we have a man at our office that states the police used a device that
had a rubber hose run across the road to measure the speed of a car.
is or was there such a device???

Hi adamananna and thank you for the question. As an ex-special
constabale I can confirm that the "man at your office" is correct! The
police can use a "rubber hose" to detect speeders.

"DS2 (TruVelo) is a portable attended or unattended trap using a set
of three rubber hoses and at one end are Piezo-electric Sensors, being
either permanent which are hard to spot, or a moveable system which is
easier to spot. Look for the three strips 1 metre apart on the tarmac,
at the permanent sites look for the small grey pillar about two foot
high. These sites can be linked to Portable Autovision or Autovision 2
allowing the Police to gather video evidence and sometimes these sites
will be left unattended."
http://www.ukspeedtraps.co.uk/speed02.htm

"HOW DO OFFICERS USE HOSES TO DETERMINE VEHICLE SPEED?
An officer places two rubber hoses across the road. The hoses are like
those at gas stations that ring a bell,except these hoses connect to a
box that measures the time it takes for your vehicle to travel between
the hoses.Your vehicle speed is indicated on a receiver in the police
vehicle"
http://support.tandy.com/support_auto/doc66/66712.pdf

Thank you for the question and if this was the answer you were looking
for please do not hesitate to rate it, and if you have any doubts   
regarding my answer just ask for a clarification and I will be happy
to help.

THX1138 (ex-police officer)

Search Strategy:
As well as personal knowledge:
police speed rubber tube "across the road"
://www.google.com/search?q=police+speed+rubber++tube+%22across+the+road%22&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&as_qdr=all&start=10&sa=N

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Clarification of Answer by thx1138-ga on 11 Jul 2002 20:00 PDT

Oh dear!
After answering your question I saw that knowledge_seeker-ga  had
answered it...
I hope that the GA answers team can sort this out.......Sorry on
behalf of GA answers.
THX1138

Thank you also for your answer. This will clear up an office debate.

An ex-police officer that's nicknamed
THX1138, I love it.

-AI

When I lived on the East Coast of the USA in the 1950's the device was
popularly know as a "Whammy". When laid on a road with numerious tar
strips across it, the hoses blended in and were nearly invisible. For
kicks, tractor trailer drivers would sometimes lock their trailer
brakes as they drove over them and pull them out of position.