people (on here) yelled at me about this when i said it before but a) you need traffic enforcement and b) speed cameras are vastly preferable to cops.
Reposted from
David Ho
“…when speed cameras are doing the ticketing, the proportion of tickets issued to Black and white drivers aligns closely with their respective share of roadway users. With human enforcement, in contrast, police officers stop Black drivers at a rate that far outstrips their presence on the road.”
Comments
This is a problem with license plate readers.
It’s clear, however, that police never have a power they don’t abuse eventually.
"What tour?"
THE WORLD TOUR!!!
The cameras can be more even handed; the cameras need to be properly tuned for safety rather than max revenue.
The worst thing is that lots of people think tech solutions are “set and forget,” or somehow magic, when they are absolutely not.
However, cameras aren’t gonna “smell weed” as a pretext for a search or asset seizure, or shoot someone reaching for their wallet.
Cameras are often sold to cities or counties as a revenue source and pushback and a public insistence on tuning and calibrating the cameras is necessary.
So this would be the correct take if fines were wealth based, but instead this just punishes the working class and keeps them poor.
Can AI law enforcement tools be truly 'color blind', or is AI inherently racist, being a product of human imagination?
So far people are emboldened here to not stop on red, to drive through signs, and ignore school busses.
I want to safely navigate. Not just get there.
And to stop inspiring others to do the same. I shouldn't have to fear crossing the parking lot of a grocery store because people "don't need to respect a stop sign or right of way."
Gas is much more expensive, too.
I just know how aggravating it is to drive I'm Hyde Park/Englewood with speed cameras every few blocks.
It doesn't feel like safety to me: it feels like revenue generation on those least able to pay.
Make no mistake: The shirts will be blue this time.
with sliding scale for fines based on income as well the offence
and use both in person roadside ticketing and traffic cameras
and make repeat offenders pay to take driving lessons with actual attendance or lose their license for a month
This would require a much more expansive bureaucracy. That's preferable to the deadlines of police, but it opens up new issues that will hit poor folks.
Now, everyone is going the same speed, whatcha gonna do about tailgating?
I know the autobahn culture is a bit nuts - but I thought in towns and cities things were a bit better. maybe not?
I have bicycled there, and the few times I had to ride a bike on a secondary road (not a separated bike path) drivers were *extremely* courteous.
Never mind all the drunk driving. We're a country of low-key alcoholics.
So in a 60 zone, speed cameras give out tickets at 65.
over 100kph its 5%. so in a 120 you get one at 126.
in the US the tolerance is *typically* 10mph or *16kph*
so.... cool trade, I'll take it.
(rather low limits in town, rather fast on most autobahns)
Like its just universally accepted that that is okay!
going even the limit on secondary, country roads in the UK scared the shit out of me.
On the motorways (much less stressful) I think I was just at the limit.
I'm sure I annoyed many a UK driver slowing down considerably at round abouts
(I'd have gotten several tickets, i tend to be around 5 over here - or 7 on the highways 0 so other drivers don't literally try to kill me)
Not sure about it being the core of 'rugged individualism' but it comes close.
The petty, day-to-day harassment that Black residents in Ferguson, MO faced with traffic tickets and fines was parallel to the harassment British colonists felt from taxes and tariffs on tea and rum.
LOTS of people 'casually' speed. What they're thinking is that EVERYONE speeding will be tagged. Likely not- it'll be like a 5-10 MPH cushion due to all the possible variables.
City streets tho...
It works fine, but the USA has this weird cultural expectation that the "real" speed limit is 5-10 mph above whatever the sign says.
Hum. Maybe the solution would be two cameras- if you're speeding past BOTH, bang- ticket.
The effective limits on side streets shouldn’t be 30 mph.
He got a stern but polite letter noting that multiple cameras had seen him speeding that the speed limits were in fact limits and asking him to slow down.
After that he got fines.
There is a 'happy medium', and conversations like this can lead to it. :)
Camera enforcement of speed limits improves safety.
(I do think there should also be minimums on limited-access freeways with 60+ maximums, for both safety and traffic flow)
You tell people the limit is 50 with a 5mph "buffer" people are going to drive 55.
I agree that what happens to that data is a big worry, though.
Tax the hell out of SUVs/tall cars & huge trucks, plus proper urban design with less lanes (eliminate stroads), narrower, tree-lined streets make drivers feel it's not safe to drive fast, that adjusts driver behaviour.
Probably drives a massive truck & speeds regularly. It's about impunity for People Like Us.
I’m personally sick of impatient drivers trying to beat us while in the crosswalk. I’ve been nearly hit too many times.
Now that bodycams are a thing, my presumption is the cop is lying unless corroborated by a camera.
yes it might currently be necessary, but other solutions exist that might be preferable to both
That and the ways cities will tweak things like light timing and speed limits to juice revenue.
It'd likely be a problem for households with more than one member using a particular car, but as for me nobody drives my car but me. I don't want to have to put up with cops.
"multi-tasking" on their phones.
(One even using BOTH thumbs to text..... think about that...)
Someone doing 46 in a 40 is not the same as 98, from a safety and situational perspective.
How could this be addressed, beyond a ping to dispatch from the camera?
(Cops having do *real* work is the pachyderm du jour.)
A camera can't prevent, much less STOP, dangerous and stupid.
There are countries where the ticket is further based on the offender's income, which I think is a *great* idea.
Driving in France has been transformed over the last ten years.
I guarantee that if the law was repealed, a large number of those people would suddenly oppose red-light cameras, likely using progressive language (“unfair to low-income ppl”)
As long as you make it easy and fair to challenge the ticket
If they set speed limits to the speed 75% drove then I'd agree.
Did find where the private company was trying to increase installation x10 though and was getting a fat share of ticket revenue.
I love the large light-up shame numbers.
Edmonton has them, too!
https://www.lse.ac.uk/News/Latest-news-from-LSE/2017/10-October-2017/Speed-cameras-reduce-road-accidents-and-traffic-deaths-according-to-new-study
1. Cost.
2. Privacy.
3. I think traffic laws are dumb and I hate anything that makes it harder to break them.
Responses:
1. Sure, but still a cheap way to save lives.
2. Appropriate safeguards are not that hard.
3. Blocked.
Anything that is an alternative to cops is better.
In virtually every situation I can think of, cops are a worse solution to a problem.
Just because a solution isn't perfect doesn't make it as bad as or worse than cops.
Cops are absolutely terrible as a solution.
It’s nuts not to encourage their use at least a bit more widely.
It protect the people in the neighborhoods they are places in. Not punishes
(you should obviously follow the law, even if you think that this law is a bit stupid)
Our speed limit isn't 30 km/h
And people generally drive faster than allowed, because our fines are pretty low.
We are not Switzerland
1. there's nobody on the road until suddenly there is and you're going way too fast to react
2. going 100mph in a normal car can be extremely dangerous *to you* even if no one else is around
It’s still bad. Better we fix traffic to reduce enforcement?
Otherwise the critiques tend to boil down to "I should be able to commit crime, but other people shouldn't."
I see arguments for and against just being honest
And this is indeed what much of the research done before this says.
I’m all for safety. But there’s too much bias in placement of cameras in black and brown neighborhoods
So do we need cops to pull those folks over? Some other group? We need to figure it out.
e.g., in most big cities a good portion of obscured plates and/or parked illegally are cops, fireman, connected people, etc --- their cars aren't getting towed. So what agency handles towing so it's (relatively) free from favor?
That’s not really what we are discussing here.
(Since that is where we are 😀)
I don’t see how location is a source of bias.
I want them in mine so I can jog or ride a bike without getting killed.
Even if they *are* put in certain neighborhoods to "punish" the people there, I mean, that works exactly one time.
Not installing them in wealthier neighborhoods.
If there are verifiable ways to ensure that the cameras have limited triggers and are never available to cops, then sure, that's cool. I don't think anyone is doing that though.
Seitz is a long-time, hateful, POS who is among those whose behavior augured the coming of Trumpism.
https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2023/05/25/spousal-rape-loophole-continues-in-ohio-despite-years-of-bipartisan-support/
https://www.propublica.org/article/chicagos-race-neutral-traffic-cameras-ticket-black-and-latino-drivers-the-most
To my mind, accuracy is massively under-rated in the public debate. It may be hard to demonstrate courts are accurate but for lots of technologies the opposite is true.
Also, peripherally, WHY THE HELL is it not true that any FSD vehicles are speed restricted to the legal limit? For god's sake, e-bikes are!
Chicago's placed speed cameras in some bogus places, though. Between two fenced-in cemeteries, purportedly to protect kids at the park! (I go no more than 29 mph there.)
Traffic cameras don't shoot innocent people.
Lots of reasons not to fully buy into that version of the arg, either! Just clarifying.
"...so drivers will be less likely to speed there and hit children?"
https://www.transport.gov.scot/publication/guidance-relating-to-the-traffic-signs-amendment-scotland-regulations-and-general-directions-2022-august-2022/miscellaneous-advisory-and-warning-signs/
Especially the 'well actually the safest way to drive is to go with the flow of traffic' folks (aka everybody speeds to match the fastest driver).
Commuting has become an act of worship for some folks.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/06/finnish-businessman-hit-with-121000-speeding-fine
Does there need to be some thoughtfulness about where the cameras are placed? Sure. But it only tickets people driving recklessly, so just don't do that!
If no human was involved in writing the ticket, though, maybe cities will be more open to excluding tickets written by the cameras?
I wonder if BCC, WMCA, WM Police have done equality impact assessments on their current enforcement strategy.
But yeah
More of these things, please.
Traffic enforcement revenues should be dedicated to redesign.
All without police.