WTF was that policeman holding?
 

Just been driving in Leeds. 3 lane carriageway, all one direction, no housing, no risks, no fields, just Tetley's brewery next to it - 30mph zone, naturally :rolleyes:

Traffic was making good progress along the road.

Bloke in fluorescent yellow jacket with hat on is standing on pavement pointing thing at passing cars. it is small, handheld and black. It looks like a small video camera, or something of the sort.

He steps into the road behind me, and stops the car behind me (who was closing on me, despite me flashing brake lights - no helping some people). God only knows what happened then, but I can guess...

I've just wandered through UKSpeedtraps website, and nothing looks close to what this guy had!

Any ideas?

Cheers,
Nick.

Speed gun i can only assume...is a small handheld device which the nod point at cars, and it gives a speed reading on adisplay at the back...

Looks like a square hairdryer...

Unless it was a device for reading licence plates and seeing if they correspond to a valid tax disc. The bar code on tax discs is now scanned and sent straight to the DVLA database, so a quick check of the licence plate will tell if the car is taxed.

Just a guess . . . anybody know if they can do this yet?

not sure... quite possibly...

I should have been clearer - the thing was only about 4 inches deep, 4 inches high and an inch wide.

It's waaaay smaller than the speed guns that I've seen before, hence the interest!

Dunno then.... Maybe you should have stopped and asked him :D

Tempting as that suggestion is, I just put my foot down, opened the window and screamed "you'll never take me alive coppa!"

;) :D :) etc for the truly humour impaired ;)

Sounds similar to the device used by the community speedwatch OAPs around our way. Like a Box Brownie held at waist height and looked down at?

Sounds very like an ANPR detector. (Automated Number Plate Recognition)

As suggested above, the camera "reads" your number plate and immediately flashes up if there is a "marker" against that cars record on the PNC.

The cars tax may be expired, it may have been used in a crime, or the registered keeper may be wanted by the police for some reason.

I wouldn't expect it to be plate recognition. If you knew a car was dodgy, would you step in front of it? Normally with the 'tax dodger' type systems they'll have a support car/bikes down the road to pull people over.

Joolz