Good news for voters in Bellingham, Wa

All cameras should be banned in WA. Catching speeders and red light blowers is one thing but ticketing people for rolling right hand turns?? Sorry but we are not PERFECT drivers. Do something more useful with your time officer.

Many times with taxes on hotel rooms or other taxes on out of town'ers we first think well it won't affect me so why should I care? Problem is, like any other transaction you get burned once and you don't come back. Photo cameras are a tax. Justify them till the cows come home and they're still a tax.

I would have thought that a ticket was a "fine" (as opposed to a "tax") because a "fine" is defined as money extracted as a penalty.

However, I find that a "tax" is defined as a charge against a citizen's person, property or activity for the support of government. So, it would appear that a ticket is a "fine" but can also be characterized as a "tax".

This means that a lot of people will automatically be opposed to cameras because they are opposed to "taxes".

Of course, people get "fines" for things like insider trading and polution, etc. So, I expect that a lot of people - in the interest of being consistent - will be asking the authorities not to enforce laws against insider trading and polution because doing so could result in the offended being "taxed".

I consider redlight cam referendums a vote for a higher quality of life.

Like when communities vote to ban those ubiqitous plastic bags floating through every parking lot, park and thoroughfare.

There are a miriad of ways to enforce the law...just like there are a million ways to carry your groceries home.

To say that a group or community that opposes redlight cameras are opposed to enforcing the law is akin to saying those who oppose plastic bags in their community are "anti-grocery". (Or those who oppose nuclear power are "anti-electricity".)

The causality of the opposition is misinterpreted and misplaced.

The reality is - votes against RLC's are an opportunity to still enforce the laws (and engineer the roadways) in manner that is more accetable to the majority of the community...that's all.

I say....good for those voters in Bellingham.

How does the absence of red-light camera contribute to a higher quality of life? and for whom?

Has any citizen referendum against cameras contained any comments about alternative enforcement?

Has any group opposed to red-light cameras ever taken their "opportunity" following a ban and followed up with plans for alternative enforcement or re-engineering the roadways?

HF stated his opinions. Why don't you give opinions instead of questioning others?

If HF was stating his opinions, I misread his post. It seemed to me that a reasonable person reading his post would conclude that HF made declarative statements. I did.

So, I asked if he had any support for those statements.

It is my opinion that some people who oppose cameras want to be able to speed and or/run red light when they feel they need to. There are many people who are opposed to cameras because they have been told selective and misleading information (they certainly have not read the full studies in an attempt to make up there own mind). There are some who are anti government.

I have responded in other threads to the misrepresentations of camera studies by some on this site. When someone selectively extracts a statement like 'rear-end accidents are increased" without also admitting that "fatalities" are reduced - they are being disingenuous.

Well, he started off his post with "I consider."

I agree with Frside007 that these "fines" are just taxes by another name. Numerous jurisdictions have put these RLC's in place at illegally short yellow lights just to raise revenue without increasing the lengths of the yellows (which would increase safety but decrease revenue).

If the government is serious about putting these RLC's up for safety, they shouldn't retain a single dime. Let all the fines go to some random charity. We'd see then what their real motivation be.

(emphasis added)

You make a valid point. Perhaps I should have given more consideration to HF's "I consider"

You have made a declaratory statement that, in my opinion, is false. Can you point to "numerous" pieces of evidence (not thenewspaper.com's selective quoting - but studies or reports) that would back up that statement?

I have reported on several instances where short yellow times appeared to me to be a money grab. "Numerous" seems to me to be a stretch to make a point.

I have an opinion of studies. It seems to me that the findings of a study vary, sometimes greatly, depending on who funds the study.
From Florida FHWA

Now here is a respected professor that did not conduct a study.

And here is a summary of 5 other studies.
http://blog.motorists.org/red-light-cameras-increase-acciden...

And this from atsol'

Please provide proof of your opinion, "that some people who oppose cameras want to be able to speed and or/run red light when they feel they need to."

I think we all know of areas where speed limits were reduced because of political pressure and not based on engineering studies. A perfect example is Queens Boulevard in Queens NY. There have been many instances of pedestrians that have been killed or seriously injured by drivers both exceeding the then in force limit and now the reduced limit and drivers obeying the limit.

The limit was reduced at least once that I know of and possibly twice.

Queens Blvd. is a road that is three lanes in each direction with a two lane service road in each direction.

Many of the people killed were not crossing at the corner in a cross walk but in the middle of the block. The time needed to cross was not adequate for older people or those with even mild impairment of mobility. The City changed the length of green time to cross in addition to reducing the speed limit. The city even installed fences on the median to prevent mid block crossing.People are still getting killed because of their own laziness and stupidity.

The limit was reduced to satisfy the the pressure groups and the City gets to write speeding tickets for exceeding a 30 MPH limit on a road theat should have a 40 MPH limit.

To the best of my knowledge no evidence was produced that showed that by reducing the limit there would be fewer pedestrians hit by cars.

To one of my previous posts, spokybob chided me for asking questions because he claimed that HawaiianFlyer had only given an opinion. I then responded

I generally do not like to give "opinions" but when I do, I try to label them as such. At the same time, if I make a declaratory statement, I generally have a source for that statement and, if there is other information from the source that is necessary for presenting a complete and/or balanced view, I give that also.

As I have pointed out in other threads, people often engage in selective quoting, like red light cameras increase rear end accidents, without giving the complete conclusions of the study.

Back to the questions:

I granted that HF's first statement on quality of life could be considered an opinion. I thought that the statements about "alternative enforcement" and "opportunity" to follow up were intended to be declaratory to justify a position and asked if HF knew of any groups who had followed up.

I felt that spokebob was defending someone's right to give an opinion without having to provide support. So, I thought I would give an "opinion" to see if I would be given the same treatment - that is, not having to provide proof for my opinion. I did not really expect that I would be treated the same, and so

Of course - I have no "proof" that "some" (not all, but some) people oppose cameras because they want to speed or run red-lights when they want to. But, let's look at the situation. We had, in another thread) a long discussion trying to come up with valid reasons for running red-lights (see http://www.poi-factory.com/node/30318) and determined precious few legitimate reasons for doing so. Thus, If people still blow thru red lights they are, in my opinion, doing so because they want to.

And, it takes a long time before the proper engineering is taken up.

Basically, you've proven nothing. You were supposed to back up your opinion with proof that other people want/need to blow through red lights. No one in that thread ever said such a thing. It's what you think other people think. I'm not even sure that's an opinion anymore, since you're speaking for other people.

Never claimed I could prove it - and said so in my post above. I said it was an opinion.

I'm glad to have your opinion on opinions. I am imterpreting your opinion to mean that when someone makes a comment like "cameras are for revenue purposes only" that they should be able to present "proof" of that. Have I interpreted your opinion correctly?

In my town, the traffic lights are poorly timed and poorly synchronized. Every time emergency vehicles trip the red light override, it takes many cycles before the lights recsync so you can cross downtown without being stopped twice for lights that have not resynced yet.

At off traffic times, if you pull up to a light that just changed for a single cross traffic vehicle, you've got a wait of between 1-2 minutes before the stupid light will change, though the sensors don't detect cross traffic, it is off hours, and you are sitting on the traffic sensor.

Add up all those idling delays, useless burning of fuel across the country and you wonder why people are pissed off that cities and private companies see dollar signs for RLC installations, and don't review the reason for people squeezing the lemon, poor implementation of modern technology to improve traffic efficiency? After all, they don't see any increased revenue in doing such a practical fix. Ask why people push the lights to see what improvements can be made rather than put up more obstacles.

I didn't give an opinion. *edit* But that is another example of your speaking for someone else.

Agree to disagree.

In a post directed at me, you wrote:

How would you characterize your words above? Your opinion as to what jgermann should do? A statement as to what jgermann should do (and if you call it a "statement", on what authority do you purport to speak)?

I was merely doing the same thing you did to HF. Asking for proof of an opinion. And, for the record, I still did not give an opinion in any of my posts in this thread.

That's where I got my "authority." From you.

Twix, you need to do better than this.

To my knowledge, you have never questioned the opinions of anyone who was an opponent of cameras.
When I was stating an opinion, I labeled it as such. As such, I did not think I needed any authority to support it.

When you said:

I interpreted that as a declaratory statement and feel you need some authority to make it.

If that was just your opinion, then say so, please.

Following your lead, are you authroizing me (when you are not responding to me but are just commenting in a thread) to ask you to give authority to the statements you make?

That would seem fair.

I have no idea what you're saying at this point. Once again, instead of trying to speak for me, why don't you speak for yourself? That would be a good start.

Never have tried to speak for you. Have asked you questions but you have said you do not have to answer (which of course is your right).

As said previously, I do not like to give an "opinion" but try to make statements (when discussing cameras) which are supported by studies.

Now I wish the citizens of Lynnwood WA would wake up and do the same thing. These cameras are set to trap for the cash.

I'll let you have the last word.