[Jeff Higgins]

Watching the local news the other night, I saw a story about a local town that had just installed the cameras about a month ago. There was a publicity campaign to inform residents of their installation, and a one month grace period to allow folks to get used to the idea. They sent warnings out to violators during that one month.

The town was absolutely overwhelmed by how many warning they were mailing. They could not believe the number of people rountinely running red lights. So they extended both the grace period, and the yellow light duration. So, yeah, it must be all about the money... A city councilman was interviewed for the story; he said (repeatedly) that "it's not about the money. We want safe intersections. We have doubled the grace period, we have extended the yellow light time. We have done everything we can do to get the word out..." Yup; all about the money. In contrast, the citizens on the street interviewed pretty universally said "screw the grace period. Nail 'em if they are gonna run red lights". I pretty much agree.

While I certainly do not like cameras monitoring our behavior in most circumstances, I can see this as the only effective way to deal with one of the most dangerous traffic problems out there today. Folks that run red lights are a hazard to all of us. I would much rather see red light than speed cameras; I thinks it's pretty obvious that folks who routinely run red lights do actually cause accidents. At a far higher rate than speeders.