only reason you shouldn’t is have accountability for maybe not you, but for the bad drivers.
I can condone taking down pedestrian surveillance, but people who drive cars should follow the rules or get fucked.
That would be fine if they did anything to increase safety but studies have shown it actually increases accidents by 3-8% https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095756415302786
From that study:
“red light running photo enforcement installed experienced 4 percent reduction in fatal crashes for intersections with multilane approaches, and 48 percent reduction for intersections with single-lane approaches.”
Reduction means LESS.
Gonna be downvoted, because apparently this is car brain central, but the amount of mental gymnastics people will do to make red light camera enforcement “bad” is crazy.
The US’ private company control over these cameras notwithstanding.
Fuck me, so many people die on on roads, and especially at intersections.
The US’ private companies
this is entirely the problem, because they’re turning over info to ICE and other agencies and it’s being used oppressively.
The city I work for put up Flock cameras with specific instructions from Council that they were only to be used for identification of cars flagged in active warrants.
Within a week of their installation, police used the cameras to track the movements of someone who filed a complaint.
Fuck the police
Shout out to Road Guy Rob
I just don’t think having this kind of surveillance state apparatus is ever worth it I don’t want the government or private companies tracking my every move.
I don’t even own a car and I want these cameras gone.
People enjoy driving dangerously. They don’t see it as risky because they haven’t been killed in a crash yet.
Cops enforcing traffic? Bad.
Cameras enforcing traffic? Bad.
The USA needs more speed traps (all sorts), red light cameras, traffic circles and draconian fines to prevent the undisciplined idiots from killing people.
draconian fines
nah fam
On the one hand, omnipresent surveillance is bad and ripe for abuse.
On the other, I feel like the haphazard and selective enforcement of traffic laws by police officers is also really bad. Cops can selectively enforce laws so poor people or black people or whatever out-group suffers more. A machine should be impartial.
On the last hand, no traffic enforcement is probably going to get people killed. So that’s not desirable.
Also, fines are problematic. Fines should probably scale with wealth, but also it shouldn’t be a revenue source because that’s a perverse incentive.
Some countries do scalable fines, so you’ll see headlines about a rich person being given a $75k speeding ticket or something.
I do agree with the concept of traffic laws, but I went back to my home state of Iowa recently and it was seriously comical, cameras everywhere, stoplights but just randomly along the road, everyone was driving exactly the speed limit and I was going insane. Having humans involved in policing does introduce biases but it also introduces common sense and good judgement.
I like the idea of mobile camera units, so bad spots can be focused on, people understand that it’s a bad spot, but it doesn’t turn into a permanent fixture.
surveillance like this violates the non-aggression principle (which, being someone who’s left-libertarian, should be rewritten and reinterpreted to say ‘DON’T use force or coercion on anyone, except for self-defense, or the defense of your community’)
Speed traps and traffic light cameras are defense of the community though.
like speed bumps?
Friendly reminder that no technology is ever intrinsically good or bad, that is determined by who wields it and to what end.
Sure, remove the red light but please also remove cars.
Too bad it’s not true.
I’m a little confused, do you want people running red lights in the name of “personal liberty, yeehaw” because that seems like a bad idea.
No, I just haven’t seen any evidence red light cameras are effective.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/red-light-cameras-may-not-make-streets-safer/
Also I don’t like everything being under camera surveillance, so I need a strong justification to be fine with more of it
Red light cameras may not be effective at making streets safer. But, they’re nearly 100% effective at making people who run red lights pay fines. The first one would be amazing, but I’m happy to settle for the second one.
You sound like someone who can likes rich people getting away with just paying fines for being rich assholes
And you sound like someone who wants to be able to run red lights without consequences.
The problem is not the cameras then, but the fines. Should be proportional to net worth
we both know thatll never happen in america, and until then its a law for poors only, as designed. Its continued existence only affects poor people
Cameras specifically to catch people running red-lights will only take a photo when a car crosses a red light rather than run continuously.
They’ll only have you “under surveillance” if and when you’re breaking the law by running a red light.
So if you’re so worried about “surveillance” from those cameras, don’t run red-lights.
There are other, newer cameras like those from Flock that run and check continuously. I prefer the old-school ones you’re talking about.
Yeah, the old ones are fine, but they’re just turning into mass surveillance tools now
Big problem with these is profit motivation. They are usually operated by a for profit business that the city contracts to. One of the cities near me had a few installed. The company made 5 million a year in fines, city ended up with pennies. The road is built like a 40mph road but has a 25mph speed limit only where the cameras are. There is no money to update the road to actually make it safer because it all goes to the company operating the cameras.
That’s not to mention they usually change the timing to catch people off guard for more tickets. Someone went around in my area timing a bunch of different lights and found that every light with the ticket generating cameras had yellow lights shorter than the legal limit for the state.
The photo shows a traffic light enforcement, not speed enforcement.
There’s a road near me that has an unnaturally slow speed limit enforced by a camera. That’s a bit annoying. But, it also has red light cameras nearby. Those are great. I really don’t care what someone’s excuse is: I was distracted, I thought I could make the yellow, the light was taking too long… if you think you really do have a valid case, talk to the judge.
I made this point in another comment, but these cameras send you bills instead of tickets. They ignore our right to a fair trial and subvert our right to confront our accuser. The only one I’ve received had no info on how to dispute it, just pay or fuck you type of bill.
A red light camera is no different than a speeding camera in this regard.
I made this point in another comment, but these cameras send you bills instead of tickets
Maybe where you live, not where I live.
Canada? You really think you are somehow safe from this shit huh.
Well, yeah.
Well, this is a meme. But I personally am anti-surveillance. With the way things are going, these will almost certainly be “upgraded” to ALPR/“AI” systems for 24/7 surveillance and tracking; I’m guessing some probably already are.
Sounds about like the techbros. Tech isn’t there yet, but let’s deploy it anyway and start making money.
I mean, being anti-authority is fine, but even if you achieve your stateless society, don’t you still want your stateless society to still have traffic co-ordination somehow?
Stateless =/= rule-less
Photo enforcement cameras are problematic for several reasons.
A) It has been shown that yellow lights with such cameras are very often set to a yellow duration briefer than generally accepted engineering practices to increase revenue *1
B) They discourage a rare misbehavior, actually running red lights, whilst causing another to become common. That is slamming on the brakes even when it isn’t safe to stop. Exacerbated by A. Better slam on the brakes when it flicks yellow even if you are way too close to reasonably stop whilst going only the speed limit.
People who are caught up by it are almost always those who found themselves a bit too far into the intersection to safely stop. EG those who cross the threshold right as it is changing. There is for reasons of safety a few seconds between one light turning red and another green. At 30 mph (44 feet per second) someone will fully clear a 40 foot intersection in less than a second. That is to say the only people you catch aren’t those who would have collided.
They are those
- you fucked with the shorter duration yellow oops
- people who hesitated because of 1 and slowed but ultimately decided to proceed thinking they can make it
- People with poorer brakes and or dealing with rainy conditions reducing stopping time.
C) Most of the money goes to the contractor who owns the cameras. Essentially you are letting a private company prey on your citizens as long as government gets to keep the scraps.
*1 https://ww2.motorists.org/blog/6-cities-that-were-caught-shortening-yellow-light-times-for-profit/
A) It has been shown that yellow lights with such cameras are very often set to a yellow duration briefer than generally accepted engineering practices to increase revenue *1
Then create and enforce laws that require a given yellow light timer for a given speed.
B) They discourage a rare misbehavior, actually running red lights, whilst causing another to become common. That is slamming on the brakes even when it isn’t safe to stop. Exacerbated by A. Better slam on the brakes when it flicks yellow even if you are way too close to reasonably stop whilst going only the speed limit.
Guess you’d better leave a safe stopping distance between you and the car ahead of you. If you can’t stop quickly enough to not rear-end someone slamming on their brakes, you’re following too closely. Kids and animals run into the street all the time.
You and others like you are letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Red light cameras encourage perverse incentives whilst not actually meaningfully improving safety. There isn’t any “good” worth protecting.
In real conditions there is often a maximum distance that one can maintain between cars as giving a big enough gap will cause it to be filled by another car. Also people have both a minimum reaction time and stopping distance that is greater than the practical distance that exists in real traffic. Slamming on your brakes too abruptly is likely to cause accidents in real situations with real drivers with real reaction times.
None of these are actual problems with red light cameras, and actually people run red lights all the damn time.
Shortening yellow lights to cause people to unintentionally run them, people slamming on the brakes and causing accidents, and a monetary transfer between citizens and a private company are not problem?
I’ll add one more. They subvert our right to a trial and seeing our accuser. The fines are all supposed to be viewed by some sort of officer that is supposed to show up if you challenge the ticket. The only one I’ve received didn’t have any info on how to challenge it. It was like a bill that obfuscated my right to a trial. Guilt is assumed and forgiveness is ignored. 28 in a school zone in an unfamiliar city, instant fine with no “oops I fucked up” recourse.
Crazy how car drivers all think they deserve one free pass for dangerous driving.
Pay more attention.
That aside, it’s bullshit that they allegedly made it difficult for you to understand how to take the matter to court. In all fairness I’m not sure I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt here, considering you missed the school zone as well.
In some cases you don’t actually have an automatic court date as one would have with a normal officer issued ticket… This is the same with parking enforcement you can receive a ticket that if you don’t pay you lose your license but they can simply ignore you and if you want to fight it you have to front a few grand to a lawyer to fight it and initiate a lawsuit or represent yourself and commit to losing multiple days pay and risk your job which will not understand.
This is always a hard conversation to have. There are drivers on the road who want everyone to be safe, and do their best to function in our bad infrastructure. I try to be one of them, partially because I commuted on a bike and public transit for a long time. I did miss the sign in this instance, it was one of those “when present” signs that doesn’t have lights.
Personally I want more fines for actually dangerous driving. Its hard to quantify how much dumb shit I’ve seen while driving as much as I do. Watching TV while driving should be straight to the drunk tank and yet i see it every day.
You clearly don’t live in and never been to my country (Portugal, which in my personal experience of driving all over Europe has some of the worst driving in the continent) if you think running red-lights is a rare behavior.
Around here, were there are no zero red-light cameras that I know of (unlike other countries in Europe I lived in), it’s literally the norm for people to run the red-light for about 30 seconds after it has switched over from yellow. There’s even a joke around here that “Green means Go, Red means Stop and Yellow means Accelerate”. You will literally get honked at by the person behind you if when you see the yellow light you slow down so as not to run a red-light.
Curiously, in the other countries in Europe I lived in which did have red-light cameras, such behavior was incredibly rare.
Even more entertaining, when I first moved out of Portugal as a young adult I went with that very same behavior trained and not soon after I started driving in my new country of residence (which was The Netherlands) I almost immediately got a €50 fine for running a red light in that way and getting caught by a camera, tried to dispute it, got told “Red is red, it doesn’t mater if it has been red for 1 second or 1 minute”, paid the fine, learned my lesson and never did it again. Whilst anecdotal, it’s none the less one data point of red-light cameras working at making people change their habits.
In The Netherlands they weren’t shorting the yellow light times, but that’s because unlike in the US were the Law and Politics are a total shit-show, the Dutch actually have specified in the law the minimum time period for the yellow light (you know, because they have politicians which are at least somewhat competent and not on the take) and if city halls had it lower than that all of their red-light fines would end up thrown out in court if it was ever found out (and taking them to court over there is also way cheaper than in the US) same as parking fines get thrown out if the “no-parking” sign isn’t properly visible.
You see, the problem you have pointed out is not a problem with red-light cameras, it’s a problem with the Law over there, so it’s the Law that needs fixing not the red-light cameras.
If only it were possible to transport humans and goods without a network of cameras invading everyone’s privacy.
If only that was the natural state of the world for more of human history until just a few years ago.
Hell even in Amsterdam they have traffic lights. This isn’t an issue about the lack of public transportation.
Traffic signals and traffic cameras are two entirely different things.
I swear people just jump to the comments they don’t even digest the picture to understand this is about the cameras and not the traffic signals
I mean this in a genuine way, why in your mind those are the two options available? Total anarchy without functioning transit or cameras pointing at drivers?
There are several different ways to control traffic. If privacy is an importanr factor for a culture, they’d rank privacy respecting alternatives higher.
First, don’t call it anarchy. But second, the other way to stop people from running reds is more cops.
I think the arguement is that the cameras are only there because people are running red lights. Don’t you want to catch people who habitually run red lights, and therefore represent a danger to the public? If you’re not the sort of person who runs the red lights then the cameras are irrelevant to you.
Don’t you want to catch people who habitually run red lights, and therefore represent a danger to the public?
If it improves safety, which it’s not clear red light cameras do. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/red-light-cameras-may-not-make-streets-safer/
If you’re not the sort of person who runs the red lights then the cameras are irrelevant to you.
This is the same argument as ‘mass surveillance shouldn’t matter if you have nothing to hide,’ it’s a fallacy that only considers some elements of the situation.
The way we run society is relevant for all people in it. My taxes fund maintenance of these systems. I want us to work on effective prevention not bandaid punitive systems that don’t improve safety.
The SA article mentions Houston, a notoriously horrible city to drive in (concentric freeway rings, I swear). It pulled data from Texas from before 2010, and I know at least some municipalities were shortening their yellows then to encourage short stopping. It also studies changes in behavior after the punishment tool has been removed, so the drivers are already operating with years of conditioning. They even referenced the study that showed that the number of people running red lights in Virginia dropped 67% after red light cameras were installed? I need to look a little bit closer at their statistical analysis to see what confidence threshold they were using to determine that the reduction in accidents that they did see was not statistically significant, but overall I’m not that impressed by one study from a borderline pop science magazine.
Meta-analysis is the way to go.
As someone else pointed out, the traffic light itself isn’t being affected, just the automated enforcement mechanism of the camera. We managed just fine without those.
Plus, they’re not safer the way the government likes to claim. People slam on their brakes when they see one, and they can only ticket, it’s not like they’re stopping accidents or saving people, can only report on what happened.
There is some political horseshoe theory that connects “People who cannot stand any kind of authority at all and start shrieking even when a forum mod removes their comments.”
It’s the weird far-left anarchists and far right libertarians finding common ground in wanting a society where mommy doesn’t tell them to not run with scissors. Some of the “sovereign citizens” who make for hilarious Youtube content are sincere in their their irrational hate for any kind of rules and laws.
I have had enough dealings with these folks that I have a pretty strong opinion that nobody has been able to change, that these folks just have serious authority issues and do not give a shit about a broader society and are just mad at their parents.
They are the absolute worst people you could ever have as neighbors. I sometimes think we should drive them into the sea via mobs with torches.
edit: let me double down - if you get angry at the idea of authority (not considering the enforcers or management of that authority, which is a separate thing) you need to be driven into the sea via mobs with torches. We need systems and rules and taxes for a functional society. Work on changing the way that society enforces and motivates people to follow those rules instead of blindly lashing out at anything designed to keep people safe.
I don’t think sov civs actually have a problem with rules or authority. I think they are deeply insecure in the fact that they don’t understand the rules so they make up new ones that they believe to be absolute and above all else.
They believe like dogma in this shit like the maritime flag with stripes and a court with that flag gets magically invalidated so they don’t have to follow any rulings. They get a feeling of control when they understand the rules even when the rules are imaginary.
Civic religion, but make it gnostic.
Personally I have found authority in America to be stupid, abusive, incompetent or all 3. Do you live somewhere else?
Police officers and FBI directors are broadly stupid, abusive and incompetent, but that doesn’t encompass all authority.
You face authority every day. You follow systems and rules and contracts so that society functions. You use traffic laws. You don’t shoot people who make you mad, you don’t write bad checks or walk out of stores without paying. You are under a system of authority whether or not you agree with the values and enforcement of the people who enforce these rules.
I’m fine with throwing out the leadership and officers who enforce the laws, but we HAVE to have rules and laws, and this includes safety issues like speeding. I don’t care what motivates you to follow these rules, as long as you do, because I am also on the road.
I don’t need a system of law not to shoot people or walk out without paying. Some of us have ethics. I have found authority in America broadly garbage from bottom to top. It’s not just the top that is fucked.
I don’t need a system of law not to shoot people or walk out without paying. Some of us have ethics.
I cannot take your word for that, even if it’s true, I cannot trust everyone, and even if someone is a good person, every human is vulnerable to emotions and failures of judgement, so yes we do need laws and rules and nothing can change that short of some system of taking away everyone’s free will. I already said that the enforcers as, top to bottom, are a separate issue.
Traffic enforcement cameras are one of the worst ways I can think of to coordinate traffic.
red light ones are not great due to increased rear endings from some idiot slamming the brakes on when they should have gone through / people rushing and assuming the person in front will go through the yellow.
speed ones work great, when placed appropriately (i.e. on a street with an appropriate speed limit for the road design and in areas of higher pedestrian activity). I hate that Ontario just banned speed enforcement cameras, because that means a loss of revenue to pay for the road network maintenance, more police activity enforcing speed (which a camera does automatically all day long) which means police aren’t doing more important stuff and also it’s a waste of my tax dollars, and they will have to spend more of my tax dollars putting shittier speed reduction methods in place like speed bumps (annoying as fuck, bad for fuel economy, loud because people race from speed bump to speed bump, ineffective because people pay attention racing from speed bump to speed bump instead of to what’s going on around them, annoying for bicycles and people with towing trailers, loud when people telling trailers go over them, loud when regular cars go over them, bad for snow plows…)
now, this is just for speed enforcement, not coordinating traffic flow. although in a properly designed network, there are times that this can actually be achieved, unlike those light cycles on arterial roads that let you go through if you speed just a little bit but if you go the speed limit you hit every single red light
There are plenty of areas where the speed that is safe and reasonable to travel is substantially different from the one set. This is only not wildly broken because everyone disobeys the law and the cops refrain from stringent enforcement because forcing the traffic to all slow down would completely break traffic flow.
Maybe this works well in Canada but America governments are about as stupid as Americans.
You think people pushing that thought further than “What’s the edgiest political personality I can use for posing online”
That can be done though street design. See: The Netherlands.
That’s like $27 per camera or so.
That’s $27 of meth they wouldn’t have had otherwise
Copper you say?
Yay! Crashes! 🥰
They would remove the camera not the traffic light. I don’t think that would cause an accident
The camera only snaps a picture when people blow the traffic light. If everybody obeyed the traffic lights then nobody would ever get their car’s picture taken with the camera.
They have speed and traffic light cameras made by the same companies and they are pushing them out indiscriminately.
Also why should that company get money if someone speeds or goes through a red light? Why do they get that privilege but no one else does? The government getting fines is one thing but a private company is another
They have speed and traffic light cameras made by the same companies and they are pushing them out indiscriminately.
Who’s “they”?
Also why should that company get money if someone speeds or goes through a red light?
Around here, the company doesn’t get money. The fine is sent by the government and the government gets paid. I don’t know why it’s different for you, sounds like you need to change your government.
The reason the camera is there is because of the crashes that happened when it wasn’t.
Cool, sucks that we went with the vibes feels like it should help solution then.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/red-light-cameras-may-not-make-streets-safer/.
We found no evidence that red light cameras improve public safety. They don’t reduce the total number of vehicle accidents, the total number of individuals injured in accidents or the total number of incapacitating injuries that involve ambulance transport to a hospital.
That’s not true. We have a ton of these popping up in my neighborhood in places where there haven’t been issues.
Also they are owned by private companies that pocket most of the money you pay the fine with.
Why do I need 5 of these on my way to work in the morning? That’s 5 times where if I accidentally went too fast I have to pay a private company $200. That’s up to 10 times a day I am at risk of a random fee to some company. Insane that you want that
All good but “risk of a random fee” ?🤨
Same discussions as in German; FFS people have to drive within the speedlimit. That’s the meaning of a limit. If you cannot do that reliably you will not get a fine for accidentally driving 3km/h under the limit. I do not understand how checking people for safe driving is seen as a predatory practice. Everybody getting fined is literally in the wrong.
American roads are massive and built so you can safely drive way higher than the limit, which means most people do. It sucks and the solution is to design roads better.
Currently we just have a system where going the speed limit causes backups and people make dangerous maneuvers to get around you.
Hell, I even got pulled over for ‘impeding the flow of traffic’ once when I was going slightly over the speed limit. Pig just gave me a warning, and I certainly would’ve succeeded in contesting it if he hadn’t, but our whole road infrastructure sucks
In America we like to build roads in such a way as they cannot reasonably work at posted speeds force everyone to speed somewhat and just pull over the minorities for speeding whilst black. For 20 years the maximum speed on the interstate highways was 55 mph or 88 kph. In case you aren’t familiar with the vernacular.
Interstate: A high-speed, controlled-access road in the U.S. network of highways designed for long-distance travel and linking major urban areas
It’s still common for there to be areas that for practical purposes roll at 10-15 mph over posted limit where literally every car is going that speed and being pulled over is basically a random act of police rather than actual normal law enforcement.
This comment is provided to you by the “the light was really yellow” crowd
My only real issue with it is that there are a ton of them now and they are privately owned. If the fine went to the city that would be a different story.
Imagine if next they put a sensor right in your car so if you ever go over a limit you always get a fine. Would you still be into that? Would you buy that car?
That is actually a legitimate concern. Add it to the long list of “technologies that are cool and good except when capitalism”
Maybe don’t speed
Everyone goes over the speed limit at some point but usually there isn’t a cop there so there is no issue. It’s impossible to drive exactly the speed limit even if you wanted to
“Sir! The unfed masses are tearing down cameras to sell them for food!”
“BUT WHAT ABOUT PROPERTY VALUES? HAVE THEY NO SENSE OF COMMUNITY?!”
i mean, car crashes very much also often lead to death
i don’t think speed cameras are a good way to prevent car crashes, but straight up acting like car crashes aren’t a problem worth mitigating is extremely silly
The country’s “rugged, free individualism” is a fucking menace. It has given so many people the righteous feeling of being above the law, of being offended at the law applying to them, and especially the “social contract” a phrase that literally enrages some segment of the population on both sides of the political spectrum. I hate it here.
It’s showtime
