T H EY ’ R E FAST, W E ’ R E F U R I OUS How street racing and intersection takeovers became a neighborhood problem Story by CONNOR HENRY
YOU CA N H E A R I T F RO M M I L ES AWAY. Engines roaring, tires screeching and spewing clouds of smoke, spectators yelling and cheering. Sometimes fireworks and gunshots ring out when the crowd gets especially excited. Reports of street racing from the Dallas Police Department shot up to 8,441 in 2020, from 4,867 the previous year. 911 calls related to speeding and racing have increased every year since 2016. Metrics from the first part of 2021 show no signs of decreasing. “My No. 1 issue by far, and not even close to anything else, is street racing and police response to it,” District 14 City Councilman David Blewett says in a recent meeting. “I’ve been getting constituent complaints for upward of 12 months now.” Street racing and car stunts are by no means new phenomena, but last year, intersection takeovers, excessive speeding and extremely loud vehicles started to infiltrate downtown. People noticed the problem, and DPD patrols increased. Lane
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reductions at key intersections and temporary stop signs were implemented to calm traffic. “Curbing street racing in the c i ty b e c a m e a p r i o r i ty, a n d i t worked,” Councilman Chad West says. “But, since it worked, it got pushed to the neighborhoods.” DPD’s limited resources mean officers find it hard to keep up. Blewett says on any given weekend, there could be 1,000-2,000 racers in the city. Dallas has about 1,600 traffic signals, so there are plenty of potential takeover sites. Also hampering DPD is a strict policy on high-speed pursuit, revised in 2011 after it was determined that high-speed chases, often over misdemeanor offenses, result in increased injuries and deaths. Now, officers only engage in pursuit when they can identify a threat of physical force or violence. And, like almost every other aspect of life, COVID-19 has played a part. “The pandemic has greatly exacerbated this,” Blewett says. “It’s mostly younger people who are stuck at home, some not able to go
to work or school. They’re looking for fun and action and not having many options.” At times, crashes related to racing and drifting in intersections have resulted in property damage, injury and even death for participants and innocent bystanders. An off-duty police officer died in late 2019 after a racing-related crash near White Rock Lake. Incidents have residents stirred up. In April, neighbor Jeff Auvenshine was on his way home from grocery shopping when he found himself with a front-seat view of a takeover at the Skillman and Live Oak intersection. Within seconds, cars were spinning out in front of him. He posted videos on Twitter. “It was actually quite terrifying because some cars were getting a little too close for comfort. One wrong move and you’re done,” he says. “Anyone on the side of the road could have been hit or one of us in one of the cars.” As sirens got closer, spectators jumped into moving cars through the windows, he says. “It was quite the scene.”
