AN INTERESTING ISSUE IS currently being debated concerning the release of your private details to third parties who may wish to pursue action against you.
This has been a key factor in the matter of private car parks across Australia who want registration authorities to release the identities of car owners to them so they may impose penalties for non-payment or overstaying the time limit.
In the US, one of the main criticisms of red light cameras is that they penalise the registered owner of the vehicle, not necessarily the driver at the time of the offence. In Australia, of course, cars snapped breaking the rules will have the infringement notice sent to the registered owner who then has the option of nominating the identity of the driver, as long as you can remember who was driving at the time of the offence.
In New Jersey, a bill has been introduced that would prohibit other states from issuing traffic citations to New Jersey residents caught by speed or red light cameras. If the bill passes, the New Jersey Motor Vehicles Commission will be banned from providing licence plate numbers or other identifying information to another state or interstate information network for the purpose of imposing a fine.
The bill targets any speed-control devices that utilise cameras and vehicle sensors, and are capable of automatically producing a recorded image of an alleged violation.
One of the main issues with automatically recorded infringements is the time lapse between the offence and the delivery of the infringement notice. Weeks pass before owners even know they have been implicated by a camera, and that’s where the problem arises. “How are you going to defend yourself against that,” asks Steve Carrellas, the head of the New Jersey branch of the National Motorists Association. “In the old-fashioned way, a police officer looks at your licence and you at least have a chance to have some explanation or you have the opportunity to talk and the officer can use the appropriate discretion.”
Automated traffic control devices are under increased scrutiny and criticism. Recently, the Chicago Tribune revealed a sudden and unexplained surge in the number of red light traffic offences. Violations would spike for a number of days then “abruptly dropped back to their previous levels.” A similar situation arose on the Western Ring Road in Melbourne when one camera inexplicably began catching a huge number of motorists exceeding the limit – in fact, more than all the other cameras combined! When the glitch was discovered, authorities declined to reimburse motorists who may have been penalised unfairly.
Speed cameras have been so unreliable in Baltimore that the city has decided to scrap the system and spend $450,000 to replace it. Meanwhile in a nearby county the Baltimore Sun reports that the speed cameras showed, in some data sets, more cars travelling above the speed limit than there were actual cars on the road.
Authorities claim speed and red light cameras will make driving safer by changing driving behaviour over time, but increasingly, critics say the safety benefits are dubious and the cameras are nothing more than revenue generators for states and municipalities. Rather than improve traffic safety, a 2008 study conducted by University of South Florida researchers found they “significantly” increase the number of crashes.
The problems in Chicago, Baltimore and elsewhere (including Melbourne!) tend to reinforce the perception that speed and red light cameras are more about revenue raising than road safety. At least 31 local municipalities in the US have put traffic-camera measures on their ballots since 1991, and voters opposed their use 30 times.
The opposition to the devices might be reduced if they were placed in proven black spots and well-marked with warning signs. Their use should be discussed more openly, so that they may actually change driver behaviour, rather than simply provide revenue to governments, as seems to most people to currently be the case.
New Jersey is in the process of concluding a multi-year pilot program to evaluate the effectiveness of automatic traffic control devices in about two dozen communities.
“New Jersey is at a crossroads,” Carrellas said. “This pilot program is coming to an end, and it’s had lots and lots of problems. I think we’re seeing the start of the downfall of automated enforcement.”
At least the use of automated traffic control devices is being openly debated in the US, unlike in Australia where governments are becoming ever more dependent on their traffic violation revenue addiction. And as long as Australian motorists continue to meekly pay up, nothing is likely to change.