Traffic Light Cameras

I have a few questions on this.

I was driving home the other day and misjudged a stop light. It was my fault and I’m willing to take responsibility for it, but I didn’t mean to do it. The point where I realized I might not make it, if I would have stopped it would have been very abrupt. The person in front of me tried to make it, then at the last minute slowed, then bolted… so that was most of the reason why I would kind of stumped on what to do, there was also someone behind me I think.

I could have sworn when I ran it I saw a flash, but I could have been wrong. I live in a suburb of Buffalo, NY. called East Amherst. How do I find out if they have these cameras around here? I did a Google search but little came up. This was at night time, would I have seen a flash? Do these lights work most of the time? What kind of action is usually taken? How many of these things exist? Are they all over?

The guilt is killing me. I really made bad judgment, but I really didn’t mean to. I wasn’t in a hurry or anything, I just missjudged it all. So I would like to know what I might be in for here. If anything. It’s not the concequence I’m afraid of. I just would feel worse if others knew I guess. :frowning:

Thanks a lot!!

If you haven’t heard about it in your town, they probably aren’t using red light cameras, because there is always a huge tizzy fit involved. You would have heard about it.

The penalties involved depend on the local jurisdiction. call the PD and ask if there are any red light cameras or other photo radar devices currently in use. They will tell you.

The stoplight could be one of the new types which have a bright flashing bar in the middle of the red light. They’re supposed to be more visible. I’ve only seen them a couple of times, but maybe your city noticed a problem at that particular intersection and invested in them.

I wouldn’t think a flash bulb would help things much from a box placed what, twenty, thirty feet above the roadway.

The GATSO traffic enforcement cameras here in the UK emit a visible double flash; the driver is usually aware that he/she has been caught, however there are more camera housings by the roadside than there are cameras (the camera is the expensive bit, the doppler unit, flash and housing is relatively cheap) - they move the cameras about from box to box, but the box will still flash at you if you run the lights/break the speed limit.

Mangetout

True enough that GATSO cameras double flash, but the ones on junctions are not speed cameras and as such do not need a comparator frame.

Stop light cameras only fire once, they take an image of the offender from behind and show the car, its registrations plate, and the state of the traffic lights as the vehicle passes them, sometimes there is a time elapsed from red on the photo too.

You would definately know if you had been flashed in darkness, if there was another vehicle in the same frame you could make various legal arguments, especially on speed cameras.
Sometimes, despite the condition of the lights, it may not be wise to suddenly lock on the brakes.

One I can think of was a London cabbie who was snapped but although he took it to court and was found guilty of the offence, it turned out he was trying to make way for a following ambulance, which flew on past him, he was fined a token amount, something like 1pence to satisfy the legal technicality of the law.

In New York State, only New York City has Red Light Cameras (about 50, although Bloomberg keeps trying to increase the amount to make more money).
Sporadically Suffolk County makes noise about trying to get them, but they are pretty unpopular among most folks (it seems only politicians and the [my opinion] damn fools in Transportation Alternates and their ilk love them] and so this idea usually gets dumped.

This is a funny story about the red light cameras

Yeah, that story always goes around in a new jurisdiction, so does the one about the judge who gets photographed with his girlfriend instead of his wife. Blah blah blah.

I think red light cameras are great, and I am neither a politician nor a cop. I drive in southern CA with children in the car, and people run lights out here like it’s a medal sport. Screw 'em if they get caught.

Several cities in CA use or have used Gatso cameras for photo radar and red lights.

The problem is that the camera cannot show all surrounding evidence…there are some cases where the safer course of action is to miss a yellow light by.5 seconds vs. coming to an abrupt or dangerous stop.

It’s extremely bright-- almost like a strobe light. You can’t help but see it. I’d say the bar of light is maybe an inch wide, across the middle of the red light, and it pulses. As I said, I’ve only seen them in a few select cities, so they might not be very common yet, but I think they’d be very useful if they were more widespread. Having run a few red lights in my time, anything that makes them more visable, (especially when the sun is shining in the light and makes visability poor) or “catches” the eye the way a flashing light does, would be most welcome.

There may be a lot more to the story though, EJsGirl. The problems with these cameras have only been touched on here. Their inability to capture all the evidence has been mentioned already, but there are more concerns as well. I think we can all agree that red-light-running is a dangerous problem, especially in certain places. But there is some evidence that red light cameras actually reduce safety when they are installed.

Car and Driver’s Patrick Bedard wrote a couple of articles about these systems recently. These articles are online at:
http://www.caranddriver.com/xp/Caranddriver/columns/2002/december/200212_columns_bedard.xml

The National Motorists Association also has a page of articles on red lights cameras and photo radar online at:
http://www.motorists.org/issues/enforce/articles.html

This is just a general recap. . . The primary problem with these systems is that often the very same people who are responsible for evaluating the effect also have a financial interest in the success of the system. The jurisdiction in which the cameras are installed receive benefits in the form of fines, and the manufacturers of the systems also receive a portion of the revenue generated in addition to the purchase price. Studies have shown that up to a certain limit, longer yellow lights correlate to reduced accidents at an intersection by reducing the incidence of red-light-running. However, when a red light camera is installed, the yellow lights are often shortened in order to boost the number of fines collected at the intersection. Studies have indicated that the red light camera, though it may reduce the incidence of side collisions slightly, actually significantly increases the incidence of rear-end collisions.

I have a great deal of experience with photo radar, though not as much with red light cameras. I will tell you that local jurisdiction do not make as much money on citations as some people would have you believe. The systems are expensive to use and maintain, and that comes out of citation fees in some jurisdictions. Also, many sytems are not purchased but leased, which is an on-going expense.

Citations issued via photo radar and red light cameras are not “slam dunks”, they are debatable just like any other moving violation. You don’t argue with the cop, you tell it to the judge. Mitigating circumstances should be taken into account if you appear. In fact, some judges will be more likely to be lenient with a red light camera citation than they will with a ticket issued by an officer! Of course, if you go in acting like a jerk, most judges won’t cut you much slack, but that’s true for any ticket.

At least in the CA jurisdictions I am familiar with, photo radar is never unmanned, nor is it installed in unmarked cars (as mentioned in the DC links above). In National City, each unit was installed in a Jeep Cherokee (not exactly a low-profile vehicle) clearly marked as a police vehicle with paint and lights. The back doors of the Jeep were open to accomodate the operation of the unit, and it was manned by at least one sworn officer. The officer had to keep a log of each car photographed (yes, they could tell who was getting shot), listing the make, model, & color of the vehicle and the time of the violation. If the log and the photograph didn’t match, or if no log entry was made, no citation was issued. Another CA city only used photo radar in school zones when children were present (and clearly visible in the pictures).

Each jurisdiction sets the speed limit on the cameras. If your city routinely busts speeders for 10+ miles over, you can expect that the radar will be set at that threshold as well.

In any event, I still don’t believe that it’s an invasion of privacy, or Big Brother. It’s just one more tool for the cops to use. I still think that we (the general public) get over on the cops more often than they get over on us. If that changes, I will re-evaluate my position.

We do have photo cameras here in Phoenix, and you can clearly see them. They are obvious cameras mounted on poles, and there is a warning sign in front of the intersection (or stretch of road) that it is photo monitored.

As others have noted, you may still plead your case if you feel that there was an extenuating circumstance.

Worst case scenario, though–a ticket. Not too bad. So don’t worry too much, 'K?

:slight_smile:

Here in my corner of So Cal red lights are being treated as just a general recomondation.
I am not talking about somebody a red by .5 seconds. I’m talking about having my light turn green, waiting for the guys who blow it by .5-1.0 seconds go by, looking both ways, steping on the gas, and having to land on the brakes because an idiot is blowing through the intersection a full 5 seconds after his light turned red.
This is going through on the yellow, this is just flat running a red light.
Or perhaps the times when the light turns red, and I come to a reasonable stop (not super hard, just a little over average) and a driver 5 car lengths behind me passes me to go though on the red. (we had been traveling the same speed before the light turned red)
Personally, I would like to remove the camaras

And replace them with heat seeking missiles. :smiley:

Thanks alot posters!!