The end of hurricane season in South Florida always ushers in the other season that marks the local calendar: tourist season. For many in South Florida, such as hotel and restaurant owners, this is the busiest and most important time of year. But, for residents who are not directly involved in the hospitality industry, tourist season brings a lot of headaches.  One of the big issues for locals during tourist season is traffic tickets. People, who are not from the area, can often cause local residents to get traffic citations in Miami or Palm Beach traffic tickets. The reasons for this are many. It is not that tourists are necessarily bad drivers who cause accidents. Instead, tourists just are not familiar with driving in South Florida. They often come from rural areas that do not have the congested traffic that is familiar to residents. Tourists do not know where they are going. Sometimes that means that they drive too slow while looking for their turns. Sometimes it means that tourists take sudden turns because their GPS device is telling them to turn immediately whether or not it is safe to do so.

The upshot is that local residents have to be more careful driving during tourist season in South Florida. If a tourist turns suddenly and that causes a local resident to crash into the tourist, the Miami Dade officer is all too willing to give the local a Miami traffic citation for driving too close or inattentive driving. This is something that traffic ticket lawyers see all the time in South Florida.

Of course, even though you might be more likely to get a traffic ticket during tourist season that does not mean that how you handle the ticket should be treated any differently. You should be more careful around tourists and give them extra space on the road to avoid getting tickets, but that is not always possible. You cannot always tell who is a tourist and who is not. When traffic is heavy, it is impossible to give anyone any extra space. Traffic tickets are likely and no matter the reason that you got them or the time of year, you should fight the tickets. Not fighting traffic tickets leads to other problems. If you hit a tourist because of something the tourist did, you get a Miami traffic citation. You also might get an order to go to traffic school. You might get points against your driver’s license. Your auto insurance company might decide to raise your rates. If you forget about the ticket and do not pay it, your driver’s license will get suspended. Those are just a few of the problems that come with traffic tickets in South Florida. It is much better to fight the ticket.

Hiring a traffic ticket lawyer in Miami is the best way to fight the ticket. Let the attorney deal with the prosecutor and the courts. You might not even have to show up in court to get the ticket taken care of without driving school, points against your license, increased insurance rates or a suspended driver’s license. The next time you get a traffic citation in Miami, give our office a call for a free consultation whether your ticket was because of a tourist or for any other reason.