Abu Dhabi has a reputation as a place of law and order.

Aside from the life on the streets. Not like “on the streets” in the “homeless” sense … but life on the streets. As in “driving.”

When people here are behind the wheel of a motor vehicle … this is not the Mideast, it is the wild west.

So I was bit surprised when I turned the northeast corner on the track surrounding Khalifa University and noticed …

… a police cruiser with its lights flashing and a small sedan the cops had, apparently, pulled over. On Saada Street, right below the Airport Road overpass.

As crazy as the drivers here are, and they are stark raving mad, I rarely see anyone pulled over.

Typically, we don’t think much about what we don’t see. So it struck me, as I trudged around the running track tonight and saw the blinking lights … that I rarely see a car pulled over by the cops.

Why? Some ideas.

–Passive restraints. That is, the idea that many of the major thoroughfares have video cameras on them, or devices that measure speed. Don’t need cops on the road when the electronic eye catches a driver speeding. (One of my co-workers was nailed twice by cameras during a single commute to Al Ain.)

–Traffic. Easy to be rude, when traffic is choked, but it’s hard to break a law so’s anyone would notice. You’re going too slowly to speed. You can anger someone by edging over into the next lane to gain one car length. But it’s not really a failure to signal. No speeding is involved. Plus, police aren’t going to see you, just one car among the hundreds at a busy intersection.

–A lack of concern by authorities. The cops here are interested in other stuff. Almost all the time I see a police car on the streets, it has to do with an accident. A couple of crumpled cars pulled over on the shoulder, and a cop car nearby, with the police taking statements.

I think that is what it is. Accidents suck up a lot of manpower. Not many cops and not much time left to cruise the streets looking for the guys who go 100 mph from one stoplight to the next.

Anyway, drivers here are awful. Bad judgment, poor decisions, angry and not always competent. But I can’t say I’ve seen five people being written up in more than a year here.

I wonder what the person did to get pulled over, out in front of Khalifa University? Going 100 in a 40 zone? Crossing three lanes without signaling? Cutting off the cop himself?

Probably all of the above.