Lights! Sirens! Action!

As I was leaving my home to run some errands today, I saw something which, unfortunately, has become pretty commonplace. A police car going up my one way street the wrong way. Of course that's something you deal with living on a one way street, but normally it's civilians. Those are always the times when my wife and I lament "where's a cop when you need one?" Not one minute down the street I saw a horrific crash! A Milwaukee police car that wiped out entering the freeway (41 North) from the Wisconsin Avenue on ramp. My first thought was "WOW, that looks bad, I hope whoever was in there is alright". The cruiser looked like an opened and discarded sardine can and the guardrail it obviously struck not much better. My second thought was of how disrespectfully police drive their vehicles now. Going the wrong way up my street is lazy. Police shuttle back and fourth from the old District station on Vliet to the new North Avenue Communications Center constantly. Instead of going one block over to the two way, or one block over to the other one way, they live by the law of physics. "The shortest distance between two points is a straight line". Damn the torpedoes if that happens to be a one way street, or for that matter if I go 60 MPH through the residential neighborhood filled with pedestrians and kids. I can't pass judgement on the accident victim from today, but I'd say speed certainly played a factor. The frequent trips up and down our street are usually seen as a good thing. "Nice to have some police presence" my neighbor will say. "At least their visibility level is high" my wife will chime in. Personally, I'd be shocked if they could get a license plate number or description at the speeds they travel. Many homes in our neighborhood sport yard signs pleading with passing motorists to "slow down, children at play". Do they make those signs for the cops? "Slow down, children at play, criminals at bay, crimes under way". Probably not.