GPS service warns of possible speed traps, red light cameras
PhantomALERT lets you download data for your GPS to warn you up upcoming speed traps, and more.
PhantomALERT lets you download data for your GPS to warn you up upcoming speed traps, and more.
You’re behind the wheel of a family road trip when the kids start with the incessant "Are we there yet?" Your spouse has to go to the bathroom and you’re so hungry you could gnaw on your left arm. It’s no wonder you didn’t realize you were cruising a few clicks above the speed limit.
Instead of being slapped with a speeding ticket, imagine your GPS warning you of a speed trap about 900 yards up the freeway.
This is the concept behind the PhantomALERT, a new service for your existing GPS device that calculates your vehicle’s speed and alerts you when approaching a possible speed trap or red light camera with both audible and visual warnings.
This isn’t a radar detector –- rather, this site contains a downloadable database of more than 3,400 known fixed camera or radar sites in the U.S. and Canada, plus users can upload additional sites to keep it up-to-date; this information would then be imported into your GPS’s mapping software via its USB cord.
Supported by many GPS manufacturers such as Garmin, TomTom and Magellan (see site for specifics), PhantomALERT data can be downloaded and used for free up to one year, and then costs US $24.99 for an annual subscription thereafter (no commitment is necessary).
If you don’t already own a GPS unit, you can buy the PhantomALERT Road Safety System GPS navigation unit for US $199.99, which also includes 12 months of free updates.
On a related note, Trapster (not Napster) is another service that lets you report speed traps using your mobile phone or by calling a toll free number. The service warns of upcoming speed traps on mobile phones, PDAs, GPS navigation systems and laptops.
Filed Under: Portable Devices
It says "users can upload known sites as well". Whats to stop police from uploading false sites at every certain interval to make people stay slow? If you get my meaning.
Unless there is a filter to turn off user submitted spots, this would be all to bloody easy to make it ring every 30 seconds.
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"You're behind the wheel on a family road trip…cruising a few clicks above the speed limit".
That first paragraph says it all: no need for the GSP service.
At the present and prophesied future cost of a litre of
gas, the family road trip/Sunday drive/2 week holiday driving Route 66 (or any other route) is out of the question for most and certainly no one with any common sense is putting the 'pedal to the metal" anymore.
The GPS service just got crushed under the wheels of the
2008 gasoline consumer.
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Are our highways not already inundated with poor drivers and "speed-demons"? It seems as though you can't drive a block anymore without encountering careless motorists. So I must ask: Why the hell should more tools be created for the people who ignore traffic laws? Oh yes, let's make it easier for the "speed-demons" to get away with it…Why not, since it could be you or a loved one that one of these "freaks" kills next? Shouldn't we put more time and energy into making our roads safer?
There is a much more simple solution, if "speedy drivers" wish to avoid being ticketed…JUST SLOW DOWN and obey the traffic laws.
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I am one of those people who high beam others to warn them of a speed trap. Typically the traps are at the bottom of a hill, or where the speed limit changes from 60 to 50.
I understand that these fines go to the city, but it's still to me an underhanded way to catch speeders. But sometimes those I high beam still don't get it, and get caught in the trap anyways.
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