Your Safety for Sale

Folks, if you don't live in Washington, DC, you may not recognize the man to my left. His name is Charles Ramsey, and he's the Police Chief here in town. And he's a lying crook.

Despite today's Washington Post article which revealed the District's red-light cameras have not had any effect whatsoever on accident rates, Chief Ramsey stands by them as effective. He says that the number of red lights being run has dropped by sixty percent since the cameras were installed in 1999. "They make people slow down. They reduce the number of traffic violations, and that's a good thing."

Okay, Chief. One question -- sixty percent fewer people run lights, but accident rates remain constant, what does that tell us? It tells us the people running red lights aren't causing the accidents. Second question -- why should the police department waste resources enforcing a traffic law that doesn't cause accidents?

Did I just say "waste resources"? These cameras don't waste resources. In fact, since installation in 1999, the forty-five cameras have netted the District a cool $32 million. If these cameras were meant to prevent accidents, not raise money, then why were seven installed at intersections that had not seen a single crash in years?

This isn't a new issue. In 2002, the Weekly Standard ran a five-part serial about this. One of the surprising things they exposed was how this program was managed. The entire process was contracted to Lockheed Martin IMS, who kept $32.50 for every red-light ticket, and $29 for every automated speeding ticket. (Since then, the contract moved to Affiliated Computer Services.)

What's wrong with this picture? Not only does the program not serve a public purpose, but it also allows fines to be levied and points issued without the review of a government official. Pretty scary, since over a quarter of citations issued are successfully contested in court as misidentifications. It becomes worse when you realize the contractor has a financial incentive to ticket as many drivers as possible.

If you want to stop people from running red lights, increase the length of the yellow. They're way too short in Washington, DC -- and the government knows it. The average yellow at an intersection with a camera is four seconds, even though Federal guidelines suggest six seconds. None of the forty-five targeted intersections have seen yellow length increases to attempt to save lives. Of course, increasing the length of the yellow would decrease violations, and thus decrease revenues.

What about the speeding cameras? Surely those are helping us be safe, right? Wrong again! Repeated studies have shown that people generally ignore posted speed limits, and drive what they feel is a safe speed for the road. A Federal Highway Administration study found that changing speed limits by 15 mph caused drivers to shift speed an average of 1 to 2 mph.

People drive with the flow of traffic. A police officer in the median tends to slow the flow, at least temporarily. A hidden camera doesn't affect speeds at all, but it does issue citations to drivers that would risk being rear-ended if they drove the speed limit. How many drivers? In the first week of the Districts use of speed cameras three years ago, the police caught close to 10,000 drivers speeding. That's four percent of DC's population, and equal to the number of speeding tickets issued the prior year.

The net result is roads that are less safe, thanks to this hidden tax on drivers. But it's not just our roads that are less safe -- the Washington Times once reported that the large number of automated speeding tickets issued to fire trucks and ambulances had increased the average response time to a 911 call.

Folks, this is insane. There comes a point in the inevitable growth of any bureaucracy where its primary function becomes to grow larger. At this point, the District Police is more concerned with increasing revenues and expanding the government than protecting citizens.

Chief Ramsey, three years ago you said "It isn't about revenue making. It's about saving lives." With thirty two million dollars in revenue, and no lives saved, it's time to admit you were wrong.

Click here for more links on red light cameras, and here for a large collection of studies about this.

Labels: dc, nanny state, privacy

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