The Car Radar Detector Debate: To Legalize Or Not To Legalize

Outside of the United States, there has been a widespread ban on car radar detectors. However, this is not a new motion. In Canada and in many European countries, radar detectors have been illegal for some time now because of the fact that they would normally allow motorists to break the law until the mildly annoying beeping noise notified them of police presence.

In that case, the motorist would quickly slow down to the proper speed and nobody ever had to know that they had been driving 50 Kmph over the speed limit.

The radar detector would notify the motorist in plenty of time before the police caught them on their radar. It seemed like the perfect crime. However, radar detectors were soon outlawed. Some police organizations also fitted their radar with a detector that would detect... well... radar detectors.

In other words, they developed a radar-detector detector. For the most part, this made it nearly impossible to use one and get away with it. Now the word on the street is, why are radar detectors banned? What is so bad about them?

The counter-argument to those who advocate use of the radar detector is simple. The anti-radar detector group believed that motorists who use radar detectors pose a greater risk on the road than those who do not use them. At first glance, you may be inclined to agree with the anti-radar detector group simply because those using radar detectors would be more likely to drive faster, therefore increasing the risk of accident.

However, the 2001 Mori Report tells us that those drivers using a radar detector actually pose 28% less risk than those who do not use them. Interestingly, this may point to the fact that those drivers who drive at or under the speed limit pose as great of a risk of accident, if not more, than those who drive over the speed limit.

In Canada, the car radar detector is illegal in all provinces and territories except Alberta and Saskatchewan. It was legal in most provinces until the late 1980’s and early 1990’s.