The Volo Museum, located about an hour north of Chicago, has a problem: it's being fined for a traffic violation that apparently happened nowhere near its property.
In mid-May, the museum received a $50 speeding citation from New York City alleging that a replica of Kitt, the iconic talking Pontiac Trans Am from the 1980s television series Knight Rider, was caught doing 34 mph in a 25 mph zone on Ocean Parkway in Brooklyn on April 22. The catch: the museum's Kitt replica has been stationary on display at the facility for years.
A traffic camera captured images of a black Trans Am bearing the customized California license plate "KNIGHT" while traveling southbound through Brooklyn. The citation was automatically issued and mailed to the registered owner associated with that plate, the Volo Museum.
The museum posted the citation online on May 7, complete with photos of the vehicle from the traffic camera, and the story quickly went viral. "Well, this is a new one," the museum wrote, expressing bewilderment at how its display car could have been ticketed for speeding a thousand miles away. "This is 100% legit... You can't make this up!"
In a tongue-in-cheek jab at the original show's star, the museum added: "Does anyone have Hasselhoff's number? He owes us $50!"
The vehicle in question is not an original from the television series, which aired for four seasons beginning in 1982 and starred David Hasselhoff as detective Michael Knight. Instead, it's a 1991 replica built by Mark Scricani using production designs from the show. The museum notes that while it wasn't used in actual filming, the car carries genuine pedigree: it once belonged to George Barris, the legendary car designer who created the Batmobile for the 1960s Batman television series and later worked on Knight Rider's production.
Barris even autographed the museum's Kitt facsimile before his death, cementing its status as what the Volo Museum describes as a "true masterpiece of automotive technology and engineering."
The museum has indicated it intends to dispute the citation at a hearing. New York City traffic officials have not publicly commented on the case. The confusion appears to have stemmed from the license plate match alone, without verification that the vehicle in question was actually the museum's stationary display car.
Author James Rodriguez: "Only in the automated ticket-issuing era could a museum's decorative car get nailed for speeding from a thousand miles away, but the real crime here is that nobody checked whether a 1991 replica actually drove itself to Brooklyn."
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