Curious things spotted while seated idly, smoking.

I was asked what I meant by this comment from last week's On The Avenues:

... I’m guessing the policeman who lately has been standing idly across Spring from my house monitoring traffic (is he intending to jog after the chronic speeders?) has spotted the wrong-way cyclist, too ...

On second thought, "idly" was not merited, although "standing" still is true. At first I thought the policeman making frequent appearances on the 1100 block of East Spring in nice weather was responding to domestic disturbances across the street from us, but then I realized that he was carrying a piece of electronic equipment.

Periodically he gets the reading necessary to jump back into his car and issue a citation (hence, my mistaken "idly"), and so my question is this: Why the need to stand outside his car? I was told by an observer that the device will not register through glass. Or is it just having a uniform in view, even if I seem not to have seen the scenario repeated elsewhere?

Standing Speed Trap? Sounds like a future Urban Olympics event. Wouldn't it be better to calm traffic on Spring Street through design means?