Popping wheelies at walmart after business hours.

[Rob MacLennan]

Brian I agree. I posed the same question on another thread and honestly the answers never really made complete sense to me either. They were saying that well at a track you expect to be going fast, there are conditions made to enhance safety etc.... at the end of the day it is still dangerous driving.

Here is my opinion: To me common sense says-> if one were in a parking lot with people around that were innocent bystanders not involved in any way with what was going on, and someone did something that could potentially cause great deal of harm, THEN I CAN UNDERSTAND a criminal code charge.

Someone is in an empty parking lot.... WHO CARES?!!! Someone does a wheelie behind a warehouse with people who came there to watch wheelies.... WHO CARES?!

Give peeps a spot to legally stunt and that might very well cut down on all this nonsense. If one can sue the city for the stunt spot, I'm sure they could sue the city for something on the roadway as well. You might as well keep stunters away from Joe Public.

Sorry -> I know my way of thinking won't ever change anything, but anyhoo.... those be my thoughts.

The difference is that it's an organized, licensed, insured, and zoned area for the expressed purpose of holding races.

 

[turbodish]

So, on a roadracing course, where we routinely do things that would have a police officer throwing us in jail if those things were done on public roads, how is that not "dangerous driving"?

I am failing to see the difference between going very fast and dragging knees and occasionally lifting up a front wheel on a roadracing course while participating in a sanctioned roadracing event - or a track day, which is not a sanctioned event!, and going rather slowly with one wheel in the air a lot of the time on a stunt bike in a hypothetical location where such activity is hypothetically sanctioned (or not).

Explain.

The race track is a controlled environment with access restrictions to keep participants apart from non-participants. Very few race events allow just anyone off the street to participate and there are formal driver/rider licensing requirements to help ensure that all participants have some level of qualification to be out there. Even lapping days tend to split riders into groups by experience level, and observers are in place to ensure that a rider is not put into an inappropriate group for their skill level.

The same cannot be said of someone doing stunts in an ad-hoc uncontrolled-access parking lot, especially if it occurs in close proximity to spectators and with nothing to contain the stunters away from spectators if something goes wrong.

Had this guy done what he did on a controlled and closed course with proper barrier separation from the bystanders, he would not have faced dangerous driving charges.
[video=youtube;07VAFMROOoo]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07VAFMROOoo[/video]

 

[turbodish]

Give peeps a spot to legally stunt and that might very well cut down on all this nonsense. If one can sue the city for the stunt spot, I'm sure they could sue the city for something on the roadway as well. You might as well keep stunters away from Joe Public.

If the municipality simply turned a blind eye to it, then you could sue the city for allowing a potentially dangerous situation to continue unchallenged. The municipality saves itself from liability by having police actively enforce laws against dangerous operation of motor vehicles that puts others at risk.

 

[fastar1]

The race track is a controlled environment with access restrictions to keep participants apart from non-participants. Very few race events allow just anyone off the street to participate and there are formal driver/rider licensing requirements to help ensure that all participants have some level of qualification to be out there. Even lapping days tend to split riders into groups by experience level, and observers are in place to ensure that a rider is not put into an inappropriate group for their skill level.

The same cannot be said of someone doing stunts in an ad-hoc uncontrolled-access parking lot, especially if it occurs in close proximity to spectators and with nothing to contain the stunters away from spectators if something goes wrong.

Is that according to the law or your own interpretation of the way cops should make the distinction? Because I see no difference between an organised, blocked-off, restricted access, owner authorised lapping day and the equivalent stunt day. In fact the stunters were much more qualified to be stunting than some track riders are to be running laps. Yet, I have seen cops shut down a stunt day that was set up just this way.

I fear the reality is that any track day or even race day participant could be slapped with a Dangerous Driving charge on a whim, and the law would support it because it's basically idiotic.

 

[turbodish]

Is that according to the law or your own interpretation of the way cops should make the distinction? Because I see no difference between an organised, blocked-off, restricted access, owner authorised lapping day and the equivalent stunt day.

If a given stunt day is done in an owner-authorized, restricted-access venue with proper barrier separation between stunters and spectators, then there wouldn't be any basis for dangerous driving charges, would there? That assumes that the stunters are operating with due regard for the safety of others stunters on the pad with them.

That however is different from the matter of an individual doing so without taking those precautions.

Even driving on a closed circuit in sanctioned competition doesn't mean you can't cross the line into criminal territory. The line is drawn much higher because of the closed circuit and risk expectations inherent in racing, but it is still possible to cross it. It's just a whole lot harder to prove the difference between criminally reckless and simply making an incidental racing error.

I recall one bad crash many years ago between two cars on a race track during sanctioned racing where the police actually did consider the driving of the at-fault and surviving driver to be reckless enough (over and above the competitively aggressive driving ordinarily expected in racing) that they seriously considered laying dangerous driving charges. In the end they didn't, but it was on the table for a while.

 

[Metastable]

If the municipality simply turned a blind eye to it, then you could sue the city for allowing a potentially dangerous situation to continue unchallenged. The municipality saves itself from liability by having police actively enforce laws against dangerous operation of motor vehicles that puts others at risk.

What fastar1 writes is exactly what I am talking about. To my knowledge, there is NOTHING in the law that specifically states that if you have a "sanctioned event etc etc etc...." that you couldn't be dinged with a stunt driving charge.

Furthermore, what is preventing the city from being sued by a guy on a motorcycle blasting through traffic? What is preventing from someone saying.... "Oh those guys on bikes are always driving like crazy and you do nothing about it?" Sure the government could say they were trying to control the situation by enforcing tickets etc.... but if it is still happening regularly, then are they still open to liability. Similarly, if one is in a "controlled stunting area" can't the city say they are trying to make things safer on the roads by having a "stunt" spot.

Bottom line is that no matter what you (organizer, government etc) do there is really NOTHING one can do to prevent legal action. If a spectator is killed during a trackday, because a rider decided to do a kamikaze braking move, screwed up, took another bike out and a piece of debris hit a bystander off the track.... and killed the person. Well, what is there preventing legal action. What is preventing a cop from arresting someone for dangerous operation of a motor vehicle? Really? There is no law preventing legal action.

I hate laws, but there really should be a law that says something like:
Where outlined to be an area designated for a given activity (like......etc...etc...etc) any participant and/or individual in the designated area, can not commence legal action against any other participant, bystander, owner, operator etc.....with regards to the activities that area is designated for. I think that would help to clear out crap legal action.

 

[turbodish]

Think skating. If you try some of the more aggressive hockey moves while skating in an all-skate session, you'll quickly find yourself in jail. If you do it during a hockey game, you get more latitude because of the inherent nature of the game but you can still end up facing charges if you go too far.

Same applies on a race track. You can do on a race track that which you cannot do on the street, but there is still a line you must keep within.