Red-Light Cameras Inherently Discriminate

Sounds like you've got a real cracker-jack idea there.

If that is your ?TRUE? opinion, your best avenue of action is to petition your local and city government to ban all bicycles from the local roads. (Would you include motorcycles, mopeds, and motorscooters, too?)

Now...Back to the red-light camera issue.

I'm not sure what US laws are, but up here, you can get ticketed if you go too slow, not that i have seen anyone being stopped for that. At every hwy entrance there's a sign telling you that you need to be able to do the posted speed limit. Motorcycles can do the posted speed limit and pay to use the road. If you can't do the posted speed limit maybe you belong in a safe bicycle lane. I've seen Bicycles on major streets up here in the evening rush hour going home after work.
They don't last long, maybe a month or two and then they disappear, never see them again. I have bin taking the same route for 25 years.

The license plates would only be a temporary measure until the government can outfit us all at birth with GPS devices to keep track of us!

Welcome to 1984. Oops that's already gone by, hasn't it.

Fred

You should be glad you're not in Houston where they're planning on using drones as eyes in the skies. If you watch the utube video (local channel 2 footage) between 2:32 and 2:54 you'll hear the HPD executive assistant (public affairs?) talk about the multifunction use of the drone. I'm sure there'll be some mission creep from the original intent of border patrol to other law enforcement and surveillance uses. Apparently, these drones have the technical ability to zoom close enough to read license plates and in some cases identify people in a target car or house.

WAY past
...and the exponential effects of advancing technology and Pavlovian-learned 'norms' with it for better & worse.

interesting topic, never quite thought about bikes and red-light cameras.

Amazing how all our rants come out on some of these topics...lol. Here's another thought on one chaps comment on how California's governor was gonna get more Revenue. Couple of days ago on the news they were saying a guy got a speeding ticket in Sweden worth over $200.000.00. He was driving a Ferrari. The reporter said that in Sweden your penalty is based on your income. Sounds really fair to me. 200 bucks means something to me but to the rich it means nothing. Some one in CA care to push that idea to him? Good Luck

Ha! I love it. That should make mine about $20.00

Motorcyclists in a growing number of states are being allowed to go through red lights when sensors aren't able to detect they are there.

Here's the full article:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-06-10-red-light-law...

Doug Hecox, a spokesman for the Federal Highway Administration, said the states should try to find a technical solution to the problem.

"We don't necessarily think that empowering motorists to make up their own rules of the road is the safest or best approach," he said.

Here, too, is a automatic device (similar to a red-light enforcement camera) that can only discriminate automobiles as its applies its function. And what does it do? It marginalizes the other road users, and erodes their comparitive level of safety and freedom of travel that the law affords.

Instead of fixing the traffic light sensors, the states' "fix" to this problem is to carve out a "special class" of vehicles (motorcycles) that can run red-lights. (...and can show NO "legitimate government purpose" for doing so.)

I can almost guarantee that one of the reasons the FEDERAL Highway Admin. does not like this trend is the states are running deep into 14th Amendment territory.

Same problem with red-light enforcement cameras. They allow a group of road vehicles (motorcycles, mopeds, motorscooters, bicycles) to go un-enforced with no "legitimate government purpose" for doing so.

If states are going to use red-light cameras for traffic law enforcement they need to bring ALL road vehicles into a conformity that the cameras can recognise. If a state can not (or is un-willing) to do this, then they must discontinue their red-light camera enforcement programs.

My wifes car had $1500 damage from a bicycle and she was stationary at a stop light.

Sorry to hear that...I got a trip to the hospital once when a stationary car in a long line opened its passenger door into the bike lane. Instantly clothed-lined me...

Back to red-light cameras...

You know a recurring trend I have noticed in many of these posts about red-light camera enforcement is how willing many people are to associate and compare the enforcement limitations of the red-light camera with human discretion. As if they were the same thing.

Let me summarize my view on that argument and be crystal clear: HUMAN DISCRETION AND THE LIMITATIONS OF A MACHINE ARE NOT THE SAME THING. They are apples and oranges. To compare the two as if they were equivalent only raises the status of the machine and lowers the status of the human.

Sorry to put it to you so bluntly, but --- there it is.

I was taught a couple of tricks when I rode. One was to ride down the sensor line to maximize the amount of exposure to the detector, the second was to drop the side stand and put it on a junction where a two loops met. Both worked and I rode a "small" bike, only 500 cc.

So, what you're saying is you had to maneuver your motorcycle from the comparative safety of the center of the traveling lane to the outer edges of the lane where the sensor lines lay?

You sometimes also had to put your kick-stand down while in the middle of traffic???

And you had to perform all this "Rube Goldberg" maneuvering to (hopefully/maybe) activate the traffic light machine???

A perfect example of how the limitations of machines create inherent discriminations in the application of laws. It's a compelling argument towards motive that some states recognise this discrimination in in their revenue benign red-light traffic SENSOR applications, but not in their revenue enhancing red-light camera ENFORCEMENT applications.

Perhaps these two class-action causes have more in common than they realize...

Slightly off the topic, but a motorcyclist should tell you that the center of the lane is usually where you don't want to be.

Most slippery from asstd. drippings, not the optimum place to be seen in a mirror, etc.

(..wait.. I just did )

THATS IT!!!

There is only ONE way to solve this whole redlight camera problem!
Everybody meet at my place and we will all turn ourselves in.

This is the thing, if a car runs a red light they are taking a very small risk. There is a small chance that if a collision occurs that they would be killed or injured. Also, the car has potential to cause damage when it hits or is hit by another car. A bicyclist has a higher risk cost. If they hit a car or is hit by a car there is very high risk to personal injury or death. Even though cars are fined but bicyclists are not there is still a higher cost for a bicyclist to run a red light. That cost is the high risk of injury. A motorcycle still has lower cost than a bicycle. A motorcycle travels faster and therefore has a lower risk or collision. A bicycle is slow and the rider has almost zero protection. No offense but this topic is very illogical, it seems that the poster did not really think it through.

I disagree. If you go by the topic subject, they DO discriminate between road users that are supposed to obey the same rules when it comes to red lights.

His additional comment about 'not so sure that is entirely legal to apply the same traffic law diffrently to one group of road users .. than another group ..' may or may not turn out to be a legal fact, but I think he's spot on about them being discriminatory by (current) design and/or implementation.

Where most of the disagreement seems to come from is when we try to rationalize 'discrimination' as in a 'victim' of it, and opinions differ there. But discrimination is by definition:

1. an act or instance of discriminating.
2. treatment or consideration of, or making a distinction in favor of or against, a person or thing based on the group, class, or category to which that person or thing belongs rather than on individual merit.

I think it's obvious using definition two that most all current implementations of them do, and thereby fit definition one.

As for which road user is most discriminated against by their flaw and with the worst potential consequences, my vote goes to the juvenile pedestrian.

Not to mention that you should switch wheel tracks every couple of minutes to help fix in the driver's mind there really is something behind me because the light just moved.

In essence, any method of issuing tickets is discriminatory. How many times has an officer pulled someone over on an expressway, and everyone drives by going over the speed limit? There's no way to ticket everyone for every infraction 100% of the time, so does that mean we don't ticket anyone ever? Of course not. I'm all for getting rid of RLCs, but not because bicycles cannot be ticketed the same as automobiles.

Again you are supplanting discrimination for discretion. A human officer chooses whom to pull-over (out of ALL the road vehicles) base on a number of discretionary factors.

A red-light enforcement camera does not even have the opportunity to do this. It can only pull over one type of vehicle (cars) and disreguards the others
(motorcycles, motorscooters, mopeds, and bicycles).

No. you can not provide 100% enforcement, but the enforcement provided must be equal under the law. The percentage left out can not be a particular "class" of vehicle left un-enforced, especially when it is within the sates authority and jursdiction to bring ALL the vehicles into a protocoll the camera can recognise for enforcement.

When the state decides to move to an automated red-light camera enforcement system the state MUST bring ALL the vehicles it previously enforced with it...

RLCs have humans that check the data, and decide if a fine should be issued. It's not an automatic system that relies on machines alone.

I'm wondering why you're spending so much time and energy discussing this with people on the internet, instead of taking this issue to the proper authorities?

LOL.... you sure started something here. This post of yours just keeps going and going.

Yes, humans check the "data". But, the "data" excludes: motorcycles, motorscooters, mopeds, and bicycles.

The "human checker" can sit as his/her desk all day and watch countless: motorcycles, motorscooters, mopeds and bicycles run the red-light. The "checker" officer (in states that have such) is completely powerless to issue any citations for those vehicle classes even though they are covered under the SAME law as the automobile...even if that officer saw a particularly grevious act - there is no way to effect a citation for those vehicle classes.

The discrimination is a limitation of the red-light camera method and occures before any human has a chance to apply their own discretion. Further, the machine actually prevents the human (the "checker officer" in this case) from being able to apply their authority and discretion across ALL the vehicle classes covered by the vehicular traffic laws.

And...just to go off subject for a moment...I'm wondering just who are YOU to call into question how I spend MY time???

(BTW...your "either/or choice" of discussing.."this with people on the internet, instead of taking this issue to the proper authorities" ...is a false choice. Not sure if you realize that.)

Ummm I do!,but then I am always aware of my surrounding and have my GPSr loaded with the freshest files from the POI factory and I don't speed either.
If you speed or don't stop for a red light then you deserve what you get.

I guess I'm going to make a "false choice" of no longer participating in this topic. I'm beginning to question how I'm spending MY own time! I have much data and logic to check, so I'll be busy with that.

I prefer you spend it every where. Maybe it was a bad choice of words, maybe not. Either way I wouldn't want you to take it personal. I've seen some of these topics go really haywire... NEXT.. When i bought my first GPS I had no idea what else i could do with it. When i bought the 755t I lucked out and found this place. Had the 755t not caused me any grief I still wouldn't know what these things can and cannot do, and i wouldn't have found this place. And too boot all this info is FREE so are the files. I read through the posts and grab what ever info that might pertain to me, and add my 2 cents once in a while. There's tons here that is totally useless to me, I cannot bring a gun to the US so why would i care about gun shops? but i'm sure its quite useful to the next person. I want everyone's 2 cents, i'll sort out what's useful...lol

Claudius

Tucson publicly stated it would not send out tickets to Mexican plates! Thats discrimination, they say they would mostly be unenforceable(READ not profitable). Would an LEO let a Mexican run a red or go 50 in a 25 without ticketing? Traffic cams do nothing for safety, they want the money, period. If they help safety, how come all they tail light pieces and other scraps near Traffic Cam locations?

If it wasn't for RLC's and Speed cameras we would have nothing to complain or talk about....

If you do it on a: motorcycle, motorscooter, moped, bicycle (or your vehicle is registered in Mexico) - you get a FREE PASS.

I believe that is a "personal choice"...

Thanks for your input about red-light cameras, though.

interesting topic