New FIU stop signs seen from mid-roundabout (click photo to enlarge)
If a proposed regulation meets the approval of the Board of Trustees in their upcoming March 14, 2012 committee meeting, FIU will place new stop signs throughout the university in the hopes of raising funds through increased traffic fines.
Citing severe state budget cuts as the catalyst, the General Counsel’s Lupina Alfonso asserts that the new plan will raise two-hundred thousand dollars a month in frivolous traffic violations and subsequent fees.
Among the changes, expect to see new stop signs away from intersections, and even back to back. “Some people might observe the first sign in the middle of the road, but most will surely fly through the second one just six feet away,” hopes Liane Martinez, Associate Vice President of Business and Finance.
New stop signs will spring up in the middle of the rotaries and nailed to some palm trees. A pilot program at BBC last month cleared all the wildlife off adjacent Oleta River State Park due to incessant tire screeching. “That is a small price to pay for the safety of our students and of our jobs,” opined the Vice President.
The plan also calls for video cameras at the “most egregiously violated sites” as a way to better enforce the new traffic laws. “We are excited about this innovative use of technology, which will certainly make our lives easier,” reads an official statement from the Parking and Transportation department.
To make sure the driving population stays alert, some of the stop signs will be triangular, round, or trapezoidal; and some will be FIU blue and gold, instead of the traditional red octagon mandated by federal law. The idea, Ms. Martinez insists, is not to catch faculty and students off-guard, but to promote school spirit and university identity.
The money raised through the proposed regulation will be used to pay for the maintenance of several mission-critical, safety-related elements of the various campuses, such as the new stop signs and closed-circuit video equipment and traffic ticket printing presses.
The regulation currently under review will allocate future funds for a new automatic payment transponder system similar to that of Florida’s Turnpike also known as Sunpass. The transponders will tentatively go on sale at the FIU Bookstores for a nominal fee, and will make paying traffic violations a simple and speedy process.
Drive Easy, Speed-Free Campus
FIU drivers will be happy to know that a measure was struck down which would have allowed for motion-sensitive, spring-loaded stop signs that crop out of the asphalt just as cars pass by them, because they proved to be hazardous to cyclists and pedestrians.
If passed, the new traffic laws will take effect starting next semester. Various banners promoting the regulation have already been installed at several high-profile locations around FIU with large letters that read “Drive easy. Speed-free campus.”
