1. Speeding. This was on everyone's list, and the reason is simple. The faster you go, the longer it takes to react to an unexpected situation, whether it's a pedestrian stepping into the street or another car making an unexpected lane change. Braking distances also increase as speed builds, and it takes about 120 feet for a vehicle to stop when it's traveling 60 mph. Speeding is common in the San Fernando Valley, which has 230 square miles of mostly wide, straight streets. As recently as the early 2000s, the area attracted frequent street races that played like scenes out of The Fast & The Furious and its sequels. People are driving faster than they did in the past, particularly on the freeways in the busy area of south Los Angeles, notes Edward McElroy, a California Highway Patrol officer. "People seem impatient; their commutes are longer than ever before," McElroy says. CHP officers write tickets, particularly for speeding, in an attempt to control the "mileage death rate" — the number of people who die per freeway mile. That's a sobering thought. An opinion on how far over the speed limit a driver can go without being pulled over: 5-7 mph "easy," The officers for this story confirmed that there's a "buffer," but added that the decision to cut a speeder some slack is up to the officer's discretion. 2. Illegal cell phone use. Distracted driving, usually because of texting or talking on a mobile phone, is high on the list of ticket bait developed by our experts. Although just a few states ban all cell phone use in cars, more than 30 have banned texting behind the wheel. "People think, 'I'll just make a quick call,' or 'This text will only take a second!" Illegal cell phone use is common — and responsible for a lot of trouble. 3. Hazardous driving. This is a catch-all category for common violations that each of our experts noted. Wiles ticks off his favorites without hesitation: stop sign and stoplight violations, improper lane changes, illegal U-turns, failures to yield and unsafe speeds. People who apparently have forgotten they're driving cars: They're busy shaving, eating and even changing clothes. And what exactly is the violation you're committing when you're changing clothes in a car? "Unsafe speed," he says. "There is no safe speed for pulling a shirt off over your head while driving." 4. Equipment violations. Everyone knows the movie scene where a cop smashes a taillight to justify a traffic stop. But in real life, there's little need for that, our experts say. People commit a multitude of code violations all on their own. Leading the list are heavily tinted windows, burned-out headlights, broken windshields, expired tags, the lack of a front license plate (in California and some other states) and loud exhaust modifications. 5. Following too closely and improper lane changes. This one was a tie. Both of these violations are forms of hazardous driving that our police sources specifically called out. Following too closely can easily cause accidents by shortening a driver's reaction time. Combine that with cell phone use or texting and it is a recipe for disaster, he says. An improper lane change means cutting someone off or changing lanes without looking first, Bustos says. Failure to signal can also be added to this ticket, he says, but it usually doesn't initiate the traffic stop — partly because the failure to signal is so common. A Traffic Cop Critic's List Police officers aren't the only ones keeping track of what gets drivers in trouble. Some attention-getting moves that the police experts didn't mention, including: Cruising in the left lane of a multilane highway instead of using it only to pass slower traffic on the rightDriving more slowly than the normal traffic flowPeeling out from a stoplight or stop sign, and squealing tires in generalDrag racingRacking up lots of unpaid parking or traffic violations These are thing that make your car stand out and catch an officer's eye.