Heres one why to identify that you are a true railfan for this lisence
They give you a TEST about railroads, not some simple test, but a test that tests your knowledge. And to be sure that you are the real deal, Photos that you take (With Negatives) and some little information about the photos. I admit, maybe the lisence should be free, I am just trying to make our lives a little easier.
Let the Manufacturers Railway Merge UP into their System…Then Armour Yellow/Harbor Mist Grey will become Green/Cream/Gold-copied fron BNSFKLINE
I like that quote-If anyone know how to run a railroad it’s Anheuser Busch
I would not use such a Card. Hunting license, fishing license, I agree with, since you are shooting animals and removing fish from the watershed, However, I am not going to carry an ID to apologize, or validate myself being a railfan any more than someone should need an ID to birdwatch, watch planes, or sit and watch Harleys drive by. If a Railfan ID were started, and I was automatically sent one, it would go straight to the trash. Its up to the powers that be, to educate themselves on Railfans, perhaps they need to subscribe to Railpace, or Trains to understand the hobby so they are not wasting their time, taxpayer money, harassing innocent railfans. I’ll be darned, if I have to carry an ID as a security blanket just to take pictures of trains. Dave Williams http://groups.yahoo.com/group/nsaltoonajohnstown
These threads are enough to try an active cop’s patience.
I’ve been a deputy for a little over two years. During that time, I’ve made arrests and issued citations “on public property”, and “on private property”, running into the dozens. During that time, I’ve also run into exactly two railfans, one birdwatcher, and a bunch of folks wandering around near an Army parachute drop zone (on private property) trying to take pictures of Junior defying death from sudden impacts with the ground.
I don’t need to subscribe to TRAINS, the Audubon Society, the Sierra Club, or the AIRBORNE journal to figure out when someone is doing something harmless, or when they are breaking the law. I do need to graduate from a police academy, take additional training each month, and undergo the supervision of my sergeant, lieutenant, chief of deputies and Sheriff. My arrests are also scrutinized by the same people as well as a District Attorney, judge, and sometimes, a jury. There are even folks from the local “media” and watch groups ranging from the NAACP to Amnesty International who pay very close attention to the activities of my department and me. I don’t worry about them as long as I do my job right. When I do screw up (it does happen- I’m human) I hear about it in ways that have a real impact on my paycheck, my marriage, and my life in general.
Each time I stop my patrol car to “hassle the public”, I’m doing it for a reason. Usually it’s because I’m responding to a call from a property owner or because someone sees, hears, or smells something suspicious. (An example of this was a call I got of a possible crystal meth lab in a neighborhood. Turned out the ammonia smell was from the fertilizer a farmer had just put down.)
Woe be unto the cop who dumps a call into the hopper because he/she “knows” it’s a dumb call.
I routinely pull up behind cars parked on the side of the road that don’t belong there. Because I’ve been shot at from cars like that, I will always call
Erik,
I think you may have misunderstood my posting…
In no way do I think cops are ***…but I do have severe doubts about the guys running Homeland Security…
I advise anyone approached by a officer to cooperate completly…every cop I have ever know dosnt “hassle” the average citizen.
They do, on the other hand, check out things that seem out of place, or dont add up in their experience, and most of the time their right.
I also advise anyone who dosnt possess an license to pratice law in their state to not quote “the law” to a cop…most cops forget more valid laws than the average citizen can dream up, and they do dream up some weird concepts of “law”…often confusing what they think is right with what is legal.
Last, if someone is going to complain about a cop, I said to do so through channels…gripping on a forum about the cop who hasseled you dosnt do a darn thing…and if your going to gripe through channels, be prepared to defend you gripe to close scrutiny.
Are there bad cops?
Sure, but there is also a lot more “bad” citizens than bad cops…and the checks and balances that do keep cops from abusing their power work most of the time.
I have met only one cop in my life time who became a cop for the “power” it gave him, and he didnt last at the job very long…the system works quite well to weed out bad cops, and its getting better every year.
The very fact that most cops deal with the scum of our society all day long, and then, when they do interact with the average citizen, when they have to issue a traffic citation or just answer a question, they always act in a manner that reflects well on their uniform and badge.
It has been my experience that most people who do gripe about what a cop did, or didnt do to them, is often just an attempt to justify being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and getting caught doing something they knew they shouldnt be doing.
LOL! When that happened to my great-grandma , lol, they flooded the basement, way more than 500 I must say! They need to be more conservative. [:0] LOL! good times…
I think that everyone needs to take one giant step back anr reevaluate what is going on here. The police are more vigilant than ever before and are looking for people who are doing wrong. Your intent might not to do anything wrong, but they don’t know that and the only they can find out is to ask. What you might think is public area may indeed be private property, or even in public areas you might be causing a hazard not only to yourself but to others. I have had several run in’s-all positive with law enforcement officials and it is generally cleared up with an explanation. Most people think that a short answer will give the man or woman the peace of mind they seek. I have an experience that comes to mind when I say this. One night as a dispatcher for the Indiana Rail Road I had just dropped a crew off at a local crossing, watched the train pass and crossed behind it to turn around. After turning around I crossed over the tracks without stopping at the stop sign. A few seconds later red and blue lights flashed and I was stopped. Officer approached my car and asked why I didn’t stop at the tracks, he said I could have been hit by a train. I said no sir, that’s impossible. You see I just dropped the crew off and the train just left. There are no more trains tonight. He shook his head, got back in his car and left.
As I said in an earlier post on this thread, I said, as long as you are courteous to the officer, and are within the law, you should be safe from being locked up. My point was with the way the Metra incident was handled…A simple conversation could have straightened it out. Being held for an hour, having a vehicle searched, being told that the Joint Terrorism task force will make the decision as to whether the railfans go free, or go into federal custody, being told that public photography of that nature is illegal, and future activity of that sort could result in arrest, this is what is wrong here…Obviously, someone high up is not up on the Railfan Hobby, and thinks that anyone taking pictures of passenger trains is to be considered as a possible threat. Dave Williams
I had a similar idea and found it met with all sorts of negative feedback along the lines of rights and previously tried it…didn’t work then won’t work now. My thought was that it could be accessed by, say the police agencies as they do when they run a license plate. It would be in a national registry as in the plate situation and your “I.D. card” would let the police know you were accepted by the railroads as a railfan allowing you to persue your hobby in relative peace. The ‘fee’ could go to the RR’s charity of choice or in a fund for disabled RR workers/families or to fund railfan sites as in Rochelle or some useful thing like that. We are governed by a whole lot more buracracy (sp?) than this in our lives and while I don’t like having more red tape or hoops to jump through it sure would save a lot of heartache with the police trying to explain why you are doing what you are doing, I think. But probably won’t happen, I suspect.