Complaint Review: Pedersen Construction - New Liskeard Ontario

Legal Disclaimer

What you are about to read are my opinions only. These are guaranteed under my Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Specifically section 2 which states that I am allowed "b) freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication;".

These opinions are not statements of fact and should not be interpreted or viewed as such. These are merely my opinions and these opinions are not falsifiable. In other words a person cannot say to me, "Your opinion is wrong and/or false". Forming an opinion of something is not making a statement of fact. An opinion is whatever you believe it to be.

This story is presented without any malice, and is made from a neutral viewpoint. From a legal stand-point, this blogs follows the "truth" and "fair comment" defence.


On a nice summer day in August of 2010, I was traveling highway 11 South, returning from a wonderful day of site seeing in towns such as Cochrane, Temagami and New Liskeard.

At 1:54 PM, two hours outside of my highway 64 exit, my attention was drawn to my side view mirror as I noticed a yellow Ford F150 truck was entering the oncoming traffic lane. It blew past me at a great rate of speed. "What the hell is his hurry?", I thought to myself. People had passed me all day but this vehicle was the fastest yet.

Over the next 30 minutes or so, I observed this yellow truck passing many more vehicles on the road by entering the oncoming lane. When there were no vehicles in front of it, at times, the F150 would move further and further away from me. I was doing approximately 110 km/h in a 90 km zone and still not always keeping pace to this truck.

I would catch up to this truck from time to time - at construction zone stops or when slower moving vehicles were in front of it. I wasn't always behind it of course, other vehicles would pass me and get between us.

It is my opinion that this truck was at times, doing approximately 120-130 km/h in a 90 zone (30-40 over the liimt) when no traffic was in front of it..How did I come to this opinion?

I timed the truck from the point that it reached an object such as a signpost or guardrail and counted "one one-thousand, two one-thousand" and then when I reached the same point also counted for myself.

This worked well while the truck was travelling along a bend but it was harder when travelling in a straight line as it was not always possible to see when exactly it reached the endpoint. Each time I used this method to count speed though, my count was roughly 1.5 longer than the truck. At 90 km/h, 1.5 * 90 = 135 km/h.

Now I could have also HYPOTHETICALLY (suppositional, uncertain) tried to catch up with the truck in order to take the photos that you see below. And while HYPOTHETICALLY trying to catch up to this truck my speedometer could have gone as high as 130 km/h and my GPS could have alerted me via an alarm that I was exceeding a speed limit that would bring me into a potential "stunt driving" charge. By doing so and finally matching the truck's speed, I could have basis to state that this truck was travelling at 130 km/h in a 90 km/h zone ($280 fine) in accordance with my speedometer and GPS. I cannot state this though because to do so would admit that I committed a Highway Traffic Act Offence.

The logo and company title on the truck indicated that it belonged to Pedersen Construction, based out of New Liskeard, Ontario. The company is reported to be run by brothers Alec, Dennis and Terry Pedersen.


Could I be mistaken?

My methods are not factual and certainly are open to debate as to their accuracy. My opinion is only that this large truck was moving well above the legal limit.

I am not a trained police officer, I cannot accurately determine a vehicle's rate of speed nor can I determine if someone is passing "safely". I can however state my opinion that there was frequent passing going on with this vehicle and based on my speed-testing methods, was at times in excess of 120 km/h and close to 130 km/h.

I did not observe any other vehicles passing as frequently as this one nor did I observe any other vehicles moving away from the 'pack'. We all pretty much maintained the same gap between us.

I mean come on, you KNOW when someone's being an idiot on the roads even if you can't measure it with a radar.

Passing

I did attempt to pass this truck to obtain a photo to show the company. This doesn't necessarily mean that I had to take my eyes off the road or my hands off the wheel. My camera can be set to take multiple shots sitting on my lap, is not considered a Hands Free Device and also has a remote that I can hold in my hand.

I could not pass the vehicle as I accelerated because it remained beside me. When I rapidly slowed down to enter back into my rightful lane, the truck was still beside me. It was only after the vehicle braked quite rapidly that I was able to enter in front of it.

I don't understand why the driver simply did not immediately slow down when he first saw me passing - you can see he was looking directly at my vehicle from this photo. I can tell you when I see someone attempting to pass me, I reduce my own speed.

This guy did not allow me to pass, and there was a transport truck approaching far down the road. I felt that he was trying to cause me to crash into the oncoming traffic.

I eventually stopped in a public area where the truck also followed me in. The driver got out of the truck and approached me. I asked him if he was aware that he could lose his vehicle for 7 days under the stunt driving laws if he had intentionally tried to block me from passing. I also explained that I thought his speeds appeared to be quite high.

The driver then said what about my almost hitting a transport. He didn't seem to understand that if he had slowed down and allowed me to pass, instead of block me in the oncoming lane, there would have been no almost hitting a transport.

I told the driver he was going way too fast (130 in a 90 zone) to which he replied, "Is that right?". He seemed oblivious to the fact he was dangerously close to losing his truck for stunt driving.

I drove away and continued my journey home.

Pedersen is based out of New Liskeard. You may see one or more of their vehicles on the highway. This website is to inform you about my opinions and how they came to be. It is also to serve as a public interest message in the event that you are driving along highway 11, and have occasion to form an opinion that one of their vehicles may be operating in an unsafe manner. In this case you should know that you are not alone in thinking this way.

You may contact the local OPP (*677 on some cell phones). You may also contact the company directly. It helps to have video, so if you have a camera you may want to document this. I now carry a dash camera which records speed, GPS map and video.

The company's address is:
Pedersen Construction
Bedard Road
New Liskeard, ON P0J 1P0


You will note that frequently throughout this blog, I use the terms "my opinion". This is for legal protection. I am not making any factual statements, only opinions. I do not want you to take my story as absolute truth - form your own opinions as to what you think occured and to the validity of what I am saying. Example: In my opinion this guy is an idiot and deserves to lose his truck. I'm not saying that he is an idiot, only that I think he is. Therefore you cannot say that I am making a factual statement.

I have given the company a link to this blog and I hope that they do speak to the driver about his 'speed'. I really don't think it will result in anything. I think that one of the brothers may have been the driver because all of the construction crews were waving to this guy.

If I see one of this company's vehicles on the highway again, for the sake of my family's safety, I will be pulling over and letting it pass. These type of people don't belong on the road.

Drive safe...