Should You Obey School Zone Laws When School Isn’t in Session?
Let me paint the picture as I'm sure most of us have gone through this before. You're driving somewhere and happen to be passing a school on a holiday or even during the summer for some reason and the timer is set for those lights to flash indicating to drop your speed to 20 miles an hour. But, there's no school that day so there are no kids around so maybe they just forgot to turn off the sign for that day off. Do you risk maintaining speed through the school zone figuring it was just a mistake on the school's part to keep those school zone lights active on the day off?
Should you obey school zone laws when school isn't even in session?
The short answer is absolutely.
The shorter answer is yep.
Even though there are no kids anywhere near those blocks or in the school and never mind if it happens to be a day off or anything like that, if those lights are flashing, they are law and if an officer happens to catch you you'll risk getting a speeding ticket if you're not driving that magical 20 miles an hour.
Just about the last thing you could possibly want is to stand up in a courtroom full of other people who got speeding tickets trying to fight them with whatever claims you happen to have. I've personally fought speeding ticket in the past and hearing the stores from everyone else, from testing new engine so they had to go 120mph to make sure it worked to people who didn't know you had to slow down to 60mph from the freeway before you pass that sign, the judge has heard it all before. In fact, the judge, at the beginning of fighting a ticket, literally said something to the effect of if anyone was there to fight a ticket in a construction or school zone, they already didn't win. Keep that in mind.
It doesn't matter if it's Christmas on a Sunday, if those school zone lights are flashing, drive 20mph.