Ticket's in the mail: Red-light cameras questioned

Got two flashes, no tickets.

Two warrants , no license, and I ain't got insurance yet.

 

Traffic violations are strict liabilities for large part, meaning no excuse is allowed as defense.

But I totally understand what you describe here because I live in L.A. too. A case like this doesn't really pose danger to the road, because other cars all know you were in the middle of avoiding an accident, and this is very different from speeding through a red light. So if a cop lying in wait there, he probably wouldn't give you a ticket.

 

I've not gotten a red light ticket (knock on wood). The city closest to me with red light cameras is, I understand, taking them down because they cost too much to maintain and don't generate enough revenue unless they shorten the yellow-light times or ticket people who aren't actually running the light.

I know Lubbock took theirs down, too, after the news media there showed that the intersections with cameras had shortened yellow times.

I'm personally amazed at how many people supposedly run red lights. It's rare that I see anyone actually run a red light (truly entering an intersection and continuing through after the light has turned red), and I have traditionally been a high mileage driver.

But I look at the statistics in Amarillo (where they recently installed red-light cameras), and it works out to roughly 20% of the population of the city running a red light at one of five intersections with cameras at them during the course of a year.

Given the number of intersections in that city with traffic lights, I would venture to bet that would work out to every single person in the city running at least 100 red lights per year.

That seems unlikely.

 

I haven't gotten a ticket thru the red light camera either, but got a speeding ticket going 21 miles over on a speed trap. I'm not upset with that, but I'm trying to sign up for defensive driving by calling and thru the internet.

I got the ticket on 2/28/09 and my court date is schedule for 4/06/09. The thing is, up to this date, the court doesn't have a record of it yet. They said the cop hasn't turned it in. I'm trying to get this over with, so I can do some traveling and not worry about going to court when he decides to turn it in on the last day.

Am I screwed? Sorry for hi jacking this thread, but didn't want to start a new one over this.

 

What disturbs me about the red light cameras is how they intentionally reduce the yellow light time to increase the number of citations. 610 and Westheimer is a prime example. On any given night, you can see that flash go off every 2 minutes at the least. It's ridiculous. You're approaching the intersection, the light is green and you're making a right turn behind a long queue of cars. The light turns yellow. You have no idea how long it's going to stay yellow for, or if you're going to successfully complete the right turn before it goes red.

You slam your brakes, there's a high chance you get rear-ended.

You try to make the turn, there's a high chance you
a) rear end the person in front of you, or
b) the camera gets you anyway because you were a few milliseconds too late, or
c) both.

You want to tell me that intersection is now safer because of the red light camera?

Psh. Please.

 

I found this interesting.


Article from: www.thenewspaper.com/news/26/2606.asp


11/24/2008
California: City Caught Trapping Drivers with Short Yellows
Video evidence shows a San Bernardino, California red light camera operating with a yellow time so short it violates state law.

A brand new red light camera on California's historic Route 66 is already generating thousands in revenue for San Bernardino, but the biggest lawbreaker in these cases may turn out to be the city itself. Since September 25, a photo ticketing device has watched over the intersection of Mount Vernon Avenue and 9th Street, trapping motorists caught by a yellow light that is so short it violates state law.

Truck driver Raymond Chacon discovered this last month while taking a training course to help him upgrade his commercial driver's license. Under the supervision of an instructor, he came to the intersection behind the wheel of a big-rig tractor trailer. He entered just a split-second after the light had turned red. After successfully completing the course and passing the Department of Motor Vehicles Class A license test "with flying colors," Chacon received a $400 red light camera ticket in the mail. Chacon immediately began investigating what might have happened at that location. He turned to the highwayrobbery.net website, which encouraged him to check whether the city used yellow signal timing that conformed with state guidelines.

Video from the intersection in question confirms that drivers are given only 3.0 seconds of yellow, even though the California Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices insists that 35 MPH intersections have a yellow of no less than 3.6 seconds. While this 0.6 second shortage appears insignificant, it can represent the difference between a ticket and no ticket for thousands of motorists. This is even more true for truck drivers like Chacon.

Most drivers faced with a quick-changing yellow can simply slam on their brakes to avoid the citation. For Chacon's 53-foot-long rig, however, the compressed-air braking system requires an extra 0.5 seconds to activate. Beyond the usual risk of causing a rear end collision in this situation, slamming the brakes with an unladen trailer risks jack-knifing the truck. With a properly timed signal, Chacon would have had enough time to clear the intersection.

Studies show that shorter yellow times can increase the number of citations generated. According to the Texas Transportation Institute, when the yellow light timing is one second shorter than the bare minimum recommended amount, violations increase by 110 percent (view study). Confidential documents uncovered in a San Diego court trial prove that the city and its private vendor, now Affiliated Computer Services (ACS), colluded to install red light cameras only at intersections with short yellow times (view documents), thereby maximizing profits.

San Bernardino may be aware of the importance of this signal timing. It is one of only a handful of cities across the country that deliberately conceals signal timing information -- including the "time into red" or "late time" -- on its citations. In 2002, a Baltimore, Maryland judge had used this information to find tickets issued at locations where the signal timing was illegally short. As a result of the judge's investigation, Baltimore was forced to refund thousands in citation revenue (Read court memo). Chacon insists that San Bernardino similarly provide refunds from those caught by the illegal signal timing on Mount Vernon Avenue.

"It is a cash cow for a financially strapped San Bernardino city," Chacon told TheNewspaper. "The fact that they knew the yellows were too short shows that public safety is not a sole concern for the red light cameras."

Earlier this month, the National Motorists Association Foundation announced that it had begun a nationwide search to track down intersections with short yellow times and force cities to comply with proper engineering practices. Visit the Short Yellow Lights Project website.

http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/26/2606.asp


For some towns, apparently these "red light cameras" are seen as more of a revenue device than a safty program. Who would have thunk it?

 

they've got timers in downtown Houston now...it is 100x better than the stupid red light cameras. i can see exactly how many seconds are left before the light turns yellow and that lets me know if i can still safely proceed at my current speed or slow down.

 

I can agree with that, but I'm sorry if you are 'slamming on your breaks a few feet away' when the light turns yellow, cameras or no, that's just straight dangerous. And I also don't think that the existence of the cameras causing that much anxiety is going to be a problem for the majority.