New rumble strips installed in ‘hot spot’ area as Las Vegas officials try to curb illegal street racing

LAS VEGAS, Nev. (FOX5) - It has been nearly a year since the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department announced a new task force to crack down on reckless drivers here in the valley including illegal street racers.

It has been a problem we’ve seen countless times in our area. Metro teamed up with Clark County commissioners and NDOT to battle the issue. The solution is the first of its kind in the state.

Metro has deemed the intersection of US 93 and Grand Valley Parkway as a hot spot for illegal street racing and now rumble strips have been implemented by NDOT.

Essentially, what they do is force cars to slow down and create an uncomfortable drive.

“It is a growing trend that has to be stopped,” said a Metro police officer.

Tire marks from trick driving, trash and glass bottles can be seen at the US 93 and Grand Valley Parkway intersection from the illegal acts.

“And it’s all for social media,” said LVMPD traffic intervention officer Mike Thiele. “How many followers they have and how much their tires can smoke.”

LVMPD, NDOT, and Clark County officials partnering to combat illegal street racing by implementing the rumble strips.

“Came up with a design based on how much radius it would take for a car to spin at a high rate of speed,” said Engineer for NDOT Mario Gomez.

“It is going to do some major damage to the tread of their tires,” said a Metro officer. “It is going to reduce and hopefully deter these racers from coming out here and doing this.”

The effort to do this also came after truck drivers working for a nearby oil company said they were being harassed.

“Stopped transporting fuel from here because our drivers were scared,” said chief legal officer for Rebel oil company Maryls McGrew. “There were reports of people jumping on the vehicles and slashing tires.”

Since Metro’s RAID team was put into place a year ago it has made 170 arrests, issued 214 citations, towed 210 vehicles and recovered several firearms.

It is also working with the DMV to crack down on modified cars.

“These drivers will have to change or reverse those modifications on their vehicle before they can take them on the roadway again,” said a Metro officer.

Metro explained how they plan to determine if these rumble strips will be a success.

“The RAID detail will be monitoring this area, specifically to make sure they know we are not going to put up with this anymore,” said Thiele.

Metro said if the rumble strips prove to be a success, we could see more implemented in other hot spot areas across the county.

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