Redflex: red light camera revenues are DOWN for the year.

It would be great if all the cameras were removed and the local governments and companies like Redflex can no longer profit from otherwise innocent motorists.

No matter what your opinion about red light cameras is, it certainly seems like it's stretching it to call people who run red lights "innocent motorists."

Great one, clmathes! Innocent motorists, eh? Maybe if you can get your way we can lose those pesky speed limits along our public thoroughfares as well!

Local governments shortening yellow lights and setting artificially low speed limits in an effort to increase revenue is the reason I say that many of the motorists "caught" by the cameras are typically law-abiding citizens who are simply going about their daily business.

Sorry, but I don't buy into your conspiracy theory. It just sounds like whining by someone who likes to break the law but doesn't like getting caught. I have zero fear of ever being caught by a red light or speed camera, because I am an "innocent motorist" who obeys the law.

Plus, all of the monitored intersections around here have signs on all four approaches, ALL yellow lights, monitored or not, are 4.5 secs and it's only the approach with the highest accident rate that is monitored in the first place. Add a red light camera POI database to your gps unit and you have NOTHING to complain about even if you are a red light runner. Why, you'd have to be a real dorkus (but not Nimrod!) to get a photo op in the middle of an intersection underneath a red light. Red light cameras are installed at intersections with the highest accident rate at that. Take a look at what kind of protection you have when you are going through an intersection and someone T-bones you. Not much! I'll take whatever help I can get to decrease my odds of some Type A trying to beat a yellow light and I (and/or my family) happens to be in that intersection at the same time. Those are among the deadliest accidents. And you can't expect police departments to have the manpower to monitor intersections for red light runners, especially in this economy.

Saddle Light New member with sarcastic comment.

No, I just have a wife and children and friends who have driver's licenses that I care about instead of just myself.
Look, as mentioned by another user, if you don't run red lights, you have no reason to fear red light cameras. If you have a problem with running red lights: 1. Keep your eyes out for the signs that actually inform you that the intersection you're about to approach is indeed a monitored one. 2. As a backup, download the red light camera database from this website, so, between the signs and your gps unit, you have to admit, if you get your picture taken underneath a red traffic signal, you deserve the citation!

What many are saying, is that the yellow light timings are being reduced to increase revenue. This is contrary to improving safety. If you are used to a 4.5 sec yellow and proceed into the intersection at the speed limit, and the yellow is reduced to 2.5 seconds, you might get hit, even though you are doing nothing illegal.

If safety were the priority, they would increase yellow light times to assure that the intersection is clear before changing any light to green.

But as I am reading, and from experience in the Phoenix area, money is the main objective. Phoenix officials even pointed out how much money would go into the state coffers from these cameras to help alleviate the budget crisis.

If the red light camera intersections really are tweaked the way you're describing, I'd probably be on the picket line too. I can't imagine any municipality getting away with shortening a yellow light duration to trick people into running it as a revenue generator. That's downright dangerous! It's probably even illegal, being that there should be a yellow light duration standard for all intersections in any given municipality. Not only do we have a consistent 4.5 sec. yellow, we also have a 1.5 sec all-red and yet we get near weekly fatals at intersections around here. Again, we have the signs marking the monitored intersections, the cameras are only on the most accident-prone approach (not all 4 approaches to the intersection) and very few of our 550 traffic light intersections here have them anyway. That's why I don't have any problem with them and, having a wife and two children who drive, and being a driver myself, I actually like them. If I ever get caught running a red light through a monitored intersection it will be a serious wake up call that I obviously needed.

I never got a ticket for beating a red light nor in an accident that is my fault. WHY! because I'm a defensive driver. Everyone should be one to avoid an accident not to be depended on the law, RLC camera or any device that should prevent driver from their own stupidity or stupidity of other. Be aware of your surrounding. Look left and right twice before crossing an intersection or stop sign or making a right turn. Constant vigilant is the key.

In San Diego, CA that actually happened. Lockheed Martin was the red light camera vendor and they were controlling the signals. They actually reduced the yellow light times below what was allowed by state law in order to make more money. They got caught and the courts had to refund fines, tens of thousands of individual fines. I don't remember how much money it was but it was a *lot*.

....we now have a timer countdown in the walk/dontwalk display.

When is reaches zero, you know that you are getting a yellow, no matter what it's length.

I find myself now timing against that countdown, and not the yellow anymore.

If I see that I am at or over 500ft away, and it now says 1, I know I am blowing the red or at best a very drastically yellow light! It has changed my driving style bit.

I think it is a great idea and worth implementing in other areas. (better than recieving a ticket in the mail!!!)

We still have red light camera's, and plenty of them. But this countdown and with the aid of the red light camera POI, if I run a red light, I am the stupid one!

Vanman

Sometimes I have to wonder whether some of the posters on this site are people who benefit from the cameras, such as camera company employees or city officials. Otherwise, I can only conclude that they are people who have been brainwashed by the camera companies (or those that support them). Wake up people!!! These things are nothing more than instruments to take money out of your pockets and put it into theirs. Independent studies by those not benefitting from these cameras show that these things actually decrease safety, so that is not a very good argument for them.

People are getting fed up with all the garbage going on, altogether. People are demanding enough is enough.

We want our country back, people to be responsible and common sense be the rule of thumb.

While some of us may sound like we have a financial interest in red light cameras, other members make it sound like they're a great big government conspiracy to "take our last dollar." T. Turtle, if you have a report for us to read from a reputable source verifying your conspiracy theory, I'll be glad to read it with an open mind. Check this one out in the meantime: http://www.iihs.org/research/qanda/rlr.html If "they" are indeed hoping you'll run the red so they can collect your cash, why on earth would they identify the intersection being monitored? That doesn't make any sense! It's common sense to me: just do all one can to avoid running red lights only at these monitored intersections and one is free to continue exercising his or her constitutional right to run red lights everywhere else. Then one can stop being so afraid of these RLCs and "The Man" running them. It sounds like this thread is divided into two camps. Those who believe that red light cameras serve a useful safety purpose and those who think it's a government conspiracy theory. Neither side is likely to change the other. Maybe it's time to close this thread and move on! Hey, let's move on to government health care. I'm SURE we'll all agree on that one!

As I get older my reflexes althouh still good enough to have a class A license would be sorely tested in a amber light of less than 3 seconds.I have also seen several green lights that last for less than 10 seconds.

I'm so upset about the falloff in profitability for Redflex that I'm writing my congressional rep and asking for a bailout bill to save them. /sarcasm mode off.

Saddle Light, you certainly haven't been paying attention to threads here if you're unaware that US cities have been caught shortening yellow lights to ramp up revenue at intersections where it's fallen off. It definitely has been reported. A quick websearch turned up these examples of seven cities (and there have been others):
Seattle, Washington:
http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/23/2379.asp

Chattanooga, Tennesse:
Dallas, Texas:
Springfield, Missouri:
Nashville, Tennessee:
Lubbock, Texas:
Union City, California:
http://www.motorists.org/blog/6-cities-that-were-caught-shor...

Also see:
http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/25/2593.asp

So welcome to the picket line. It is definitely dangerous when cars blow through red lights, and I'd like to see traffic safety improve there as well. But the first step any city should have to take before installing a red light camera is lengthening the yellow light at a problem intersection and LEAVING it long at any intersection where a camera goes up. That makes it clear that the priority is improved safety and not enhanced revenue. There should be timing standards that are enforced, as there now in the state of Tennessee (three second minimum), and anybody who can show that the timing standards were not met at the intersection should not have to pay a ticket.

Nor should people be getting $100 or whatever red light camera tickets for right-turns-on-red (and this is the basis for the majority of red light camera tickets) or for stopping a foot or so over a stop line, as these issues are not a common cause of fatal t-bone accidents.

These red light cameras are particularly a mixed bag for safety, in my opinion, at intersections in which the speed limit is 45mph or higher. It is very difficult to judge whether there is time to stop before the line in the split-second drivers have to make the call when the yellow comes on, and installing a red light camera at such a high-speed intersection with a quick yellow forces drivers to jam on the brakes and risks rear-end collisions that otherwise would never have occurred.

Is there somewhere we can see where this is documented and actually happened...????

If you run a red light or speed how do you figure you are innocent if you get caught???

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http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-peopl...

Judge dismisses 290 red light camera tickets in San Diego

That information and info is almost 10 years old...

Yea. I think they have been gone a long time.

That doesn't make it not true, however. The got caught cheating, as all red light camera vendors probably do if they could.

What I find interesting is that a company which makes a product that's almost universally despised can have its revenues "up" in the first place.

BTW, here's an article from 2009 about shorter yellow lights in Az, and it was referenced in the very first link of the very first post of this thread. Doesn't anybody bother to read this stuff before spouting off on it?
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090701/1842145429.shtml

and another on the same incident:
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/arizona-group-forces-city-t...

IF you are caught by an short yellow light that doesn't give you time to stop or caught by a sudden speed zone change that doesn't give you time to slow down, I would say you are innocent. These cameras are set up to take your money and there are all sorts of ways to manipulate it so innocent motorists get trapped. That is why the cameras need to be banned.

Pay attention to the lights and your speed when driving and quit worrying so much about getting caught. Don't know a single person who has been ticketed for RLC or speeding. If you run a red light or speed does it make it better if you get ticketed by an officer...maybe they should be banned also.

It is great to say that if you watch your P's & Q's you have nothing to worry about. But on the I-10 south of Phoenix, the speed drops from 75 to 65 as you approach metro Phoenix and a congested area. This afternoon, within about 100 yards of the 65 speed sign was a mobile speed cam van - at least the mobile ones use radar, so they can be detected (although the strength of the radar seems to be fairly low). In this case, I do not believe that there was any advanced warning notice that the speed limit was about to go down. So within 30-50 yards of seeing a speed limit sign, the camera/radar unit is already clocking you with radar and ready to nab you. That is sheer greed on the part of the police and the state. (By the way, I did not see a flash, so I assume that I made it by.)

You're exactly right, it is all about making money. They set up the mobile cameras and place the speed and red-light cameras in locations they know there will be a lot of traffic and easy pickings (not to mention setting artificially low speed limits, shortening yellow lights, etc.). It's not about safety, at all. The strategy is simple, locate the cameras in an area where the most revenue will be generated. Safety is the least of their worries.

At 65 mph you are traveling 95.3 feet or about 32 yards per second. Are you saying you aren't looking more than 1 or 2 seconds beyond your front bumper when you're driving that fast?

YIKES!

It's easy enough to see and react to speed limit signs many seconds before you arrive at them, where the limit changes, so having a photo unit just a second or two beyond shouldn't be an issue...

Just as you can accelerate up to the new speed limit so you are at that speed when you pass the sign, you have to decelerate to the new limit by the time you pass the sign.

I guess you also missed the TWO "Photo Enforcement Zone" signs on the shoulder AND the clearly marked vehicle with the masts extended too?

Also, the camera doesn't trip until you are 11 over the speed limit, so if you're doing the previous limit, you're under the trip speed. Besides, most speedometers usually read a few miles per hour faster than your actual speed so you've got an even larger buffer there.

Though I abhor Red Light and Speed cameras and always have the most current file loaded in my GPS when I leave my home area, a lot of the posts in the various the threads on this site are starting to change my mind about them...

If cities get rid of stationary cameras, you can bet they will be replaced with mobile or on the fly sidewalk cameras, Then guess what we won't be able to track poi files for them because they move them about
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The money is to good for cities, and they are not going to give it up. For instance here in Cleveland, the Mobile cameras have a police officer sitting in the car or van, making it a standard enforcement measure even though it is a camera, flashing drivers if they speed by or run a light doing this while the cop is in the car. With this method the city has police presence on site, just as if he were using a vascar unit.

Since these types of cameras can be moved in a moments notice to a different location, POI files for them will go by the wayside.

So be-careful what you ask for, you just might get what we have in Cleveland. (Photo Enforcement Cars with a police officer in each)

get off your dam phones, stop texting or disciplining your children while driving.

I was T-Boned by 2 careless drivers with children in their cars. What were they doing? Who knows. I received a ticket by the office for "failure to yield", I had the right of way and he wasn't at the scene of the accident when it occurred. I fought it in court and WON! Who's still paying the premium, ME. Stupid insurance company.

I guess this is another topic for discussion.