A West Vancouver Ferrari driver has had his luxury ride impounded and is facing a court date to explain himself after being clocked driving at more than 200 kilometres an hour over the Lions Gate Bridge.
A West Vancouver police officer at the north end of the bridge heard the high-pitched scream of the engine before the supercar roared into view over the crest of the bridge deck in the early hours of Tuesday morning, said Const. Jeff Palmer, spokesman for the West Vancouver Police Department.
The officer barely had time to whip out his speed gun and clock the vehicle at 210 km/h – over three times the posted speed limit - before pulling him over.
Luckily, at the time the driver decided to treat the bridge deck as a race track – around 12:40 a.m. Tuesday morning – there was no other traffic on the bridge, said Palmer.
The vehicle, a white 2015 Ferrari 458, was impounded for seven days under the province’s immediate roadside suspension program. Online resources put the price of that car at around $250,000.
Police also handed the 22-year-old West Vancouver driver a notice to appear in court in September on charges of excessive speeding and driving without due care and attention under the Motor Vehicle Act.
This was not the first encounter between the West Vancouver driver and police officer. The same officer stopped the same driver for excessive speeding in the same Ferrari on the Lions Gate Bridge in April, said Palmer. At that time he was clocked at 130 km/h in a 60 km/h zone.
Prior to this week’s incident, the driver had been handed three tickets for excessive speeding – defined as driving 40 km/h or more over the posted speed limit.
Palmer described the driver’s actions in the early hours of Tuesday morning as “incredibly dangerous.”
“You have no way of knowing whether there are other vehicles on the bridge deck ahead of you,” he said. “You have no time to react at those speeds.”
West Vancouver police have impounded 95 vehicles for excessive speed so far in 2017.
Palmer said that has included a range of vehicles. “People probably would think it’s going to just supercars,” he said, but added the list also includes motorcycles, “large pickup trucks and people travelling in mid-1990s Acuras. It’s a very broad range of vehicles.”
Highway 1 and the bridge deck are common spots for speeders, but they’ve also been clocked in residential areas and school zones, he said. “We’ve had a couple (of incidents) recently where people are going 100 to 110 km/h coming down Taylor Way,” he said. “It’s a concern.”
