Posted on 07/26/2006 6:06:38 AM PDT by ziggy_dlo
Supporters of red light cameras say project should be low-cost
7/26/2006
Austin City Council members who support red light cameras say they want to find a system that won’t cost the city much money or effort. City Council Member Lee Leffingwell says the goal of a red light camera system would not be to boost the city’s revenues, but he also wants to avoid draining city funds for a network of cameras at busy intersections. “What I would be looking for in a proposal that comes back to us is one that has zero or minimal up-front costs to the city, and as much of the overhead and administrative process that can be done is actually handled by the company,” Leffingwell said.
Some other cities with red light cameras work out arrangements with the private company supplying the gear so that the company is paid based on the number of citations the red light cameras generate.
The Council could ask the City Manager on Thursday to draft a plan for installing red light cameras at busy intersections. But actually purchasing the cameras and ordering them to be installed would require a separate vote
How is that any different than any other type of appeal to any other crime? The original poster stated that the photos taken from red light cameras could not be appealed. I questioned that assertion and from what I have found, and from your post, that the photos can be appealed. If an individual does not wish to make an appeal, or cannot, that still doesn't negate the fact that an appeal can be made.
A "Journal of the Politics of Driving" is NOT an independent study. Every one I have seen that say that (like this one) are untrained people who have an axe to grind -- just like you.
Sounds like an idiot did the timing there. It reminds me of the saying "Don't attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetence." Setting up timing for a single intersection is a stretch for a lot of "engineers". Setting up several related (or interconnected ones) is a stretch for all but a few (just my opinion).
Let me know where I can find those studies.
There are independent studies at the link.
I tried to link directly to the page, but they evidently want you to go through their home page first.
1/3 of the way down, on the right is a box called "Popular Studies". Click on "Red Light Camera Roundup". There are dozens of independent studies in PDF format.
Sheesh.
My understanding of that case was that the yellow light time was set up according to accepted engineering standards (read the MUTCD for more information about the ITE formula). The politicians passed a law that was NOT based on anything other than what they felt like at the time. The two conflicted. That does not make the state law right.
I have read the Burkey-Obeng Red Light study and don't find it as "independent" as the people here claim. How many times have people around railed at studies by ivory-tower pin-heads that confirm their own prejudices. Unless it was done by an professional engineering group (like ASCE) and has been peer reviewed and accepted, I am not going to get too worked up about it.
> Let me know where I can find those studies.
Be glad to. Get an engineering degree. Join the engineering organizations in your field. Subscribe to their usual publications. Go to their seminars and conventions each year. Read the lastest studies, listen to the people doing the studies when they make their presentation, offer constructive criticism, see the updated studies in following years with the criticisms answered. When the study is accepted by your peers, it will be worked into standards that EVERYONE uses, like the MUTCD.
And no, I don't have a couple of webpages that you can glance at. Most of this information is available only to members until it is adopted.
I looked through the "studies" and "commentary" listed on the website and still don't see any independent engineering studies there. Everyone there has their own axe to grind.
If it is NOT from a national engineering group (like the ASCE) and has been peer reviewed and accepted by the people actually working in the field, it is suspect. There may be some ivory-tower, pin-heads out there who are actually doing good work, but that has to be proved, not just accepted.
>>Be glad to. Get an engineering degree.
Got one.
>>Join the engineering organizations in your field. Subscribe to their usual publications. Go to their seminars and conventions each year. Read the lastest studies, listen to the people doing the studies when they make their presentation, offer constructive criticism, see the updated studies in following years with the criticisms answered. When the study is accepted by your peers, it will be worked into standards that EVERYONE uses, like the MUTCD.
Hump you, too. I guess you are just blowin' smoke. I am familiar with the MUTCD. I am just looking for the studies that find no benefit to lengthened yellows.
Here is one that shows a benefit:
"The study found that improving signal visibility reduced violations 25 percent. Other changes could net between 18 and 48 percent reductions. Yet they found when the yellow signal was 1 second shorter than the standard ITE timing formula specifies, red light violations jumped 110%. ***Extending the yellow an additional second yielded 53% reduction in violations, producing the greatest benefit of all the factors studied*** (2-6)."
http://www.motorists.org/issues/enforce/tti04.html
http://www.motorists.org/issues/enforce/studies/tti04.pdf
Here's why your plate will soon have a chip in it.
http://www.phantomplate.com/photoblocker.html
Jeff Ward is talking about this very thing on KLBJ.
In California, yellow-light times were shortened to maximize the number of tickets issued, and "Lockheed Martin IMS, which operated the San Diego system, regularly scouted intersections in some cities based on high traffic volume, not locations that were most accident-prone. Documents revealed that officials sought locations with steep gradients and short yellow-light times," reported the New York Times
Studies elsewhere ... made a striking finding: rear-end accidents have shot up at intersections with cameras. In 2002 a consultant's study in San Diego reported that the number of crashes at camera intersections had increased by 3 percent after the cameras were installed, almost all of it a result of a 37 percent increase in rear-endings. "This finding is not consistent with the program's overall objective of improving traffic safety," the report's authors concluded.
Similarly, in Virginia studies of traffic patterns in all seven VA cities using red light cameras showed an increase in injury accidents at intersections with cameras. Even more sympathetic studies show an increase in rear-end accidents, but argue that a smaller decrease in side-impact collisions justifies it. If as a result of their implementation, though, the number of ambulance visits to red light collisions in the jurisdiction actually increased, it becomes laughably difficult to justify cameras on public safety grounds.
http://gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com/2006/01/texas-ag-should-say-no-to-red-light.html
I've found driving has been getting too easy. I think they should make the length of the yellow random so it ups the challenge.
I hate Orwellian big brother revenue enhancement programs like this.
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