit the Prius seat just about perfectly (except for the lumbar support position). Its almost like they used me as the nominal sized driver for that car. Which is why its such a problem for other people with more average leg length/torso length. My eye position is 7 1/2 inches down from the cieling of the Prius. The top of the screen is lower than my chin.

Can we assume you didn't have to pay any court costs as the office said you would?

I'd either write a letter to that police department or go have a talk with someone in charge. Police saying that are pretty much blackmailing the public to have them not fight the charge. This would also be good stuff for the local new papers. An editorial on the whole incident could be just the kick in the pants the police department needs.

Hi Shiba,

Nope. I was waiting for that, but the clerk and judge disapeared so fast, I did not have a chance to ask. I was the only bench trial that day, and when they were done, off they went.

I am not going to push this into the local media. I do not need a vindictive attitude from the Itasca Police. As I said in the trial, texting drivers are a clear hazard. And the officer had every right to pull me over based on the possibity that is what I was doing with the computer.

Having a civilian tell the officer how he screwed up doing his job, and having a judge agree is probably enough embarsment. I would be embarrased too, if I was the officer. I am disappointed the officer did not avail himself to learn from me as much as he could have.

Hi All,

Ok. Here are two pictures. They were taken with a camera that was mounted on a home-made mono-pod that calibrated the lens height to 7 1/2 inches below the car ceiling. There was a blue piece of tape on the ceiling straight up from the left side of my head, and the home made monopod offsets about half a head width, putting the lens position right between might eyes.

http://www.cleanmpg.com/photos/showphoto.php/photo/8991/cat/500/ppuser/510
http://www.cleanmpg.com/photos/showphoto.php/photo/8992/cat/500/ppuser/510

The camera has a little less than half the angle field of my view. I can see from the passenger side A-Pillar through the field of view of the second picture, and over to the edge of the field of view of the first picture.

The first picture shows the A-Pillar issue. The second picture shows the clear view ahead.

Based on those pictures and my reading of the law, you are in violation of the law in question. Part of the road is, in fact, blocked.
I'm afraid that if the cop had actually properly inspected, documented and photographed the situation, you would have lost in court.
Is there any alternative mounting situation for this device? Further back? Different angle?

Hi Tom...,

Well, there has to be significance to any obstruction, not merely obstruction, according to the law in Illinois. Specifically, what significance do you see? Can you give me a scenario where the computer would make a difference to the outcome, that would effect others. Remember, I can tilt that computer down. GPS's are fix mounted.

While you might be right, the Judge would have been wrong, unless such a scenario could be absolutley supported.

There is a saftey hazard walking down the stairs in the morning, but its not illegal. Similarly, there is saftey hazard to driving car legally. There are no absolutes, and this is probably why the law was written how it was. To prevent people from being put away for negligent homicide, simply because they put a piece of paper flat on their dashboard, when a bicycle rider decided to ignored a stop light.

Take a pickup truck with a long hood (Dodge Ram, F150), they can be operated safely with less view of the road that I have. They are legal to do so. If we were to take my computer as illegal, is it then not possible for pickup trucks to be legally safe? If a 3 foot tall person walks in front of a F150, that person would not be visible to me in the driver seat of the F150. That is not the case with my vehicle, at any location, except behind the driver's A-pillar, or outside of my periferal vision. At some point common sense has to kick in.

As you can see in the pictures, the hood of the Prius does not interfere withthe view from the driver's seat.

Further back is a saftey hazard due to the air bag locations. That was stated previously.

Placing the computer to the right would block vision along the pedestrian side of the road, as it would not be as close to me, and cause blockage well down the road, which clearly a greater hazard. And anybody who is putting one of those, even small, GPS's in the center of the dash , or to the right, is taking a grave risk if it sticks up above the dash board. BTW, California recentely amended their laws to permit GPS's, guess where, right where I put my computer, and in a useless to the driver opposite extreme (passenger side A-Pillar corner).

Placing the computer in the mid level dash takes one eyes off the road. My liftetime experience, indicates that not even highly trained police officers are competent in handing that location. Did you read the part where I was an engineer on a team that put some of the first Police computers in cars ? Tachometers, temperature guages, etc, are placed in front of the driver in cars that have them. The dash is rased to accomadate these, actually. I do not like the scan gauge because one has to read the numbers. There is no dial, or color change with parameter. This takes concentration off the road.


One thing I have noticed allot since being ticketed is the tremendous amount of stuff people have up there. I have seen a silver aluminum closing clipboard - these things are 1 1/2 inches thick, and with the oblique position on the dashboard, can extend much farther up. One guy in a work van who tailgated me the other day had 3 by 5 post-it notes arrayed in front of him stuck all along the top of the dash panel - the 3 inch direction widthwise and the 5 inch direction vertical. There must have been 15 of them. They were stuck along his dash board where it was elevated to create a shaddow for the instruments and over to mid dash. I notice these Radar Detectors below rear view mirrors - rear view mirrors that are clearly a vision blockage hazard themselves, and with the radar detector, even more so. I notice center mounted GPS units. There are also these secondary rear view mirrors that hang down below the main rear view mirror (curved ones), which blocks the pedestrian side of the roadway, yet allows for quicker maneuver in traffic.


My recent idea of what to do to improve this is is to get a Fresnel lens and cut it such that the Computer screen can be tilted so that the line of sight over the top of the screen is flush with the dashboard, and the full height of the screen is projected towards my face with the lens. While the program could be modified for tilted viewing, the LCD Panel does not illuminate well off-angle. Another solution would be to modify the PC so the display is mounted reversed (lid closed, display out). Thus the display could be shifted 5 inches closer to the driver, and the top of it would not be lower, but the view over the top would be closer in line with many drivers line of sight to the dashboard.

The officer was motivated partially by his specific knowledge of the what an ASUS computer is, and the non-grey/black color of my computer (like GPS's) made it stand out. He recongnised it as such, and I believe all sorts of things went through his head, as to what I was doing with it, BUT, what I actually was using it for. And I think this is the real lynch-mod phsycosis out there. Its just a dash board people. Nothing more. Its not a video game. Dash boards in cars in the near future are just going to be computer displays and already are in Aircraft. Take a look at what the Ford Fusion Hybrid is going to have in it as posted CleanMPG here.

I caught that you're an engineer.
My observation was solely based on my personal presumption that if I wish to avoid static with law enforcement, I will assume the absolute most overzealous cop possible and work backwards from there.

My personal approach would be to find out the chief DA's beliefs on this matter and run with those... if the DA's office has an 'official' opinion on things, it doesn't matter which cop/sheriff/patrolman decides to ticket you, because they're all going to be dependent on the DA to prosecute.
Preferably, I'd get the answer in writing, and then put the letter in my glove box.

I've got a similar issue; it appears Ohio state law may forbid even a Scangauge or GPS that DOES NOT obstruct any glass.

congrats,
Glad the justice system worked for you.
:)

Have you gone to the pre-trial hearing yet? Sometimes you can get it dropped there if you know what you're doing. I can PM you details.

Hi PookieSoup,

THe case has already been decided in my favor. Read further back.

Ah...... I must have skipped page 5. My vision was blocked. :D

Ah, you must have one of those unadjustable rear view mirrors (like the rest of us).

Actually, I just got a racing mirror. I love it.

What I probably need is a seat booster. I'm short so I don't have a great view over the dash and out the back.

he should have never wrote the ticket in the first place. his corporal should have pointed that out when he saw it.