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@bmorecitydot

I doubt it would be as profitable as you think. The amount of extra traffic court cases would increase drastically. Extra staff to maintain and calibrate would cost tons, incorrect tickets that would need to be checked and removed, thousands of people extra in court fighting tickets, additional staff to process literal millions of tickets not to mention the widespread hatred of city government spreading for insane government overreach. Let's also not forget how much it would decrease what little tourism money we get too as the entire country will know baltimore as a city of murders and insane traffic cameras.

A better solution would be to properly time lights and increase bike and mass transit infrastructure.

>It would pay for itself in a month

Bold of you to assume people who recreationally run red lights actually pay tickets

Also assuming that they have valid, active registration with their name and address on it.

It may take years of late notices and fines but it'll catch up to them

If Baltimore City DOT thought it would work, don't you think they would have done it by now?

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Lmao, no?! Baltimore DOT can have a federal grant paying for 100% of a project placed at their feet with independently repeated and peer reviewed case studies proving it would be a good idea and they still wouldn't do it.

The camera owners get like 99% of the money, not the state

Baltimore city boots after 3 unpaid tickets, and MD MVA won’t let you renew your license or registration, tags or anything. Trust and believe Baltimore city and the state of MD is going to get that money if they have to garnish your wages to do it.

Did not realize it was private. Either way, it will make safer streets.

You have faith in the government being proactive?

People might not remember, but Baltimore had to shut down the red light cameras for a few years because they were caught giving a ticket to a stopped car.

there is no "properly time lights". it's an over-constrained system, meaning you get 1, maybe 2 streets in the whole city that can be timed well and the rest of the city will have to be out of synch.

Correction: to thousands of cars - many of which were robo-signed using the electronic signature of a literally dead BPD cop.

Awarding the contract to a shitty, unqualified vendor then having cops cut corners with implementation is the Baltimore way.

Money is a very good incentive to get government agencies to get their ass in gear. Likely the financial gain from that many cameras isn't enough when the increased man power to install, maintain, and calibrate the cameras as well as the ticket side manpower needed to handle them all would also dramatic increase.

In Orlando, there's red light cameras on every single intersection. This helps as that footage could and is often used when there is an accident at an intersection.

Why aren't cars speed limited to 80 mph? There is no road in the US where cars can go faster than that.

Why does the government allow for unhealthy food like candy bars and McDonald's to be sold when almost 50% of adults are obese?

Why not have cameras covering every single square inch of public street and sidewalks so the police could watch any crime that takes place in public?

Because people don't want to live in some sort of scifi dystopian hell hole where they're monitored and controlled 24/7?

I worked with the head of the ATVES program and tried to setup even a process where we used safety or crash data to identify places that should have a speed or red light camera. But he is very invested in the 311 request -> test camera -> see if it's profitable enough. Let's just say that there is no issue with profitability, and if the program really is about safety, then we really should roll them out much more widely.

It was mind boggling to be in our Toward Zero meetings talking about people dying in crashes, and how little appetite there was from the ATVES head and DOT director to go that direction. Never made sense to me.

That's not true. They get a flat rate per camera. You are thinking of the old xerox contract that was terminated in 2015.

And if it weren't for Disney world no one would ever go to Orlando. Pretty sure their situation is aimed at getting out of state dollars. We would just be taxing our own residents and straining our already strained court system.

Proper timing does not require synchronization. The situation could be drastically improved by a citywide overhaul to add sensors to non-priority streets. In the short-term, simply adjust timers to give those streets ten seconds every minute (or something along those lines).

The problem isn't bad synchronization, it's that you have to sit at a red light for 30 or more seconds with no opposing traffic.

Well, I’m for all these suggestions except government keeping me from my candy bars.

you're assuming the goal of traffic timing is to maximize the speed of the people on the street. that isn't necessarily the case. you're also assuming that you don't have to design for the 1% case where there is some traffic diversion or something. without sensors, timing has to be done in a way that isn't optimal for normal conditions so that it's not a total shit-show in the rare case. sensors are great but very expensive to build and maintain.

the reality is that car-centric city design is just stupid and a waste of time. more cars and faster cars never made any location better. culs de sac exist specifically because people like cars for themselves but hate everyone elses' cars. if we're contemplating spending a fortune adding and maintaining sensors, we should first just build bike lanes everywhere and officially allow the Idaho stop. everyone will get to where they are going faster, greener, and with less expense. cars should take a back seat.

Can you please provide a link to this claim?

>Proper timing does not require synchronization. The situation could be drastically improved by a citywide overhaul to add sensors to non-priority streets. In the short-term, simply adjust timers to give those streets ten seconds every minute (or something along those lines).

Absolutely.

Hell, in the intermediary, a significant improvement would be to also shift some intersections from controlled signals to flashing red and yellow lights in the late night hours (2:30 - 5 AM).

Also, we need some traffic circles (roundabouts) in this region -- but done properly, unlike that dangerous joke of one in Charles Village.

>The problem isn't bad synchronization, it's that you have to sit at a red light for 30 or more seconds with no opposing traffic.

"30 Seconds"

* Laughs in Sinclair Lane *

There's that and taking literally 10 minutes to take Lombard from President to MLK at 3AM without a single other car on the road if you catch so much as one red light because you'll be sitting at a red light in - without exaggeration - every signal thereafter.

We've likewise all seen the hell scape that Downtown becomes during the day - though nothing is fixing that short of reducing demand -- aka: rail. If only there was a fully studied, fully funded rail line that ran East / West and could reduce demand by providing an incentive for others to park in the I-70 park and ride, and commute in from there. Perhaps we could even color it red.

I hate to say it because I've talked about the lack of enforcement of traffic laws and vehicle codes here for years (and I maintain that photo enforcement is not a solution), but this city's infrastructure passively encourages bad behavior.

I'm all for limiting how fast cars can go, I think that's a public safety issue.

Candy bars... not so much, that comes down to personal responsibility and self harm; until people start swerving in and out of the candy aisle causing bodily harm to others, that is.

As for the constant monitoring? What happens when someone gets mugged? There is a huge push to ferret out every doorbell cam and security system camera that might have video of what happened. So, people don't want monitoring until they want monitoring. Cell phones seem to be the exception.

I'll add that I'm typing off the top of my head and have not put much real thought into the topics.

Your comment was removed as you pinged the incorrect account: /u/BmoreCityDot

It’s not cool that people do that but cameras are just money machines for the gov that punish the average citizen

Look at 83, the people who used to drive crazy on it still do, while the rest of us are slowed to an agonizing crawl. It takes almost twice as long to get anywhere off 83 now. Those people who drive like maniacs don’t care about being ticketed. Also, people drive more erratically because of the cameras, speeding up then pumping their brakes when they know they’re coming up on one. It makes the roads far more dangerous than before.

By the same token, people who regularly run red lights do not care if they are ticketed. The people who get punished are the average citizens who are put into a situation where the light turns yellow and it is too late to stop safely, so they risk a ticket instead of slamming on the brakes and causing an accident. This happens even more regularly when the road is wet, and it rains a lot here.

For people who are against this because it's dystopian or won't help enough, what is your alternate solution for the dangerous/illegal driving behaviors that are constantly occurring around here? Or are we meant to just lie down and take it?

Unless/until there's more of an effort to crack down on people using obviously bad/hidden tags, I think the main thing you'd expect to see from any big traffic camera effort is more bad/hidden tags.

More people are dying of candy bars (i.e. junk food) than of car accidents.

What are you a fucking cop? Get out of here.

> you're assuming the goal of traffic timing is to maximize the speed of the people on the street.

I'm doing no such thing lol. We're in a thread talking about people who run red lights. One reason people run red lights is because they're waiting while there is no cross traffic. Breaking the rules a little bit leads to breaking the rules a lot which leads to the chaos we have in our roads today. The only thing that will stop that without better infrastructure design is impounding offending vehicles, because rich people don't give a shit about tickets and poor people can't afford to pay tickets.

I am 100% in favor of eliminating stupid car-centric design. I'd even support complete closure of most one-lane alleys to automobiles to provide protected pathways for bicycles and pedestrians. Making traffic signals work better for cars is not exclusive of fixing car-centric design. Better timing will benefit pedestrians and cyclists too. All the protected bike lanes in the world won't make for a safe cycling experience if cyclists have to cross intersections with bad timing and no sensors in a city where drivers are conditioned to run red lights.

> Why aren't cars speed limited to 80 mph? There is no road in the US where cars can go faster than that.

Unfortunately the cat's out of the bag on this one. Whoever limits first will be a massive safety hazard, not just to themselves but also to others. You must be able to match the speed of the other cars on the road, even if they're driving an illegal speed. Most deaths by speeding are more accurately described as deaths by speed differential, because they're a result of the speeding car encountering(and crashing into or losing control while avoiding) slower-moving obstacles. If all the cars on the road are going 70 in a 55, it's actually safest for everybody if you also match that speed, because then traffic is moving freely at a steady rate instead of lanes moving at different rates based on their slowest cars(and lots of slow-moving cars moving out of the slower lane into the faster lane).

To safely make your change, you'd need to shut down driving 100%, upgrade at least a critical mass of cars with this safety feature(you'd probably need to hit 90%+, to account for the statistical bias from people who don't normally go that fast suddenly driving their un-upgraded cars fast on the highway while they still can), and only then make it legal to drive again. That's...not going to happen. Not to mention the fact that speeders gonna speed, so you'd see people modding their cars to remove the limit immediately, and then we're right back to the status quo of there being a few cars out there that insist on driving 20+ faster than everybody else.

That maybe so, but then that’s another illegal strike against you if caught that will further bite you in the ass in court/legal fees. Tthat’s more money said person is going to have to shell out to the city/state.

That may be, but it's not an immediate public safety-of-others issue is what I was trying to convey. I had a good friend killed by a reckless driver, no friends killed by someone eating a candy bar.

>I'm doing no such thing lol. We're in a thread talking about people who run red lights. One reason people run red lights is because they're waiting while there is no cross traffic. Breaking the rules a little bit leads to breaking the rules a lot which leads to the chaos we have in our roads today. The only thing that will stop that without better infrastructure design is impounding offending vehicles, because rich people don't give a shit about tickets and poor people can't afford to pay tickets.

I appreciate that you're not a car-brain. however, even busy places like Manhattan have people violating red lights constantly. it's not a question of whether or not there is cross traffic, it's that there are no consequences for breaking the rules, as you point out. though, I think you under-estimate how many people would fix their behavior if they were ticketed. certainly not everyone, but many.

I think I've just given up hope that Americans will ever be able to properly negotiate a roundabout.

The one in Towson isn't even complex and I still manage to see multiple people fuck it up badly every time I use it.

Sure, but it looks like nobody's enforcing those illegal strikes--almost every day I see at least one parked car with bad paper tags or a heavily tinted plate cover, and those should be immediately bootable by DOT. This isn't even specifically a Baltimore thing, there's been plenty written about it in Philly/NYC too, especially over the last couple of years.

FWIW, I'm not against more cameras (I walk and bike more than I drive, and I drive with that in mind), I just don't think they'll hit the most flagrantly bad drivers we see in the city these days.

Dystopia is when car can't go zoom

Perception isn’t always reality. I’d be curious to see the stats. Though, two things can be true. Multiple task.

> it's not a question of whether or not there is cross traffic, it's that there are no consequences for breaking the rules

Poor infrastructure design leads to rulebreaking. Being forced to stop and wait at a red light while there is no cross-traffic is a failure of infrastructure design. Every ticket written for running a red light is a failure of infrastructure design. A driver wouldn't be able to run a red light if a light only turned red to permit cross-traffic.

Yes, we desperately need better enforcement of basic traffic laws in this city, but that is not what will not fix a culture of dangerous driving. Another downside is that it will increase hostile police interactions, which definitely won't help anything.

Don't boot them, tow them. Booting them just has them sit there and eventually become abandoned vehicles. Total waste of a parking space. There are at least two booted vehicles that have sat for several weeks on a street I frequent.

> I hate to say it because I've talked about the lack of enforcement of traffic laws and vehicle codes here for years (and I maintain that photo enforcement is not a solution), but this city's infrastructure passively encourages bad behavior.

This is exactly it. Enforcement doesn't solve the problems caused by bad design. We shouldn't need to write tickets for running a red light, because the light should only be red when there's opposing traffic preventing you from going anyway. We shouldn't need to write tickets for speeding, because the street should be designed such that you feel uncomfortable driving any faster than the posted speed limit. With well-designed infrastructure, we'd only need to rely on enforcement for the most egregious of violations.

>Poor infrastructure design leads to rulebreaking. Being forced to stop and wait at a red light while there is no cross-traffic is a failure of infrastructure design. Every ticket written for running a red light is a failure of infrastructure design. A driver wouldn't
>
>be able to run a red light if a light only turned red to permit cross-traffic.

I disagree. first, as I noted above, Manhattan has constant cross traffic but people violate the red lights constantly. second, I'm pretty confident that people will try to squeeze through a light that just turned red regardless of whether there was cross traffic (as OP points out, having to not proceed on their green light because there are people in the intersection running the red). the infrastructure could maybe help some, but the cases where people pull up to the light, there is no cross traffic at all, then drive through the red are not the problem cases (most of the time). the problem cases are people flying through red lights after the other direction turned green and wants to go, or as happens at an intersection near me, people go when it turns green and get t-boned or clipped by people thinking they can make it because it just turned red and most of the time the traffic that has the green will wait for them. that kind of accident isn't solved by the timing of the lights, it's solved by behavioral correction.

If it prevents a single accident, or reinforces an environment of accountability, it would be worth it imo

Because they are bullshit. They get people for not running the light.

Yeah, I don't trust this system. I've gotten them before for skidding two feet over the line in the rain.

A private company also takes a majority of the money.

False, ftr, on the first sentence.

There is a tollway near Austin that is 85.

Montana also has no day time speed limit

Baltimore City does not boot for 3 or more unpaid speed or red light camera citations because they lack state authority to do so for anything but parking tickets and these are technically moving violations.

And the state will indeed let you renew your registration without paying automated enforcement tickets.

We also lack reciprocity with neighboring jurisdictions, so people are illegally titling vehicles in Virginia and just doing whatever they want.

Bad takes 101

Have police enforce traffic laws? Design better roadways that discourage speeding with physical impediments and speed focused design instead of cameras?

I mean people that intentionally run red lights will happily ignore tickets assuming their tags are even associated with them or their residence to be able to send the tickets.

I’m on board for better road design. Don’t see how police watching for traffic violations is any less dystopian than cameras though

Just drive defensively. You have the green light...go till you cut them off. I never have more tha 2 jump thru.

Subscription costs would be insane.. They’re all 3rd party..

Red light cameras have been shown to increase accidents.

Have you figured out how to renew your registration without paying them?

Before we give up and let the robots enforce the laws I think we should give human police officers one last chance.

Citation needed.

Because them even being legal in the first place is a grey area.

Putting them everywhere would force the issue and the result might be that they are found to be illegal and they won't be allowed anywhere.

These are a poor tax, if you are rich you can just run red lights then?

I’ve gotten two at the Fayette/President st light turning right onto 83 when I HAD THE GREEN ARROW -_-

Fake Temp Tags from Texas go brrrttttt...

Much of Rockville Pike (MD-355) is set up this way. Its such a mad rush north or south 24/7, it has to be enforced. Baltimore could ask a winning county how it works for them.

Yes, I bet you are correct that some are not even legally on the road. But the law of averages says there are many who are both bold and dumb. Either way the photo camera will find that there is a stolen car on the road or the tags are stolen.

If you don't pay the fine and want to get tag, registration or your license renewed you have to pay off the fines and penalties.

Start with your town and let us know how it goes

It's significantly less dystopian and verifies that the person driving is the one getting in trouble. With a camera all you can do is send a ticket to an address. If it's the wrong address, oh well, if someone was borrowing your car too bad, if the plates aren't registered uh oh.

I'm not one for a police state but enforcing traffic laws is a pretty low bar to ask of police

Oh they certainly do I know from experience.

Whatever dude keep licking that boot

They don't boot or tow for ATVES tickets. Your experience here is wrong if you are claiming that, and I'd like to see your boot or tow evidence.

License and plate renewals going through despite owed tickets is new as of the pandemic. If your experience predates that, fair. Otherwise again, it's state policy and you're wrong.

Edit: This fuckin sub, I'm being downvoted for factual statements replying to a deleted comment

The boot of proven methods to increase road safety while reducing law enforcement interaction with citizens? I'll eat the whole boot yes.

Ya ok

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Wow, ya you’re right Red light traffic studies

Interesting that someone with “420” in their username is suddenly so concerned about laws

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No racial or socioeconomic bias from traffic cams, though. But ya let’s not let the robots get cocky

I know this is bad, but whenever I see a dislocated bumper and other debris laying nearby traffic calming infrastructure, a part of me is filled with glee because some dipshit done learned they need to slow down.

Studies have shown they kinda don't. Overall, they tend to reduce side-impact collisions and can actually increase rear-end collisions.

https://www.roads.maryland.gov/OPR_Research/MD-18-SHA-UM-4-37_Red-Light-Camera_Report.pdf

Yeah. In fact cities/contractors have been caught making yellow lights shorter because it increases ticket revenue. But it also causes more crashes.

You're really just asking for something that allows some company to skim money from people (because the vast majority of the money goes to a contractor and not to the government).

It's worse for people in basically every other way.

What? Weed's legal here now. Where you been?

If we did this and lane change photos in the tunnel, this city would be looking like the Jetsons by this time next year.

Drivers run red lights with impugnity in Baltimore.

So many expired out of state tags in my neighborhood. These fuckers need to get some jury duty. I'm tired of going every year.

Do you really want these idiots doling out justice in the jury box?

Yeah, and I want them to pay taxes too

Well I can't argue with that.

In Jacksonville they were taken away because it was proven to actually increase accidents from people slamming on the breaks to avoid getting ticketed. It was argued and proven to be safer to increase the length of yellow lights and do away with cameras.

The city doesn't own the camera so from the past it was found that the companies that owned them just wrote tickets because it was just printing free money. IIRC the city only got like 30% of the cash.

https://www.leg33.com/maryland-speed-camera-fraud/

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Yes, and every morning when I go to work, there is a traffic boot van clamping a boot on some car in Mt V. The ONLY thing the city gov is aggressive about monitoring and over sight has to do with parking violations.

Why do u want hard working people to pay for tickets? If u don’t like it stop living here. Tired of people like u complaining about little shit like this like it ruins your life. Go live in the boonies!

Lol tell em!!! So many people come on here just to cryyy

The city can’t even fix potholes and you want cameras at every intersection…

Tell me how you feel when you or your loved one gets hit by someone running a red light.

Calendars must be too difficult for you to understand.

Tell that to the cop I walked past with a fat blunt in my mouth. Nobody cares. It's over. Prohibition is dead.

Tell me when u start minding your business and stop crying over petty shit

Right! Forget all the corruption and the shitty roads and the massive heroin problem and the economic disparity and the lack of quality public transportation and on and on and on. It’s the people running the red lights that are the REAL problem. And the solution? Expand the surveillance presence 100 fold! We need every Baltimore citizen’s every move to be recorded at all times from every angle. /s

“Nobody cares” is not the same as “it’s legal”. I appreciate you making it crystal clear that you both realize you were wrong, and have demonstrated you lack the courage to admit when you’re wrong.

I feel like they’re also not the type to show up for jury duty

Hot take: public roads’ tolls and ticket endorment shouldn’t have a vendor doing anything

Maybe then a private company shouldn’t be involved. Just like with prisons.

Disney isn’t in Orlando though. Part of it isn’t even in the same county.

Why do people assume that all the bad drivers are hoodlums in stolen cars or stolen tags? Drive through the hallowed areas of MoCo & HoCo, and you see the same illegal actions. Does this mean that in Columbia or Silver Spring all those people who are breaking traffic laws are thugs, and thugs from the city? I don't think so. I thinks its more the way kids act when the teacher is not in the classroom. They don't have self control and feel entitled to act out. Arrogance is just as prevalent in well off areas with the self-righteous as it is in less affluent areas. Attend a meeting at any public school board which covers gifted and talented programs, and the entitled a-- holes are filling most of the seats. This could be why those counties have so many traffic cameras.