The stop light cameras at the junction of Pine and Broadway are keeping busy. They have been in place for a while but I’ve only noticed the flashes going off recently – maybe they’ve only just been activated.
They’ve been going off a lot. That means a lot of people cursing when the $124 tickets arrive in the mail.
I think the cameras are a great idea for 3 reasons:
1: If you don’t get the whole ‘red light means stop’ idea then you need an incentive to change.
2: I know a family that was badly T-boned in this intersection by a red light runner
and most importantly of all…
Red light cameras increase accidents, turn city governments shady have little to no oversight and provide massive amounts of money to out of state businesses. Traffic cameras are bad news all around. The way to decrease accidents at intersections is to increase the length of the yellow, not shorten it to increase tax revenue.
So, you’re the city. You just installed these nifty red light cameras that make you $124 every time you catch someone running the red. Oh, and there’s little to no oversight to how you operate them. What’s to stop you from decreasing the time the light is yellow? The sooner the light turns from yellow to red, the more money you make. Cha-ching! Who cares if it actually makes intersections more dangerous?
It’s just like speeding enforcement. All the equipment and training for speeding enforcement comes from the insurance industry? Does anyone actually believe they make the roads safer? Of course not, but they make the insurance industry a butt load of $$$
I want to make sweet gay love to Tim Eyman.