SoCal is Looking to Crack Down on Street Takeovers
Street racing has been around forever, but street takeovers are bringing the spotlight back for lawmakers.
According to NBC Los Angeles, recent reports of street takeovers–the practice of closing down a street or intersection to “perform dangerous and reckless stunts”–in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles County is bringing about a reevaluation of the city’s laws by the L.A. City Council committee. City Councilman Mitchell Englander claims, “These events can not only cause damage to public and private property, but put the participants’ lives in danger, as well as spectators, law enforcement, and the general public.”
As usual, the suggestion is to increase penalties, fines, and the scope of the L.A.P.D. to squash illegal street racing, which is baffling because that approach hasn’t worked since drag racing started evolving around 70 years ago. The reality is that law enforcement simply does not have the resources for the existing laws to be enforced, therefore any new penalties and fines will still, largely, be unenforceable.
What actually decreased the amount of street racing was the advent of drag strips. Places where people could legally go and race and be safer about it. The street takeovers portrayed are a completely different thing though. If the media coverage is accurate and representative, then the problem is that, unlike street racers, these people aren’t car enthusiasts. As much as we love shredding tires, we don’t need the horrific injuries and we certainly don’t need the vultures preying on those possibilities. If cars are just something they all use to do something dangerous and illegal purely for the thrill of both, then offering a safer alternative isn’t going to work at all. We just hope that the idiots we see in the report don’t bring the kind of legislation that could ruin everybody else’s fun.
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