Speed enforcement operation in Salinas

Motorcycle officers with the Salinas Police Department worked traffic enforcement along one of the city’s busiest roadways on Wednesday – North Main Street near the rodeo grounds.

The officers were working at the rodeo over the weekend and noticed drivers were flying through the area, despite there being cones all over the place.

They decided to come back and remind drivers about slowing down.

“Do you know what the speed limit is?” We asked Salinas driver Juvenal Quesada. He said he didn’t.

The posted speed limit on North Main Street between Bernal and Laurel is 35 miles per hour.

He wasn’t the only driver who apparently didn’t know that.

Quite a few drivers were stopped for speeding on Wednesday. Police say the fastest speed they clocked was 64 miles per hour.

“People going freeway speeds, 55, 60, 64 miles per hour,” said Salinas Police Officer Kevin Orepeza.

It’s easy to speed on that roadway. The six-lane roadway is wide and sometimes drivers can time the stoplights just right.

“Southbound people going towards 101, it kind of seems if they make the light at Laurel, they just keep picking up speed,” Orepeza said.

We even caught people jaywalking across the roadway, which is already notorious for deadly pedestrian and cyclist crashes.

The officers were stationed in a turn lane in front of the rodeo grounds using the LIDAR speed detection device. It looks like binoculars but it helps officers focus on one car at a time to clock their speeds, unlike radar guns.

While most people got warnings or tickets, some just shouldn’t have been behind the wheel.

“One driver was driving suspended, their license status was suspended, they had been served, they were aware of it,” Orepeza said. “When I stopped them, they handed me an ID card, which that’s kind of a clue there when they hand you an identification card and not a driver’s license and they wound up getting their car impounded.”

Another car was towed after it was discovered the driver hadn’t registered his car in over a year and didn’t have insurance.