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Chris wrote:

MechAg94 wrote:

K.Mooneyham wrote:I've read this entire thread, and still don't understand why that thing ticketed me for a right-hand turn when I wasn't speeding and it turned yellow on me just before I entered the turn, if the thing was set up as it has been described. If I had been mashing the pedal and blazed straight through an intersection and ran a red light, that would have been my fault (and I assure you I would have paid if that were the case). But it simply wasn't the case. I'm still irritated, and I'm also irritated by the "customer service" that I encountered.

Maybe because it doesn't work as advertised?

My problem with all the claims of the good the cameras do is that all those things can be fixed with better light timing among other things. However, that stuff cost money to do. Red light cameras are supposed to generate money.

Yellow light timing has very little to do with someone's decision to run a red light. You can roughly figure a second for every 10 miles per hour. I had an intersection with a four and a half second yellow and people ran the ever loving crap out of it. Our engineers would extend the timing before a light was even considered. It was a huge ordeal to get a camera setup. I could do it, it just took a lot of effort. The engineering problem is when you go through many towns and hit all green lights on the main thoroughfares, it's because of some highly complicated signal timing. You add a half a second of yellow, you've got to steal it from somewhere.

I can tell you with certainty though, that adding yellow time does virtually nothing to stop red light running. I've done the real live actual studies on intersections doing just that.

Having said that, I can't say it's not about money. For people like me and the engineers who are tasked with traffic, they don't want fatalities or serious accidents on roads they control. For city managers and directors I wish I could say the same.