455 Red-Light Cameras

[Martin Hash]

[Montegriffo]

Let's do away with those pesky speed limits too. If I want to drive at 100 mph through the school district it's unconstitutional and un-American to fine me if I get caught. Same with food safety regulations, why should I be fined for selling chicken full of salmonella?
It fact let's get rid of red lights altogether, they are anti Liberty.

[Fife]

^ Room 101 HOFer

[Speaker to Animals]

Let's do away with those pesky speed limits too. If I want to drive at 100 mph through the school district it's unconstitutional and un-American to fine me if I get caught. Same with food safety regulations, why should I be fined for selling chicken full of salmonella?
It fact let's get rid of red lights altogether, they are anti Liberty.

The red light cameras are a for-profit business. The companies that put them there require municipalities to actually reduce the time of the yellow light in order to increase the amount of revenue. Only this has been proven time and again to cause accidents. These are for-profit companies willing to destroy human life through bad policy in order to make a dime by shaking down the American people.

I'd gas them on the spot or deport them to UK, I am not sure which is worse.

[Montegriffo]

Well that's fucked up.
Only the police can put them up here and they reduce the number of people running stop lights and reduce "accidents".
Maybe leaving everything to market forces is a mistake sometimes...

[Speaker to Animals]

Well that's fucked up.
Only the police can put them up here and they reduce the number of people running stop lights and reduce "accidents".
Maybe leaving everything to market forces is a mistake sometimes...

I wouldn't be as opposed to it if the police just outright bought the technology and ran it themselves, but even there Martin has a point in that people who benefit from the fines cannot be the people who are handing out the tickets.

Some groups claim evidence that these red light cameras actually reduce safety by shortening the yellow light time and causing more accidents. All so municipalities and companies can enrich themselves like sheriffs of Nottinghams and Roman publicans.

We do know that a shorter yellow light means more accidents. Three seconds I think is the standard minimum, but they were shortening it even lower than that in some places before getting caught.

There was a thread not long ago about a guy who challenged it in Oregon, proving they reduced the yellow light to unlawfully short spans, and the state tried to convict him for "doing engineering without a license".

[Speaker to Animals]

If running red lights is a problem, then put up straight-up normal cameras in the intersections feeding the video footage to a squad car down the street. As soon as somebody violates the red light, the squad car apprehends the person and tickets them.

Which brings me to another problem with the cameras: they ticket the owner of the vehicle, not the person who is driving. Somebody can be driving your car and you are getting fined for their infraction. The state doesn't give a shit about justice in this case. They only want the money.

[Montegriffo]

Well we have a set time for amber and you can't fuck with it.
Another win for regulations applied sensibility.

[Speaker to Animals]

You also have a nationwide surveillance system that is run by the police and intelligence services, and easily accommodates something like traffic monitoring.

I don't want the surveillance state, so it's not really worth it to me.

In principle, I really have no trouble handing out tickets to the drivers who actually blow red lights. In America, those cameras do not actually prove the person blowing the red light is the person registered to the vehicle. So right off the bat we are talking a miscarriage of justice. Even if they have a photo of the drivers, requiring the vehicle owner to go to court to prove they are not the person in the photo is unjust.

I would rather police just do it in person. Use cameras to facilitate that, but have police physically pull people over and ticket the driver who committed the crime.

I also strongly agree with Martin here that no jurisdiction should directly benefit from ticket revenue of any kind.

That principle really deserves a constitutional amendment.

[Fife]

Whether the ticket is automatically generated, or a buzz is sent to a cop down at the donut shop to pull over xyz vehicle, how are you going to cross-examine a piece of machinery in court?

I'm not surprised the UK subject's only complaint is that the machines aren't muh roadsy enough.