Do traffic cameras at junctions improve safety or Revenue ?

If the reason is based on safety - to reduce accidents caused by running a red light, then it obviously isn't working.

However - if the real reason is to increase fines - then it is a source of revenue for councils. Not only this, but your car insurance also rises depending on how many accidents your area has.



- So it seems a win-win situation to tax the people, without improving road safety at all.



I suggest a cheaper (free) option to improve road safety - by just extending the time of the orange light by 1 second.Do traffic cameras at junctions improve safety or Revenue ?
People like David P are very naive. Red light cameras benefit the pocket books of the red light camera companies and some cities. It's called penal fines for a profit. The more people you get to be criminals, the more money you make. And so cities have shortened the length of the yellow light to force more people to run red lights.



In the end, all of us are answerable to Newton's Laws of Motion. In order to safely stop your car, the yellow light has to be at least a specific number of seconds long. Most cities violate these primal Laws of Motion . . . especially for shorter left turn yellows--those directly violate the Law of Momentum.



The entire existence of the RLC industry owes itself to the left turn arrow flaw and a flaw in the application of the Institute of Traffic Engineers' (ITE) yellow light duration equation.



ITE's equation, in order to work properly, requires that every driver knows the point on the road located at the safe braking distance from the intersection. If the light turns yellow before you get to this point, you must brake. If the light turns yellow after you pass this point, you must go. It is a real physical point, but you don't know where it is. That's a problem.



The DOT doesn't tell you this crucial piece of information, but you got to have it to know whether or not you must go or stop. So every approach you make to a traffic light that just turned yellow is a guess--a gamble. Do I stop or do I go? We often guess right. But if we approach the light just in the those few seconds whether we really don't know whether to go or stop, then we have a dilemma. The equation sets the length of the yellow to HALF the time your cars needs to stop; therefore, stopping is not a logical option. Going is. The length of yellow predisposes you to beat the light. The gamble and the bias result in the statistical certainty that eventually you will run a red light. RLC companies and cities bank on it.



David P will eventually run a red light at an intersection with a red light camera. When David runs the light, it will not be because David is a bad driver, but because of the statistical inevitability caused by the gamble and bias inherint in the yellow light equation.



Before RLCs, police officers who had a brain wouldn't care if you were 1/10 second too late. Police officers know its a guess and grant leniency. But a RLC is stupid. The RLC doesn't know of the inherint gamble and bias in ITE's yellow light equation.



- - -



By the way, DO NOT THINK FOR A MOMENT that police officers are cheaper than red light cameras. The Town of Cary, North Carolina pays RedFlex Camera Company $900,000.00 per year to maintain 15 cameras. For that price, you could hire 18 police officers at $50,000/year. 1 officer per light, and you still have 3 left over officers.



The Town of Cary advertises that it gives the money to the school district. But the Town of Cary lies to cover up their indisgression, and the backlash if the people of Cary ever found out what Cary really did the money. Out of $1,000,000/year Cary collects, only about $30,000 goes to the schools.



Penal fines for a profit . . . for the profit of the RLC company. Against the NC Consitution by the way . . . and I am still waiting for the Wake County School Board to sue the Town of Cary.
They improve both. One second isn't going to make a bit of difference. The lights in your area are programmed for a specific reason. Technically, if you can't stop safely when you see the amber light; then you're going too fast and deserve the ticket. Around in my area, the traffic camera's have been working. It's not 100%, but its pretty effective.



Bottom line is don't try to beat lights where you know camera's might be. I'm sure you can spot them just before you pass the light. You do have a point with the car insurance statement, but there are ways around it. You can either move, or do other things to keep your insurance down.Do traffic cameras at junctions improve safety or Revenue ?
Of course, they are for the purpose of generating revenue. End of story? No. Roundabouts have been shown to be safer than traffic signals, and allow for greater traffic flow through an intersection. They have two problems, however. Safe roundabouts require drivers who are sufficiently intelligent to use them and sufficiently polite. Second, they take up a fair amount of land, which in some areas becomes an issue. Our environmental planners need to stop playing with ideas from around the world, and concentrate on what works. Our politicians need to be fired, put on the dole, and taught to respect the rest of us. If you are going to muck with the yellow lights, there is another option to consider. In some places they now have a countdown clock built into the pedestrian signals that shows exactly when the red will appear to both the pedestrians and the drivers.
If you look at the number of camera's and then look at the number of accidents of various types then you will see that there is no correlation between camera's and accidents.



There have already been a number of slip ups indicating that the government at the time was playing up the significance of camera's when in fact it was not.



Orange lights will not affect the stats. Better driver training will.Do traffic cameras at junctions improve safety or Revenue ?
BINGO!!!



Very few people are sharp enough to figure out that these cams have nothing to do with improving safety.



Police departments love them because they are cheaper than live cops. These things don't take vacations, sick days, don't need medical ins., and when they are old, no pension.



P.S. and the reason they actually cause accidents is because people are following too close when the driver slams on his brakes to avoid a ticket.



AND, they DO bring in more revenue than cops do, because NO ONE gets any breaks, including young women with short skirts.
They are not installed for revenue.

Anyone running a red light is a danger to themselves and other road users, they deserve to be caught.

Persistant offenders should be banned from driving.



The roads are dangerous enough without idiots who think the rules don't apply to them.



Let's have more cameras and stiffer fines.
The there is no known cure for stupidity, except death. Unfortunately too often the stupidest person survives the accident.

Between greed and stupidity our governments have a lot to do. It seems that the stupidest greediest persons win the elections because they can tell the biggest believable lie.

So don't look to elected officials to solve the problem, just drive smarter.
Extending the AMBER will just make people say hey I can still make the light. The goal is to increase safety by telling them not to try and make the light, as well as wanting to increase revenue(we ALL know that is part of the goal). There is no FREE solution, because people will keep running red lights.
But with out the income from the cameras then they couldnt afford to repair the roads, at least with cameras if your a good driver you shouldnt get done, where as if they added that tax somewhere else, you would have no option.
Research already has show that traffic cameras do cause more accidents, reason is that drivers see them and become more distracted and actually slow down under the posted speed limit which also causes accidents...
speed cameras are more of a hinderance than a help



when someone speeding sees the camera they generally hit the brakes , which could cause an accident

generally the best option is to delay the red light for 3 seconds
it seems u answerd ur own question