WATERLOO REGION — Want to avoid a traffic ticket? Maybe we can help.

The Record mapped every speed trap and vehicle stop that Waterloo Regional Police recorded last year. That's up to 4,410 locations where an officer on patrol pulled over a vehicle for a possible traffic infraction, or where police parked and waited to catch speeders or drivers blowing stop signs or red lights.

You can interact with the map to see where police deployed near your home, your workplace, or along your commute, to the nearest intersection. You can see how many hours police spent at each location, while handing out 11,162 tickets for speeding, distracted driving, or not wearing a seatbelt.

We calculated the top 25 places where police spent the most time enforcing traffic. And guess what? Most top enforcement locations are not among the most dangerous roads. Many are residential streets or rural roads.

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Look for example to the intersection of Beaverdale and Hunt Club roads, in the Hespeler area of Cambridge. Police spent 325 hours there, making it the second busiest spot for traffic enforcement. The road has a country feel but a city speed limit of 50 km/h. Police went there 340 times over 91 days to catch speeders. They even ticketed the driver of a double-decker GO Transit bus.

"The speed limit's the speed limit," said Staff Sgt. Jim Strand, head of the police traffic branch. "If you get a ticket, you pay for what you do."

Strand contends that police typically enforce traffic where there are safety concerns or public complaints. He denies that officers go where it's easiest to fill a ticket quota.

"We don't have quotas and we never have had quotas," he said.

He bristles to hear enforcement described as a speed trap.

"There's no such thing," Strand said. "A trap would indicate you're actually trapping something. People speed on their own. We just give them the offence notice when they do it."

Across this region in 2014, police spent a total of 32,292 hours at the scene conducting vehicle stops while on patrol, or while parked at sites selected in advance for enforcement. That's more than 88 hours per average day spent hunting for driving infractions.

The number four spot for traffic enforcement is an awkward site in central Kitchener where Heiman and Mill streets intersect. Police spent 256 hours there, going there 143 times over 84 days, mostly to enforce a three-way stop sign that neighbours say is regularly ignored.

Rob Lalonde sees police parked there in a laneway beside his home, hidden from traffic at the intersection. Officers pull out to ticket drivers who fail to completely stop.

"I'll watch out my window and I bet you nine out of 10 cars, they don't stop, they go right through it," he said. Police "don't sit there very long before they get somebody."

He has a son Tristan, 10, who crosses there on his walk to school. Lalonde likes having police there to help keep Tristan safe.

Pedestrian Judy Zielinski crosses the busy intersection regularly. Like Lalonde, she has seen cars slide off the road after failing to negotiate a bend in the road where the stop signs are located.

"I think it's great that (police) are here enforcing it," she said. "I think it makes it safer for me."

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"We're dealing with all the construction that's going on in the area," Strand said. "It's become a detour route for a lot of people. And we're just trying to keep speeds normal. It's a residential area. We don't want people ripping through the area. We want people stopping for stop signs."

In Waterloo, police spent 183 hours at Beaver Creek Road and Conservation Drive, a remote location beside a trailer park and vacant fields. They went there 22 times over 13 days, making it the number 12 spot to enforce traffic.

"The road's hilly. It's not the best condition road that we have in our region," Strand said. "And the trailer park does invite a lot of traffic. Most of the time we're up there, we're responding to complaints from people living in the trailer park."

Police spent the greatest hours enforcing traffic at one of the region's most dangerous intersections, where King Street meets University Avenue beside the Wilfrid Laurier University campus in Waterloo. Police went 566 times over 209 days and spent 580 hours there.

It's the region's 17th most dangerous road and also the worst place for pedestrians to get hit. "By heavy presence, we're going to limit speeds, we're going to limit people attempting to run lights, and hopefully prevent a lot of serious collisions with pedestrians," Strand said.

Police armed with radar set up often at Ottawa Street and Dreger Avenue in Kitchener, a low-collision location that motorists have come to know as a speed trap. Police were there 78 times over 48 days last year, spending 110 hours at the scene and showing up every month.

Ottawa Street is four lanes wide there. There's wilderness on both sides and no buildings. Motorists come around a bend, unable to see a parked cruiser. Police hit them with ticket after ticket for exceeding the 50 km/h speed limit.

Strand makes no apologies to anyone who feels suckered. His advice: fight the ticket, plead your case to a judge, or don't commit the offence.

"I have no sympathy for these people who can't obey a stop sign or a speed limit sign," he said.