7 Pennsylvania Speed Trap Towns Drivers Learn About the Hard Way

A routine drive can end with flashing lights in your mirror.

Pittsburgh-area TV news once tracked where tickets were most common for Pennsylvania drivers.

Here’s where drivers around Pittsburgh got caught.

Note: This is general information, not legal advice. Traffic laws, fines and enforcement rules are subject to change, so confirm the current requirements with the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT).

1. Harmar Township

A May 2010 report by Pittsburgh TV station WPXI ranked Route 28 in Harmar Township as the top speed trap in five counties, with 926 tickets for 2009.

The count used state data on every speeding ticket in Allegheny, Westmoreland, Beaver, Butler and Washington counties.

A follow-up in April 2011 put Route 28 near Harmar second, with 818 tickets for 2010.

Troopers handed out those tickets, so you’d have been dealing with State Police there, not the township’s police.

In the 2011 report, a state trooper in a plane timed cars between two white lines with a stopwatch and binoculars.

Troopers on the ground were positioned on the ramps, hidden from traffic.

On the day the station watched, troopers weren’t bothering with drivers unless they were more than 20 mph over the 55 mph limit.

A State Police lieutenant told the station the goal is to slow drivers down so traffic backing up doesn’t cause rear-end crashes.

2. Stowe Township

Second on WPXI’s May 2010 list, right behind Harmar’s Route 28, was McCoy Road in Stowe Township, with 844 tickets for 2009.

On the 2011 list, covering 2010, it had 347 tickets and ranked sixth.

An officer was hidden in a grove of trees along McCoy Road.

The township’s police chief said commissioners had asked him to correct a speeding problem there.

He also said his department gets only half of the fine.

3. Peters Township

Bebout Road in Peters Township, Washington County, ranked sixth on the May 2010 speed trap list, with 493 tickets for 2009.

Peters has a local police department, so its officers can’t use radar under Pennsylvania law.

A June 2022 Pittsburgh news report says the department uses stopwatches and other timing devices.

The chief supports House Bill 606, which would let municipal police use radar.

4. Moon Township

Interstate 376 in Moon Township took the top spot on WPXI’s April 2011 list, with 820 tickets for 2010.

That put it two tickets ahead of Route 28 in Harmar Township.

Moon Township had made the list a year earlier, too.

University Boulevard ranked fifth on the May 2010 list, with 529 tickets for 2009.

5. Neville Township

Neville Road in Neville Township ranked seventh on WPXI’s April 2011 speed trap list, with 318 tickets for 2010.

A May 2018 report called an intersection on Neville Island one of the top speed traps in the Pittsburgh area.

It counted 675 tickets over two years at Neville Road and First Street.

That report covered all the speeding tickets issued in the area over the previous two years.

6. Rostraver Township

In its July 1, 2010 report, WPXI called Route 51 in Rostraver Township the top speed trap in Westmoreland County, with 546 tickets.

The report didn’t say which year those tickets came from.

A 20-year-old waiting to turn left onto Darr Road died in 2002 when a construction van rear-ended his car, and investigators said the van was speeding.

Rostraver police, Perryopolis police and the State Police then combined resources to target speeders.

Investigators counted no fatal crashes there in the more than six years since the crackdown began.

The toll from 1997 to 2004 was 10 fatalities.

A May 2018 WPXI report counted 664 speeding tickets on Route 51 in Rostraver over the previous two years.

7. Mount Lebanon

Why did Gilkeson Road in Mount Lebanon draw 505 speeding tickets in 2010, fourth on WPXI’s April 2011 list?

A Mount Lebanon police lieutenant told the station that traffic complaints top the department’s list and that hard enforcement there means fewer accidents and injuries.

In 2021, a Pittsburgh news report said Mount Lebanon’s police chief sees current limits as a barrier to addressing speeding.

That story covered Senate Bill 419, which passed the Senate 49 to 1.

Radar Bills in Harrisburg

Speed radar for local police was still only a proposal in Harrisburg as of Sept. 10, 2026.

Land Line Media reported that day that Senate Bill 1237 was awaiting consideration in the Senate.

The bill would let municipal police use radar, but only full-time departments that operate around the clock, in clearly marked vehicles, in towns that first pass an ordinance approving it.

Under the bill, you couldn’t be ticketed unless you were at least 10 mph over the limit, or 5 mph over in a work zone.

Officers could issue only written warnings during the first 90 days of enforcement.

State Police troopers have been the only officers allowed to use radar since 1961.

The Pennsylvania Municipal League, which represents local governments, lists House Bill 1955 and Senate Bills 509, 542 and 1237 on its local radar page.

Pennsylvania is the only state that bars local police from using radar, Land Line says.

Pennsylvania Courts' Ticket Counts

The Administrative Office of Pennsylvania Courts has published two five-year counts of traffic summary violations, and speeding led both.

Its February 2024 release put the 2018 through 2022 total at more than 5.8 million, about 3,196 tickets a day.

Its June 2018 release put the 2013 through 2017 total at more than 6.9 million, about 3,796 tickets a day.