I used to live in San Diego where red light cameras were used at many intersections. I can say with some conviction and experience that the fairness and effectiveness of these devices all comes down to application and management.

For instance, my wife got a red light camera ticket for making a legal right turn at a red light. We didn't have any trouble fighting it, but I knew plently of others who weren't so fortunate. A big part of the problem in San Diego's case, is that the cameras are installed, operated and managed by private, for-profit companies. It's in their best interest to issue as many tickets as possible (versus actually helping the community), so they are not particularly interested in applying the cameras fairly. Also, because it was private companies that ran them, the process for fighting tickets went first to the company. If they deceded not to dismess the ticket, you would have one hell of a time taking it to court.

If these cameras are to be managed by actual municipaities, backed by local (or state votes), then I could be for them. I am absolutely against them if they are to be managed by private firms.

A lot depends on how it is implemented. Police have a hard time making moving violation convictions without some form of tangible evidence. If the cameras are used to support an officer making a traffic stop, I can support that. If they are a mail-in ticketing system, then no, I believe the police should make an actual stop. In a stop, officers have the opportunity to examine the driver for drug or alcohol use, a valid drivers license, registration and insurance. Mail-in programs do not offer these benefits.

I think if they would repeal the right turn on red would be a better idea to help with accident reduction. I've had it with Big Brother. Just make the State and City/Town Police do their jobs.

i am all for it, some stop signs should have ot too..... dont run them and you should be ok

"One camera in Houston issues 975 citations a day, at $75 a pop"

so obviously it does NOTHING to stop the red light runners

it's important to realize that the bill is proposing that tickets from red light cameras are NOT moving violations - rather fines akin to a parking ticket.

additionally, in densely built urban intersections, police are not stationed at intersections because it's simply too dangerous for officers. there is also a non-chase policy for offenders of this violation because it is unsafe for officers to go through the intersection and chase a red light runner. in these situations, police are directly instructed to allow the violator to go.

the rate of citations drastically drops as camera programs are put into place, and tend to lose money after a few years because behavior changes.

in houston, the 2 gentlemen that led the revolt of the cameras, are brothers and lawyers who make a living off of prosecuting accidents. there is a clear incentive for the intersections to remain dangerous -

public opinion strategies found 69/29 favorable/unfavorable for red light cameras and 45/18 for strongly support/strongly oppose. in addition to the IIHS study showing that in the first comprehensive longitudinal study with statistical merit of the 14 major US cities that installed a camera program, this enforcement tool decreased the number of fatalities by 25%.

that could be ~75 lives in CT per the stats in the article

These cause more rear end accidents than the problem that are there to solve... against this

I am sure on occasion everyone has had their timing wrong and has been a second or two wrong and been through a red light. People are not perfect, neither are these systems or laws. So our governments want to taxes us for our imperfection as if they are models of perfection??? I always check to look even when I have a green light.

I'm going to quote a comment that I posted on this subject:

"...many states and cities are winding down their right light cameras and speed cameras. And Iowa lawmarker is currently setting out for a state ban on them. In many other places the fines are voluntary because they are not easy to hold up in court (many of the cameras are opperated by 3rd parties). Not to mention that there are not as many red light violators as you would think and unless they're put in a city, rarely do they pay for themselves. Newark, California uses them and found that 90% of the red light violations were right-on-reds which were legal at the intersection.

Speed cameras work much better than red light cameras and do usually have the public's approval.. that is until they're actually in use for several months. Yes, the law is the law, but many people are not happy being mailed a ticket for going 1-4 mph over the limit. The issue then becomes that the cameras do not have the ability of a person to determine if the driver is going at an unsafe speed. A good example is the drop on Federal Road going into 4-corners. It drops from 40 to 30 there quite quickly. If you put a camera there it is very likely you will get speeders still slowing down, not necessarily driving at an unsafe speed.

At the end of the day, the camera systems would be more of a problem than a solution. Why not just have cops spend a few weeks cracking down on it? Once the word gets out that is all that it will take."

just another tax to generate more money to give out, methinks no way.

Make it so I don't have to stop for a red light every 100 yards and maybe we can talk about cameras. Or worse, at construction zones where traffic cops standing around idley and the traffic lights are still operational when they don't need to be. Maybe the cop could set the system to flash yellow instead of backing up traffic?

I recently moved here from a city that uses a great deal of these cameras at intersections. As long as the laws are still implemented with reason I guess I don't have a problem with it, but what the cameras do is turn a lot of 'gray area' into a black and white issue. Example, very early one morning when I was virtually the only car on the road - no one was within hundreds of yards of me in any direction - I was hurrying to try to reach a dying relative to say my goodbyes before she passed. Sure I was probably going 5 mph over the speed limit and sure, when I got to the red light in question where I should have come to a complete stop technically, I slowed to just a slow creep and then turned right - no car coming as far as the eye could see in the other direction - yet sure enough I got a ticket. Of course, I suppose the other side of the coin is that if a police officer had pulled me over it would have slowed me down even more, but the reality is that no police officer I've ever seen would have pulled me over in those kind of traffic conditions for such a very minor 'offense.' What's worse is that I was unemployed at the time and so the money came dear; I tried to fight it for all of the above reasons and they wouldn't hear of it. I'm all for targeting true offenders who jeopardize the safety of others, but this strikes me as very Orwellian.

If you don't break the law, you would not have to worry about it.

But Officer, I was stopped through that entire intersection.

How many people have you seen turn right on red, when there is a sign there telling you can't?

As much as I am a proponent of safe driving, I would be opposed to the installation of these cameras as far as traffic enforcement is concerned. As some of the previous posters pointed out, the majority of states that use these contract the work out to private companies who have it in their best interests to issue as many tickets as possible as they will be getting a piece of every one of them.

I think virtually every single municipality in the state knows which of their intersections are not only the most dangerous as well as the ones where scofflaws take the most liberties. I think towns and cities should step up enforcement of the laws already on the books before we create another quasi-government monolith to start issuing tickets that for the most part will be almost impossible to get overturned.

With the relatively cheap prices of cameras today, I would be in favor of placing them at intersections so that in case of an accident the police can simply go and look at the video that has been recorded. They run on discs that will record for a number of different times and then start to re-record or write over themselves which means they could stay there untouched, and without any additional labor costs until they were actually needed.

Red light cameras about about income. Pure and simple. Income for tax starved communities, and income for the companies that manufacture, lease, and manage the systems, taking a cut from every ticket generated. That's right, a private company, making its profit, based upon how many tickets it can generate. Talk about a potential for abuse!
The reality is, there are MANY documented cases that when the cameras are installed, accidents go up! If the purpose is SAFETY, there are better solutions, that are proven to work. For a good resource, look here:
http://www.motorists.org/red-light-cameras/

RLCs are a bad idea: http://abcnews.go.com/US/red-light-camera-backlash-cameras-causing-accidents/story?id=13925887

I'm going to look askance at the traffic geniuses who think that there is no need for a real traffic light at the intersection of Route 110 and Route 111 when they tell me they have another great idea…

For those questioning "what the law is?" try www.jud.ct.gov/. You can also go to the public library...

The cameras (indirectly) block emergency vehicles - because cars stopped at a camera hesitate to get out of the way! Other side effects: Rearenders, $$$ sent to Oz, AZ or Goldman-Sachs, where it won't come back, and tourists and shoppers driven away.
Worse, a false expectation of safety, because cameras can't stop the real late runners, who cause the accidents. (If cameras worked, camera sellers wouldn't have the crash videos they supply to the media.)
Want safety, no side effects?
To cut car/pedestrian accidents, train your kids not to step out just 'cuz the walk sign came on.
To cut nuisance running (a fraction of a second late), lengthen the yellows. It's cheap to do so can be done all over town.
The dangerous real late (multiple seconds) runs won't be stopped by the mere presence of a camera, because the runner won't know (a lost tourist) or won't remember (a distracted or impaired "local") that there's a camera up ahead. They're not doing it on purpose! To cut the real late runs, improve the visual cues that say, "Intersection ahead." Florida's DOT found that better pavement markings (paint!) cut running by up to 74%. Make the signal lights bigger, add backboards, and put the poles on the NEAR side of the corner. Put brighter bulbs in the street lights at intersections. Put up lighted name signs for the cross streets.
Who needs cameras and their side effects?

Ok, so what happens when someone is following you too closely, the light turns yellow, and you stop to avoid getting a ticket? You get rear-ended! This has been a consequence of the red light cameras in California. They shorten the amount of time for the yellow light, which means that a driver had better stop quickly. Don't agree to this voluntarily.

RLC are a fraud!

From the IIHS PHONY RLC study that was just TORN APART in a PEER REVIEW: http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/36/3699.asp

Quote: "The USF researchers then used the IIHS data in an attempt to replicate the IIHS statistical analysis. The critique concluded that IIHS failed to disclose results that contained negative values for red light cameras.

"Thus, cities using cameras are estimated to have a 25 percent higher red light running fatality rate in the 'after' period relative to cities not using cameras, despite the greater reported percent reduction in the former," the critique found. "

In Kansas City: http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/37/3703.asp

Quote: "Red light camera vendor American Traffic Solutions (ATS) is furious that police in Kansas City, Missouri released a report last week evaluating photo enforcement intersections without giving the company a chance to modify the data. In many cities, ATS plays a key role in authoring such studies, but in this case the Kansas City police department went its own way, arriving at conclusions consistent with other, independent research on the topic."

ATS is behind front groups like National Coaltion for "safer" roads. http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/35/3585.asp

FIGHT THE RLC FRAUD!

Ban the CAMS!

www.motorists.org
www.banthecams.org
www.camerafraud.com
www.bhspi.org

These articles should help clarify the issue:
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jun/08/local/la-me-0608-red-light-20110607
http://www.abc15.com/dpp/news/region_west_valley/peoria/peoria-turns-off-red-light-cameras
http://warondriving.com/post/16875838390/red-light-camera-truth
http://www.gazette.com/articles/cameras-131693-consider-denver.html
http://warondriving.com/post/15042903265/fl-red-light-cameras
http://www.motorists.org/red-light-cameras/objections
http://www.motorists.org/red-light-cameras/increase-accidents
http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/34/3413.asp
http://www.desertdispatch.com/opinion/cameras-2877-red-safety.html
http://www.mysuburbanlife.com/berwyn/topstories/x338367299/Berwyn-s-3rd-red-light-camera-criticized-by-residents-aldermen?zc_p=0