Yet Another Redlight Camera Program Found To Be Illegal

from the down-goes-another-one dept

Jeff Nolan points us to the news that yet another redlight camera program in California has been struck down as illegal, this time in San Mateo (right up the road from where I live). The details are a little technical, but effectively, California law doesn't allow municipalities to do deals with redlight camera vendors, where the vendor gets a percentage of the money brought in by tickets. San Mateo tried to get around this by giving the vendor (Redflex, of course) a cut up to a certain level. However, the judge didn't buy that, and rejected the ticket that was at issue. The lawyer who handled the case is thinking about now turning this into a class action lawsuit against various municipalities doing the same thing -- and potentially against Redflex. (Full disclosure: Just recently -- long after I'd written about how awful these cameras are, my wife got a ticket from one of these redlight cameras... in San Mateo, for the exact same thing as the guy who won this lawsuit: a right turn on red, without a full stop).

Filed Under: california, redlight cameras, san mateo
Companies: redflex

California City Looks To Evade Laws On Redlight Cameras

from the but-look-who-benefits dept

The city of Corona, CA is apparently looking to change the way it deals with redlight camera violations in an effort to avoid having to cough up some of the money it gains from redlight fines to the state and the county. They claim that this is to lower the fines that those caught by the cameras have to pay, and are positioning it as such, but it seems that residents aren't buying it. Beyond trying to evade California laws on redlight camera violations, it actually means the city would get more cash from such violations, and has some other nefarious effects. As Jeff Nolan notes, it's also of questionable constitutionality:

The problem here is that Corona is shredding the Sixth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, the right to a trial by jury. By reclassifying a moving violation (a traffic offense governed by the vehicle code) to an administrative violation (governed by the appropriately named government code) Corona is doing something really nefarious. In order to appeal an administrative citation you have to admit guilt, pay the full fine, and then apply for a hearing in front of an administrative official, not a judge in a court. The city could simply deny all hearings for administrative violations or schedule them far out in advance knowing full well that they have your money, which you had to pay before you could appeal.

The original article also notes that the majority of such fines are not on people running redlights directly, but people doing rolling stops before doing a right turn on red -- an action that very rarely leads to an accident. But it sure does dump lots of money in city coffers.

Filed Under: california, corona, redlight cameras
Companies: redflex

Arizona Dumping Redflex Cameras... But Giving Redflex An Award For Innovation?

from the and-what-kind-of-innovation-is-that? dept

Arizona has become ground zero with the backlash against redlight cameras, with plans to get rid of them across the state. And yet... Dave Records alerts us to the news that the annual "Governor's Celebration of Innovation" includes a variety of companies nominated for awards... including Redflex, the redlight camera maker who was just complaining that its revenue was dropping due to public opposition to such cameras. Oops.

Filed Under: arizona, innovation, redlight cameras
Companies: redflex

Red Light Camera Vendor Not Doing So Well With Public Opposition Driving Down Its Revenue

from the awww...-too-bad dept

There's been significant growing opposition to red light camera programs, which have a long history of showing absolutely no safety benefit, and are often run for-profit by local governments in combination with private companies. That opposition is leading more and more cities and towns to dump the red light cameras -- while some operators are getting caught illegally decreasing the time of the yellow or amber lights to try to issue more fines.

Jeff Nolan alerts us to the news that one of the biggest players in the space, Redflex, has announced that public opposition to its cameras has created a real drain on revenue, and its profits were down significantly. This would be the same Redflex that just so happened to fail to live up to its contract in Denver to deliver data that could be used to determine whether or not the cameras were really effective.

Filed Under: profits, red light cameras
Companies: redflex

Judge Throws Out Red Light Camera Tickets As Program Declared Illegal And Void

from the revenue,-not-safety dept

Yet again, we find out about a story of a city putting in place red light cameras, and using them not to increase public safety (per the official claim of the city) but to drive revenue -- even by shortening the length of yellow lights to under the legal limit, thereby increasing both ticket revenue and accidents. Luckily, this time, in Santa Ana, California, a judge has declared the whole program illegal and declared all of those who received the tickets under the program as "not guilty" (found via Jeff Nolan). There were a few reasons for this. First, the city broke the law in not clearly announcing which traffic lights would have the cameras with 30 days' notice. In fact, the city actually moved the cameras around with no notice in an attempt to maximize revenue. The city claimed that it gave notice... by stating at a city council meeting that they'd be moving the cameras around, but without indicating where. Also, the city had promised that the lights would have a minimum yellow light of 4.4 seconds, but 17 of 18 lights checked had yellow lights that were less than 4.0 seconds, which makes a huge difference. The judge also specifically ruled that the people who got tickets this way were "not guilty" rather than just dismissing their cases, to avoid having their cases somehow reinstated.

Filed Under: illegal, red light cameras, santa ana
Companies: redflex

More Problems With Redlight Cameras: Denver Not Looking At Required Data

from the oops dept

With Arizona getting rid of its speed cameras, after realizing they did nothing to make the roads safer (and may, in fact, have done the opposite), now it's time to move on to red light cameras, which have a pretty troubling history themselves. The latest, as pointed out by Jeff Nolan, is that Denver has failed to enforce the contract it had concerning red light cameras. Specifically, part of the deal was that the contractor running the cameras would deliver data on whether or not the cameras were effective (including a potential refund of money if they were not). However, the contractor, Redflex Traffic Systems, apparently simply hasn't delivered the data. Actually, to be clear, they haven't delivered any data. It's not just that some data has been left out, but that none has been delivered.

Filed Under: denver, red light cameras
Companies: redflex