Gotcha cams at stoplights, etc.

Factual Questions
41

When Texas passed a law requiring that 50 percent of the revenue from red light camera tickets be turned over to the state rather than retained by the city, my city suddenly decided that the cameras really didn’t increase safety and removed the few that had been installed.

That was after the yellow-light timing issue some have mentioned; the local news tested the duration of yellow lights at intersections with cameras, and about 75% (9 out of 12 as I recall) displayed the yellow for lower than the recommended duration, which according to them was one-tenth of a second for every MPH of the speed limit.

42

Depends on the state. I got flashed in Arizona but they never sent the citation in time so nothing happened. I did notice on the paperwork they sent where I was allowed to give up my rights to a timely citation :rolleyes:, that the clerk of the city signed that on her own PERSONAL knowledge I violated the speed law. I figured I would get off on that if I fought it because she wasn’t there.

43

The cameras here didn’t show who was driving at all. They only took pictures and video from the rear, and they were all on the passenger side of the cars they were monitoring.

44

First, the number would be confirmed by the person looking at the film/video of the infraction. Second, the make/model of the car identified by the read number can be cross-checked with the make/model of the car in the photo.
Someone staying with us got caught by one. They sent a link to a web page with the pictures and video. They were very clear. I suspect this cuts down on the objections.

An intersection a few blocks from me has a red light camera, and in my unscientific experience the number of cars running red lights there has dropped dramatically, from practically one each time the light changed (in heavy traffic on the main road) to practically none.

45

And in your unscientific experience, has the number of accidents at that intersection also dropped dramatically? That’s what the cameras are there for, right? Safety, not revenue generation?

Speed limits are supposed to be set according to the 75th percentile rule as well. It’s a Federal recommendation, and is probably in the traffic codes of most states. Or was. That would be the average speed of 75 percent of traffic. Since that would toss out the 15mph speed limit in many communities, neighborhood organizations have taken up the cry for speed bumps on residential streets, which cause traffic to slow down enough to meet the 75% recommendation. While I dislike this dodge, it beats the stop sign where there’s no intersection method.

46

From my own experience

here in Singapore, we have red light cameras. And the tickets are enforced with points on the license. if your car gets snapped, the registered owner is presumed to be the driver. You get a notice in the mail that your car was photographed such and such a date, please provide driver particulars. If you don’t provide, the ticket goes to you personally. The other driver must also confirm it was them. (As an aside, there is a market in people volunteering to take the rap for the guilty party - and people have been sent to jail for this). I think you can only get the photo if you challenge the case in court.

There have been instances where the photo has been used to prove that someone was lying about the driver (the one that springs to mind is when the real driver was a guy, but he got his mother or wife to take the rap - the photo was used to prove he was lying)

For speed cameras in Singapore, it is the same.

In general, I don’t have any sympathy for you if you get caught by a red light camera, and see the “but it’s not a person” complaints as just whining. Follow the law and there won’t be a problem. If you break the law, it doesn’t matter to me very much how you got caught.

For speed cameras in New Zealand it used to be such that you were only ticketed if you were above the 80th percentile for the road AND more than 10km over the limit. The ticket didn’t earn points. You could request the photo to identify the driver, and it was clear enough to easily identify the guilty party. I am not sure what the current situation is.

47

Oops, sorry, missed this earlier.

If the officer just sits there and pulls people over who run red lights, that would be okay, but not if he is sitting there and making a record of everyone who drives through the intersection for later review. Constant-running dash cams are a bit of a grey area, but since they’re only recording things the officer already sees, they’ve been ruled admissible although only as corroborating something the officer saw. In other words, if you toss your drugs while the officer’s back is turned and they don’t notice it until later, the dash cam footage there might be ruled inadmissible. There’s definitely some serious vagueness in what the difference is between surveillance and just general law enforcement activity, but in general the idea is that just because you’re in public doesn’t mean the state is allowed to harass you and spy on you.

Like I mentioned earlier, I’m not sure the legislators really understood how the cameras worked when they banned them and if they had realized they don’t actually record at all times, they might not have. I’m glad they did, even if I don’t fully buy the privacy argument against them.

48

Fuck those cameras, the assholes who invented them, and the city council members who approved them. I got a ticket in Redwood City that cost $500. Admittedly, I pulled a California stop where I rolled through at 1 mph after nearly coming to a stop and made a right turn. Believe it or not, I never run red lights, and turning right after essentially stopping is not even close to the dangerous stupidity of running a red light straight through. No one was inconvenienced or in any kind of danger. I’ve never been in an accident in 38 years of driving.

I’m quite confident a real human cop would never give a ticket for my particular circumstances unless it was some asshole in a podunk town.

Redwood City is 300 miles away so it’s not like a could make a court appearance and request a reduction in the fine.

I’m writing my state congressperson and seeing if I can convince them to ban them. I’m also writing my city council to make damn sure that they do not consider putting them in.

49

I don’t know if they do it differently in other countries, but in the U.S., a lot of these systems are operated by a commercial entity that gets a percentage of the revenue generated by the [paid] tickets they handle.

This leads to what might be considered a conflict of interest. There have been findings of improperly set traffic light timings [shortened amber durations], for example cite, or other technical shenanigans cite.

Since it’s difficult to challenge these automated systems in court (how would a defendant know that the underground loops were moved?), I humbly suggest that it’s not always mere whining & sour grapes on the part of the citizenry.

50

I am very interested in knowing how long it takes from the incident until the notice is received in the mail. I would hope that the interval is short enough that I would still remember the details of the incident. For example: If I’m in the habit of letting my friends or relatives use my car, I would want to be able to remember who might have been using it that day. Or even if I’m the only one who uses the car, if I receive a ticket for something I did two months ago, I might have totally forgotten everything about it, and that would make big problems for my ability to defend myself in court.

If a policeman pulls me over and says, “We caught you,” everything is fair and square and I can either pay the fine or defend myself. But what can I do in a case like this?

51

I will go over this again. In my state there are now two totally different statutes. One is the old red light statute. It is written in a way that makes it clear that the driver is to be issued the ticket regardless of ownership. It is a 2 point ticket as well as a fine. The statute for the red light camera ticket states the fine is to the vehicle. There are no points and no hit on your driving record. (So far this has held up in court but it has not gone to a high level yet) It does not matter if you remember you were driving. When you go on the website you can view the violation yourself and judge if the car went through or not. You don’t have to take anyone’s word for it. That is the same or similar to most of the states that have them.

In general it takes a while to get the ticket. Our officers that have to review the violations always have hundreds in the queue. They get to it when they can. But as I said upstream, each violation must be reviewed by an officer. The ticket is issued by the officer. How quickly it gets to you depends on how many potential violations there are, how many officers are reviewing, and how many other duties they have.

52

In my city it looks like this.

If you enter the intersection when the light is red, the camera takes a picture of your car from the front and another camera takes a picture of the license plate from the rear. Also, there is a 15 second or so video saved of the incident.

A private company in Phoenix sends one of two notices to you. Either you get a citation, or what is called a snitch ticket.

The citation is sent when the picture of the operator is clear and the individual can be identified. Additionally, the picture has to match the gender and age of the registered owner. For instance, it a car is registered to a Mary Smith, age 25, and a 60 year old male is seen driving the vehicle, there can be no citation issued. Move now to the snitch ticket.

If the picture of the driver is not identifiable, IE, sun reflecting off the windshield or whatever prevents the picture from showing a good picture of the driver, OR, the driver and registered driver don’t match (gender, age mismatch) then a snitch ticket is sent.

The citation and the snitch ticket appear remarkably similar but are in fact quite different. The citation has a date and time to appear in court printed on it. It also has information about posting bail. The snitch thcket does not have such a date and time, but it has an area where it tells you that you are required to answer and return the form with one of three options selected. A. You were driving the car. B. IT wasn’t you, it was whatshisname (hense the snitch ticket name) or C. You sold the car on X date. Other than that, the notice you get is designed to look like a ticket, and lead you to believe you must furnish evidence against yourself.

I know, because I got such a ticket. It was a snitch ticket. The driver appeared as a block blob but the license plate was quite clear. (in reality, it was a relative driving, not me) A little research on the internet led me to the above, and I responded by ignoring the notice. After a year, which has passed, the charges can not be pursued by the state.

This is the way it is in my jurisdiction, and probably in most of California, YMMV though in your jurisdiction.

53

Since I don’t live on that corner, and since accidents are rare enough that I wouldn’t see many, I can’t say with any degree of statistical certainty. A decrease in accidents has been reported in the paper. Another thing - traffic flow is better since when your light turns green you don’t have to wait 30 seconds for the red light runners to stop.

We have lots of speed bumps on residential streets that connect major streets, and also calmers, which jut into the street and encourage people to slow down to get around them. The speed limit is 25 - it is only 15 during school times right near schools.

However I don’t see the relevance. I don’t care how many people run red lights - it is still dangerous no matter how often it is done. My wife was almost killed by one of these people. She was saved by the good construction of my Saturn.

54

I’m not trying to say that the lights are illegal. I was just giving one argument against them.

So far, a red light camera has given me exactly one ticket. I’m a pretty straight arrow. I never deliberately run a red light, and I rarely deliberately speed. When this camera got me, it was in an area that I rarely drive through. When I got the ticket, I remembered the incident, and said to myself, “Really? I thought it was still yellow!”

There were two or three photos with the ticket. My licence plate was clearly visible in all of them. And in the first shot, it was clear that the light was red before I entered the intersection. It was obvious and clear that I was properly busted, and I paid the ticket without complaint.

My only point is that if I had NOT remembered the incident, I would have been very upset. I would have wondered whether it was me or my wife driving, and I would have wondered what the big rush was. As the law is written, the penalty goes to the owner of the car, so the fact that the photos gave no clue about the driver would have been meaningless in court. But I still would have been upset. That’s all I’m saying.

55

In Wisconsin red light cameras and photo radar are outlawed statewide by statute,
and counties/municipalities are prohibited from using them also.

The problem I have with unmanned photo radar is, there is no way to tell if the unit was working properly at the time of the reading. Also, even with the angled units, it is possible for a larger vehicle like a semi truck to be coming up behind a smaller vehicle and be the one causing the speed reading yet it will be the smaller vehicle on the photo. It’s not always the car in front casting the speed shadow on the radar. The angled units are suppose to prevent this, but I’ve been shown it’s not 100%.

56

Singapore also outlaws gum. Their idea of what types of laws are fair really aren’t relevant in the rest of the world.

57

Well there is that

But to be fair, they are becoming massively more liberal of late (well a little bit)

You are now allowed gum for medicinal purposes
And latest news is that the Mandatory Death Penalty for drug smuggling is going to be repealed

58

For speeding it is 1-2 weeks.

For red lights - I don’t know, I have never had a ticket for running a red light.

Interestingly, I got caught doing 121 km in an 80 area, which is a court appearance (I didn’t get a ticket, I got a “notice of intention to prosecute”), but after almost six months I haven’t heard any more about it.

59

From what I’ve read, most red-light camera intersections report an increase in rear-end collisions after the cameras are installed. Apparently it’s a result of more people slamming on their brakes to avoid entering the intersection on yellow, and the people behind plow into them. Less serious than getting T-boned, sure, but often nearly as expensive to repair.

60

Haven’t seen any of these at this intersection. I have been hit this way, but at a right turn on red situation (I didn’t turn) not there. My observation is that people are a bit less aggressive with the red light camera than they were before - a person following is less likely to assume someone will go through even at a yellow. This would cut down on the damage. (I had none in my case.) But I have seen the same data you report.