Traffic Division

Photo Enforcement
Traffic Mitigation Link & Neighborhood Traffic Audit Form
Transportation Development District (TDD) on Olive Blvd.

Making your community safer, they're out there every weekday. Traffic Safety Officers Chris Orr, Michael Vaclavik and Ron Garner, patrol Creve Coeur's busiest streets between 6 a.m. and 3 a.m.

To aid them in their mission to reduce traffic accidents, they ride Harley Davidson Electra Glides Motorcycles. While purchasing one motorcycle can cost up to $20,000, the Police Department is leasing them for a fraction of the cost in a special government lease program.

The police motorcycle has many benefits. Officer Orr explains, "Not only is the police motorcycle ideal for traffic enforcement it is an excellent public relations tool for the department. There’s never a time when I’m out riding that someone doesn’t ask me about the motorcycle." Officer Vaclavik adds, "Even if traffic is gridlocked on Olive or 270, we can get through and respond to a call in a timely manner."

They make riding look easy, but all motorcycle officers attended the St. Louis City Motorcycle Officer Training to learn maneuvering and pursuit driving. It's not without danger. Officer Orr says the most dangerous situations occur when motorists stop too quickly or pull over in the fast lane....yes, that actually happens.

Lt. William Funkhouser is commander of the COPPS unit (Community Oriented Policing and Problem Solving) of which Traffic Safety is a sub-unit. He notes that the motorcycle is just one component of the Traffic Safety Unit. These officers also have unmarked cars outfitted for speed detection. The Traffic Safety Unit is one part of the department’s commitment to traffic safety. The safety of the motoring public is enhanced through the “4 E’s”, engineering, education, enforcement, and emergency medical response.  Through data compilation and study, traffic counts and surveys; the department makes recommendation to the city, county and state traffic engineers in areas of roadway design, modification and control.
The Traffic Safety Unit regularly presents driver safety programs to our schools and other groups. The department issued over 9500 traffic citations in the past twelve months. While many have the notion that most citations issued by police are for speeding, less than 40% of the citations issued by Creve Coeur Police are for speeding violations. Officers target specific problem areas and look for the violations that contribute to those problems. The department responded to over 1500 traffic collisions in the last twelve months. In those collisions nearly 350 people were injured and one person was killed. The traffic safety officers are also state certified accident reconstructionists and are among 40 regional officers called out to reconstruct fatal or serious accidents in the St. Louis area. 
The Creve Coeur Police Department conducts an average of six sobriety checkpoints each year. These checkpoints allow the police department to advertise to the motoring public the dangers and consequences of drinking and driving. In the last twelve months, the department has made nearly 280 DWI arrests.

Traffic signal violations or running a red light is a growing problem in Creve Coeur and the country. Nationwide, red light violations are a leading cause of traffic collisions, associated with 900 deaths and 20,000 collisions at a cost of over $7 billion. The Police Department estimates that more than 2000 red light violations occur in Creve Coeur everyday. To help curb these violations, the City Council passed an ordinance supporting to allow automated photo enforcement of red light violations at signalized intersections. This photo enforcement is anticipated to be operational in the summer of 2007.
(Updated 3-15-07)