The Daily Herald reports that Scaumburg, IL was testing red-light camera technology in order to reduce the number of accidents at high traffic intersections. This sounds reasonable to me but according to many of the comments to this story, nobody seems to think this is a effective strategy. It’s the classic idea of negative reinforcement. If I’m going to get a $100 ticket for running a red light, I’m going to make sure that I don’t run that light.
My issue is not with the validity of the red-light camera technology. Many say that these cameras help to initiate tickets that wouldn’t normally garner a traffic stop by an officer. I have no idea how the technology works. It is also possible that Mayor Larson isn’t being completely truthful when he said “It was not our intent to use them as a revenue generator”. Even though they generated over 10,000 tickets in 2.5 months and collected almost $1 million. It’s reported that many of these tickets were for people who didn’t make a complete stop when making a right turn on red. (Which I know I’m guilty of.)
My beef is that enough people would complain and threaten to stop patronizing local establishments while these cameras are in place. Wouldn’t it be more logical to stop running red lights? Are you really going to get to your destination faster by inching through the intersection in anticipation for the light to turn green? I’m mostly concerned about the people putting on their makeup, eating a cheeseburger and talking on the phone without bothering to look around before going through intersections or making a turn.
So, the red-light cameras might be a complete sham solely to increase revenue. What if the Mayor is sincere in wanting to limit/prevent the number of accidents? If common sense doesn’t help and hitting the pocket book doesn’t help, what will get people to use more precaution while driving?
