Among the many issues we debate when it comes to road safety, there are a just a few that many sides agree on. One of them is the use of automated enforcement cameras to catch speeders and red light runners. These cameras are much more efficient and safer than police officers. They also work. At a press conference last week a Portland Bureau of Transportation spokesperson said, “We know in a matter of days and weeks, these cameras are able to drop the average speed — virtually eliminating excessive speeding.”
Since our major foe in the war on traffic deaths is kinetic energy, when people slow down we save lives. It’s that simple. But while these cameras do the job, they take valuable time away from other police work. With an estimated 100,000 citations a year via the 40 or so cameras PBOT expects to have in operation by 2025 (based on average citations per camera listed in a PBOT report to the legislature in 2022), that’s a lot of desk time for police officers.
When I asked Portland Police Bureau Traffic Division Sergeant Ty Engstrom at a press conference last week about adding even more cameras, the first thing that popped into his head was this administrative overhead. “That’s a lot of personnel it’s going to take because you have to review all those and you have to approve them, and so that’s that’s a daunting task.”
As per Oregon law, every citation issued by a camera (or a mobile radar van) must be reviewed by a “duly authorized traffic enforcement agent” — which since 2016 has always meant a police officer. This includes not just review of the citation itself, but details relating to the ensuing Multnomah County court case triggered by each one of them.
But that era is coming to an end. By next year, the Portland Bureau of Transportation hopes to bring some of that citation processing in-house.
Thanks to a push from PBOT and other safety advocates, the Oregon Legislature passed House Bill 4105 in 2022. That bill allows Portland to use non-police staff to process and review camera citations. So why is Sgt. Engstrom still hung up on the “daunting” amount of officer time it takes? Because even though the bill has been on the books for nearly two years, PBOT isn’t quite ready to take over processing responsibility from PPB.
After last week’s press conference I reached out to PBOT Communications Director Hannah Schafer to ask about the status of implementing the new authority given to them in HB 4105. “PBOT is currently developing the program that will result in PBOT staff reviewing and issuing citations for moving violations from the automated enforcement cameras,” Schafer said.
Once the PBOT agents are on board, the plan is to divide responsibilities on reviewing the cases and citations. PBOT has three types of automated enforcement: “dual enforcement intersection cameras” that capture speed and traffic signal compliance, cameras mounted inside mobile speed vans, and fixed speed cameras along high crash corridors. Schafer said PPB will continue to handle the first two and PBOT will take over responsibility for fixed speed cameras.
With 32 of these cameras currently up and running and more to come in the months and years ahead, it will be imperative to create an efficient processing workflow. And with PBOT taking on some of these duties, it will reduce workload on PPB officers and free them up to handle things like crash investigations and other more serious crimes.
It’s unclear how the shift in personnel from PPB to PBOT might impact the total camera program revenue. For the two years of 2021 and 2022, PBOT reported revenue of $1.37 million (about 70% of which goes to state of Oregon and the remainder pays for operation of the program with any leftover funds going to safety projects). In those two years PBOT spent about $173,000 on PPB staff expenses. With double the amount of cameras on the street in 2025, program revenue should rise commensurately.
Schafer at PBOT says they plan to begin hiring the new enforcement agents early next year and the program should be operational by the end of 2025, “if not sooner”.
— Learn more about PBOT’s automated enforcement camera program and see a list of current locations on their website.
Thanks for reading.
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Can’t happen soon enough. The left turn light from SW Naito onto S Harbor is out of control and there really needs to be a red light camera there. Drivers are still turning left 1-2 seconds after the walk/ bike signals are green. Dangerous for cyclists going south who may not think to look back over their shoulder to check for red light runners. Drivers aren’t thinking about cyclists. They are just looking for other cars when they are deciding to run the red light.
The red light running is out of control. It feels like every light cycle at least 2-3 cars just need to run the red. Not only is that incredibly dangerous, but it is also really annoying as a driver when you have had a solid green thru-light but there’s still a line of cars making left turns.
100% agree. All of the intersections along Naito in that area are very dangerous to pedestrians and cyclists due to the amount of red-light runners and extra vigilance is required. Another problem location is the right turn from Harbor to Naito. It’s a “No Turn on Red” but many drivers ignore that and roll through the crosswalk.
Apologies if I’m not understanding this and it’s obvious to others. What is the reason for the division of labor between PPB and PBOT? Is it simply that PBOT doesn’t have the manpower to review all 3 types of automated enforcement? Is there an assumption that PBOT will slowly transition to taking over all 3 types given fewer budgetary constrictions in the future?
That’s a good question eawriste that I also thought about and should probably get a clarification on. A few thoughts:
I think there are a few things going on:
– An awareness that PPB doing all this processing was not the best use of sworn officer time.
– PBOT feeling like this isn’t as a high a priority at PPB as they’d prefer, so perhaps the PPB doing it was creating a bottleneck in the program and dampening enthusiasm for more cameras.
– An overall feeling that there are many aspects of what PPB currently does that might be done better and/or differently and/or more efficiently at PBOT. Look at how PBOT has ramped up parking enforcement recently and the national conversation around reducing the footprint of police forces in general.
And yes my hunch is PBOT and PPB see this first step as a pilot project that – if successful – would expand to PBOT doing all the ticket processing.
I, for one, welcome our future patrols of unarmed “parking and traffic control officers.” You don’t need a sworn and armed police officer to enforce traffic controls when their time is better spent in operations to prevent crimes from occurring and investigating the crimes that do occur. If someone decides to try to flee from the traffic monitors, that’s fine because now a simple moving or parking violation has turned into a Class C felony (note: the Oregon statute is specific to fleeing or eluding a “police officer,” the definition of which may need to be amended by the state in order to include unarmed law enforcement officers employed by a city’s transportation agency, or else the city may need to create a second “police” division within PBOT that is separate from PPB and has the narrow mandate of enforcing parking and traffic law). Take down the plate number and description and hand it off to PPB; it’s a police matter now.
Yes! Thanks Michael. This should be something that simply normalizes an long held expected behavior of driving at a safe speed for the vast majority of Portland (which honestly has never existed in our culture). Our culture has normalized risky and unsafe behavior, which results in a lot of people who end up dead or physically disabled. Police shouldn’t really need to–and physically can’t–be forced to check everyone’s behavior all the time (they’re overworked as it is).
It’s the exceptional cases where someone is blatantly and consciously flaunting the law (and more importantly endangering others) where cops need to intervene.
Good to know. I believe (please correct me if I am wrong) that in NYC the traffic enforcement cameras are reviewed by the DOT primarily and a similar transition took place? This includes automated cameras on busses as well as fixed cameras primarily near schools (although I believe that has expanded somewhat recently to other parts of the city).
I wonder if that is a result of cultural differences on the presumed usefulness of the program between the two agencies, but that is purely speculation, and would like a more informed person on the subject to chime in if they exist.
There are a lot of misconceptions around automated traffic devices, which is not surprising since they are fairly “new” in NYC and DC. I understand some police may believe it is increasing their workload or even taking away some of their duties, but again speculation.
One area where I am still a little foggy on is how automated cameras inform the police when there is a person clearly attempting to obscure their license plate, and how the DOT communicates that. This is an entire industry in NY and in some other states where fake temp plates and obscuring devices are ubiquitous. Fun example.
Some off-duty cops are gonna start getting some tickets.
That’s what you think. The cops will just cover their plates with obscuring plastic shields.
Citizens that try to prevent people from hiding from traffic cams in NYC have reported that cops are among the worst offenders!
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/17/nyregion/license-plate-vigilantes.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
Oh, so now every cop in NYC is out here with plastic shields like they’re auditioning for Fast & Furious: Traffic Cam Dodgeball? Sure, some officers have been caught doing it—big yikes—but let’s not act like the entire force is moonlighting as plate-hiding masterminds. Honestly, it’s like blaming every chef because one guy burnt the toast.
He didn’t say every cop, he said they are among the worst offenders. Which is a quote from the linked story: “In fact, Mr. White said, part of the problem is that many police and city officials, rather than denouncing scofflaws or enforcing the license plate laws, are some of the most brazen offenders.” NYPD is notorious for flouting street safety. Another example relates to them parking their private vehicles habitually on sidewalks filling up full block faces with their cars. I’ve seen it myself and it is even worse than it might sound.
One way to incentivize police not to be offenders is to make it clear that any police officer offending will be immediately fired. Imagine, compelling the law and order officers to obey the law themselves! What a wonderful world it would be.
Why should they be treated harsher than the general population? Should a PBOT employee be fired if caught speeding on a PBOT road? It’s this kind of view that keeps the police union overly powerful as it turns out that people really do have it out for officers.
For one, obviously they should be held to a higher standard. They are entrusted with a unique responsibility and we should hold them to a higher standard than everyone else. They don’t face harsher legal treatment, they should face employment requirements that are not part of the law. She didn’t say send them to jail for parking violations, she said lose their job.
Second, they are in practice held to a lower standard than the general public. People don’t have it out for them, we just want them to actually follow the law. The police union isn’t overly powerful because people want cops to follow the law, they’re overly powerful because the police have a unique ability to use force and can therefore get their way with politicians which we have seen with their blackmail and lies about politicians they don’t like.
It’s like, yeah, if the US military decided they wanted to get their way they could, because they’re the ones with the guns. Cops are the same. They’re hard to control because they’re the ones we put in the position of power.
I agree and that is a separate argument for another time perhaps as to why we as a society have chosen to outsource our power to a distinct group in society (police, fire, EMT’s etc.) and when that trend started and why.
Also I wasn’t thinking big criminal behavior in which I agree that those who have more power in society should be kept on a short leash, I was just thinking that getting fired for traffic violations is a bit extreme, even if one is a police officer.
Yep Jeff, it’s actually way, way worse than it sounds. Examples of this sort of behavior include simply filling up sidewalks, parks and playgrounds with private police vehicles (we know they are private police vehicles because they invariably have a NYPD sign on the dashboard).
During the times I lived in NYC it was so unbelievably depressing to see families having to consistently walk down the street in traffic with their strollers because the entire block, sidewalks, bike lanes, bus lanes, post office entrances, every place you can possibly think of, was used as private vehicle storage for cops. These aren’t cop cars in an emergency situation.
One funny anecdote here: the current mayor Adams who was the BK borough president used to allow his staff to daily fill the Borough Hall pedestrian plaza with cars. That’s what New York is/was like. So it’s not a giant stretch in the imagination to see how a lot of public officials use means to obscure their licenses, and tend to ignore that behavior when done by private citizens. And that behavior makes for an extremely dysfunctional and unsafe transportation system.
Angus it pains me as much as you (hopefully) that this is the case, but there is an absolutely endemic problem in NYC where the NYPD as well as other city officials tend to be the most blatant offenders of this. The story really took flight when a person was fined with “criminal mischief” in Brooklyn simply by removing something from a license plate owned by a cop that was purposefully obscurred. Here’s a little blip, but you can find as much info as you want if you just search NYC, Criminal Mischief, or license plate scofflaws.
Again, it is not EVERY cop, or judiciary official in NY. But it is clearly endemic, (but hopefully improving based on the news coverage). And maybe it goes without saying, but here it is: the biggest issue with this is that the people who are supposed to be enforcing the law, are some of the biggest offenders.
Thanks for looking into this! It may be taking forever to implement but it will be so nice to not have to hear excuses from PPB about not having enough money to do enforcement. Especially with people like Ty leading the traffic division while blatantly admitting to playing politics with our safety for more funding.
LOL. Now you’ll just hear how PBOT doesn’t have enough money to do enforcement.
Is there any plan whatsoever to begin enforcing license plate and registration laws with this? Those camera don’t do anything if there is no plate displayed or it is obscured.
PPB is addressing this, although at a fraction of the rate needed. There are other articles on this.
Judging by the number of unregistered cars that I encounter on a daily basis, the police aren’t doing a whole lot of enforcement.
I have two cars that haven’t been updated with tags since 2019. When an RV can park around the corner and trash the place with impunity, I sure as hell am not going to pay for tags. When the city cleans up the streets, then I’ll comply.
You’re a brave hero. Not registering those cars will teach them!
Pbot is millions in the hole and facing a potentially crippling round of layoffs that could make it difficult to deliver services. Meanwhile, you proudly refuse to pay fees that are needed to pay the employees that provide city services. That’s what you call cutting off your nose to spite your face. Alas, I’m sure the irony of the situating will be lost on you.
Car registration fees go to the state, not to the city. He’s cutting off ODOT’s nose to spite PBOT’s face. Or something.
Not entirely true. Both pbot and Multnomah county receive revenue from vehicle registration fees. But the fees are collected by the state, and odot retains the lion’s share.
https://www.kgw.com/article/traffic/pbot-enforcement-expired-registration-tags/283-828d0714-0dd1-4d98-a987-7f192d7bc3bd
You’re just as bad as them.
Hey Angus, I feel your frustration. That is a really good question and it’s a complex answer that I will try–but mostly fail–to answer (because I am not someone who has worked with these systems). So take this with a grain of salt.
Here’s what I know from New York State. License plate cameras run 24/7. Historically, because of the bias against traffic cameras, the limitations were very heavy when they first started. They used to only run during the day time and only near schools in NY (but those are just details that show the limitations of laws that can restrict their use depending on the state).
In any cases these cameras are in areas that are very predictable choke points (e.g., bridges, tunnels and in NY above 60th St), so the areas where potential fake plates are detected are extremely geographically limited (easier for cops). License plate readers are very efficient at detecting anomalies and so called ghost or temp-plates which various states offer (it’s a whole business). I’ll link to ghost tags here if you’re interested. It’s insane.
Most often it’s simply a plate cover that people use to fraud the system. These can be motorized plate flips, obscuring plastic covers or even, yes fake leaves (awesome huh?). This latter group is really easy to stop because cops can just pull people over when they do it. If the same car comes through the same place every day with the same absence of a plate, well that’s a pretty good indicator of fraud, right? Unfortunately, and this is a really sad thing for me to say because I don’t like to generalize or reinforce bias against a group of people. A lot of people who use these plate covers (at least in NY) are cops. So there’s a cultural problem that seems to be also part of the issue (at least in NY).
Long story short, cameras detect anomalies almost instantaneously, send them to cops and those cops decide whether to stop the car and wait till the car comes out of the tunnel. It’s not a perfect system and I hope a cop can chime in and correct me here, but that seems to be the general process.
“This latter group is really easy to stop because cops can just pull people over when they do it.”
Thanks for the information. I do have to say, I’m not sure it’s “easy”. Police traffic stops have been restricted in Portland and don’t forget the “Ferguson Effect” is strong here as well.
Yeah I hear you Angus. It’s a tough judgement call sometimes for cops, but with a pattern of repeat offenders, there is a strong movement (even now in the local media) for people to be held accountable. And it’s a lot easier for cops to pull someone over who has clearly been recorded doing it a dozen times.
Last year with the then imminent advent of congestion pricing, and the somewhat recent Hochul-induced “re-advent” of congestion pricing, SMH 🙂 there has been a concerted effort to diminish the effect of these scofflaws. A new state law just passed in September upped the ante on using fake plates because it was a really huge hole in the revenue (estimated at $200-700 million a year). And TBH it’s not really that hard to figure out who’s doing it (although yeah I get you, theoretically “easy” but in practice, maybe less so since police interactions with the public can sometimes be unpredictable). Actually, I believe sometimes it’s just the boot that happens, so there may be less possibility for confrontation.
As an aside when cops investigate crashes involving people using fake or covered plates, it’s more difficult to prosecute, so this isn’t just a “revenue stream” as many people who commute into NYC might argue. There is a real and imminent public safety concern directly resulting from people trying to fraud the system. People die from this and the people who should be held liable may not face consequences.
As for Portland I’m not sure how different this will play out, but I’m hopeful that we can learn from the mistakes of NY. I’m also hopeful that the conversation on congestion pricing can start in Portland as well. It is invariably unpopular nearly everywhere it has been implemented (e.g., Stockholm, Singapore, Milan, London). People don’t like to pay for things that have been “free.” But after people see its effects it becomes extremely popular because it works really well. People would rather pay a few extra bucks to use roads that are by and large not congested. Just think about having that peace of mind and how valuable that is for a lot of people who use cars.
https://www.portland.gov/transportation/parking/registration
No registration citations are starting again in 2024 and missing plates are also being enforced
“Starting” is the key word. Just takes one person to suddenly quiet and short the department, backlogs begin to pile up. Like I mentioned above, I have two cars that haven’t had updated tags since 2019. Basically, my fine will be a signal for me to finally get tags, I still see it cheaper than registering every two years. I would comply if the city streets weren’t so full of criminal activity, seems a little unfair to make me pay when it takes months and months to get an abandoned car towed off my block.
Hey Matt S. I’m confused about your statement. You report that you are personally supportive of fining criminal activity with regards to vehicle registration, and would theoretically like to comply with the law. But instead of complying with the law you are waiting until others are fined? Could it be possible that other people do not register their cars for the exact same reason, and because of that the city workers have difficulty enforcing registration laws?
I would imagine many people might feel the same way about insuring their cars or driving without a license. Since no one has caught them doing it, they might feel it’s an endemic, but benign problem that is unfair if they take the initiative and comply with the law. Following a collision the repercussions for a lack of registration, insurance and/or license may compound the problem not merely for the driver, but for others involved.
It’s not “difficulty” in enforcing laws in Portland, it’s that the police were explicitly told NOT to make traffic stops for plates/registration and PBOT workers were instructed by Chole Eudaly and Joanne Hardesty to “de-empahsize” (not do it) enforcing vehicle registration and parking laws.
When someone like Matt see others getting away with it, they do it too! Simple human behavior at work here.
Hey Mary, I don’t want to seem moralizing, particularly since I don’t know the specific circumstances Matt is in, nor do I have a car to be registered, so it’s a little unfair to someone who has to deal with owning a car. But my point is this:
If 9/10 people, for example, fly through a stopsign, that behavior has become normalized. And the more it is normalized, the fewer people question it. But it is still important to recognize that despite it being typical behavior, it’s a dangerous one.
It’s unfortunate that some council members may have discouraged traffic stops for legitimate or illegitimate reasons, but this was on the heels of people who were murdered by police officers, and that sucks for everyone involved (most importantly those competent and well-meant police who are stigmatized).
Despite all of these cultural phenomenon surrounding the public perception of policing and where limited funds should go, Matt is still making an intentional choice to ignore the law, which endangers the public. The purpose for license registration is centered around public health (e.g., helping police identify perpetrators, ensuring that those people can operate a vehicle safely, provide income for road maintenance). One could argue a very similar thing about inoculation for the smallpox virus. If other people are flaunting it, then I will too. That brash individualism makes for either a lot of dead people or a couple fun pox parties.
Sending out tickets to speeding and red light running drivers caught on camera all day seems like such a satisfying job! Is pbot hiring for the role?? I would even volunteer my time!
I’m not sure it would be fun appearing in court and some lunatic starts ranting about your actions writing them a ticket and taking away from their meth money.
It wasn’t clear though if the PBOT staff would be actually going to court to describe the method of issuing the ticket if someone challenged it. Does anyone know?
That sounds great, actually. I’ve had no recourse in the past when meth heads have berated me when cycling, walking, and driving in Portland. I would love to be able to testify against them in court, and know they were being held accountable for their actions.
Meth heads usually don’t show up for court, that is partly why we have the problems that we do…
I’d like to know where to sign up too, maybe when the job opening is available it could be posted in Bikeportland jobs ?
As I recall, the city advocated for the 2022 change that would allow PBOT to process these tickets, so they’ve been thinking about this for a while. Why on earth is it going to take until the end of 2025 for PBOT to even begin to hire the folks needed to carry this out?
I dunno, is it maybe because PBOT is already broke? That the pay for PBOT staff is generally more than it is for police officers? That half of the money collected goes to the county courts and not the city?
Having never gotten one, who gets the money from these tickets? If the PPB, there’s a reason not to turn it loose to PBOT too quickly.
As for the timeline for PBOT, one assumes they have no money to bring on new hires for this job and are having to add them as they can find cash to do so.
cct. About 70% of the fine revenue goes to the State of Oregon. Here’s the breakdown:
– $60 (or the amount of the fine if the fine is less than $60) is initially payable to the state prior to any other distribution of the fine
– Of the remaining fine amount, 50% is payable to the local government and 50% is payable to the state.
– the local share is spent on operation and maintenance of the program and the rest gets dedicated to PBOT traffic safety projects and programs.
Just FYI, for 2021 and 2022 the program brought in a total of $1.37 million for both years. Of that amount, the PPB staff expense was $173,000. PBOT staff expense was $226,000
That total revenue number will go up as the number of cameras has doubled since then so we can guess around $1.5 million a year.
Do other states have this amount of traffic ticket revenue go to the state itself? I thought in most places it stayed local?
that’s a good question. I’m not sure. I need to learn more about that.
The reason that happened is a number of years ago a certain city located on I-5 used the writing of tickets to pay for their police officer. There were a lot of questions around whether the tickets were legit or not or just the result of various speed traps.
Eventually it resulted in the State taking the lion’s share of ticket revenue so that City’s wouldn’t be using tickets as the primary revenue source for police where the citizens of the community should be paying.
As it should be — neither police nor any other agency should have a financial stake in finding people to fine.
The tiny community of Junction City, just north of Eugene, on I-5. I remember reading about it in the Register-Guard when I was in college at U of O over 35 years ago. A total speed trap.
Junction City isn’t on I-5, it’s on 99/99E/99W (I don’t doubt that they had speed traps though)
It sounds like these cameras more than pay for themselves and the staff needed to monitor them. Why not put them on literally every street? Presumably traffic deaths would plummet and we’d have more money for infrastructure projects. Seems like a win/win.
that’s a really good question, Phil. The numbers that Jonathan mentioned above says that the program brought in ~$750k a year, but is that before the State takes their $60 of each fine off the top, not to mention 50% of the remainder? Also, I believe the cameras are owned by a contractor, so that cost (whatever it is) is not included. While this is absolutely a great idea & I’m all for expanding it, I’d be happily surprised if it’s even a revenue-neutral proposition.
scaling up a work force is difficult
You’re asking why? LOL, I think we all know why. Kotek just asked the media to stop throwing Portland under the bus, but then they do stuff like this in just about every department.
You and most the people commenting forget that the ticket must be signed by a duly authorized traffic enforcement agent (see text from House Bill 4105 below)
(f) A police officer or a duly authorized traffic enforcement agent who has reviewed the photograph signs the citation. The citation may be prepared on a digital medium, and the signature may be electronic in accordance with the provisions of ORS 84.001 to 84.061.
So the staff that reviews the photos is an officer of the court and if someone wants to contest the ticket that enforcement agent would have to appear in court. I suspect this would also slow the hiring process down.
How much do the “dual enforcement intersection cameras” cost?
Can I take up a collection to put one in the intersection when Jeanie Diaz was killed, and where I see drivers continuing to endanger lives multiple times every week?
And then from there we can fundraise for more cameras in neighborhoods throughout the city, because yes, I understand that not every neighborhood would have the resources to do their own fundraising. But together we could make all of Portland safer.
I believe that personally funded speed bumps are no longer possible due to equity concerns. I imagine that personally funded cameras would be much the same. Your argument makes complete sense and its a shame that PBOT is refusing to help make areas safer due to nebulous concerns about perceived fairness.
Yep a neighborhood association wanted to put in a digital traffic speed readout on a street with lots of speeding (on their own dime). PBOT said no as it went against “equity”.
It’s the first question they answer in the FAQ on their page about cameras linked above. They’re focusing on high crash intersections. Even if a neighborhood could raise the money for a camera I would bet the larger cost is operating it which I doubt any neighborhood would opt to fund.
Thank you for the link and your statement gave me a wild (meaning I know its not practical, but it would be fun) idea.
Imagine a neighborhood providing funds for a camera, supplying the labor (which is possible as they no longer need to be sworn officers and several people here have said they would donate their time. If it was for financially penalizing the scumbag speeders on my road i’d donate my time too) and then spreading the profits from the tickets to help with neighborhood improvements. Since it is automated, there would be no chance for selective enforcement nor accusations of it being a speed trap.
Is there such a thing as a crosswalk camera? Ideally with the speed camera built in as well. Can we please ticket people for not yielding the ROW at marked crosswalks? I’m thinking at a minimum these are needed along the 5 lane stroads that PBOT has recently doubled down on like outer Division and 82nd.
Jeff, this is a really good question. It’s a difficult question to answer because laws exist in most states to prevent right turns on red (Oregon is an exception). This may not answer your question well, but allow me to assuage those worries by changing your question. Do we need to automatically detect all infractions?
There are crosswalk cameras, AKA “Block the Box” cameras, which detect cars that remain in a crosswalk during a cycle where the pedestrian has the signal. When I lived in DC it was an expected behavior that people driving stopped in the crosswalk perhaps 90% of the time (it sucked). And there are other more complex camera systems, but I do not understand nor care to go into detail about them.
TBH IMO (please take this with a grain of salt because I do not have evidence for this viewpoint) the infinite variability and complexity of potential traffic camera systems may be interesting, but the more basic speed cameras proliferate, the less we really need to focus ALL specific behaviors. Think about it this way: If we have a person who burns rubber, recklessly merges, speeds, does not yield to peds when turning and generally acts like an asshat, (and all of these are unobserved by cops) do we really need to detect ALL of those behaviors to have an impact? What are the most consistent and easiest to measure of these behaviors?
I hope your answer is speeding and red light running. The venn diagram of all those dozens of idiotic and dangerous actions invariably include those two simple behaviors, and the complexity of detecting and monitoring the degree of other infractions increases the workload and operational expense exponentially. Obtain incontrovertible evidence of someone speeding and/or running a red, and you already have an automatic fine. See someone being a dipshit, using expletives, slowly moving into the pedestrian zone while people are using the crossing and subjectively “yielding” to them, well that’s not something that’s as cut and dry (nor is it worth the time/risk to engage with that person).
Anyway, hope that helps.
Slight correction in that all 50 states allow right on red lights, but individual cities are starting to ban the practice making for a patchwork of local laws.
Ooh very interesting. That threw me down a deep rabbit hole.
Thanks. To be more specific, I’m hoping for crosswalk cameras at more like a mid-block location such as with a RRFB rather than correcting ‘all’ issues at intersections. I grant you that the above should help a lot. Last point, red light running and speeding threaten cars as much as pedestrians. My hope with my question is to point these investments specifically at pedestrian safety where kinetic energy imbalance is so great. I know from having a friend get a speed camera ticket that he was first and foremost educated on the impacts of speeding in addition to the fine. I’d like to see the same at crosswalks, especially mid-block ones or ones at crossings that have a median blocking cars on the stroads. A pipe dream perhaps, but one that might generate a safer environment that prioritizes pedestrians as the modal hierarchy should.
On a technical level, this might be difficult — it is legal to drive through the strobing yellow lights (even at speed), but only if the crosswalk is empty.
I’d say that modern tech *should* be able to identify that someone is in or near a crosswalk when a vehicle goes through and flag it for human review.
a few years ago I read an interesting (to the tech geek like me) article about a Microsoft Engineer used their deep learning technology to build a system that could tell the difference between different small critters. He then compressed it into a Raspberry Pi and made a system that turned the sprinklers on some critters (pests that damaged his garden) and not others.
I think it’s technically possible, but is it available in a general-purpose module that’s affordable and compatible with our traffic cameras, and is it reliable enough to be used for law-enforcement purposes? And, given a finite capacity, is it a higher priority than speed enforcement and red light cameras?
While I won’t step into the crossing until I’m sure vehicles are going to stop, I’ve found compliance with crossing beacons to be high (at least on SE Powell and in a few other places I encounter them).
Oh yeah Trike Guy, this reminds me of the guy in China who built a radar based laser turret system to eliminate mosquitoes (I love his casualty book!). Man that’s some crazy MF tech that i’d love to experiment with (and I’m glad I had no access to when I was a child).
Any potential applications for Dukes of Hazard type drivers? Time will only tell.
I hear you Jeff. I’ve been there many times. I’ve stood at crosswalks and waved sometimes for minutes before being allowed to cross the road (only in the US). An engineer could answer this question much better than I, but I’ll give it a shot.
Firstly, If I’m not mistaken I think there are already quite a few speed cameras that are located mid block. Here are the locations. Unfortunately or not, I think traffic engineers might answer thusly: a systems approach looks at the broad trends and patterns that can be effective at combating crashes. I would be incredibly surprised if the locations of current speed cameras are entirely random. Traffic engineers have put a lot of thought and work into their locations.That’s not to say the specific intersections you prefer shouldn’t be a priority.
One more thing that I think is integral to this idea. If you put a traffic camera on, for example, 122nd, and refrain from narrowing the lanes, adding medians and separate bike lanes, people are still going to tend to drive faster than if you redesign the street to accommodate for other modes. So, yes traffic cams have a lot of data to support them, but they work much better when integrated into an approach that looks into various types of research on street design etc. Maybe I got close to answering your question? I’m not sure.
Realizing that Powell is a State facility and not part of the PBOT system, I’m curious about the cameras at the SE 42nd/43rd and Powell intersection. I bike, walk and sometimes drive thru this intersection on a daily basis, and the red light running on Powell is so frequent, our neighborhood folks always wait before crossing, especially if they’re on foot or bike. The intersection has had a ban on left turns from Powell for the 25+ years I’ve lived in the neighborhood, but left turns from Powell happen, usually on the red when folks are crossing. When PBOT modified the intersection with bike boxes on 42nd/43rd, and re-did the signal, the cameras were installed. Whose are they and can they be used to enforce illegal lefts, or red-light running?
Hhmm Laura I scoured the series of internet tubes and didn’t come up with much other than this rather antiquated study which may or may not be related to what you are referring to. ODOT did indeed install some speed cameras, but I can’t find anything specifically about 42nd/43rd, and PBOT’s site does not include cameras at that location. It’s a mystery to me as well. I do not believe ODOT administers speed cameras (how could they since nearly every hwy under their jurisdiction has consistent speeding over 10mph?). Based on ODOT’s MO of expanding extremely lucrative hiway infrastructure, it would not behoove them to use traffic cameras.
We live in a culture where consistent dangerous behavior is accepted and encouraged as the norm (even by well-meant, nice, average people). We also have the experience and evidence to very easily mitigate those behaviors. It’s simply the political willpower that we lack.
This is the primary problem with many of the issue we discuss here. There are a lot of things we could do to improve bicycling, but there is insufficient political support for them, so we don’t.
I suspect the visibility of photo radar cameras matters more than the number of citations issued. Drivers see them and slow down. Once one car slows down, the ones following also slow down. Eventually the slower speed becomes habitual among frequent drivers who pass the camera on a daily or weekly basis.
If no tickets go out, the cameras are an idle threat.
Dream Job. Please post an update when applications are open
This is awesome! Effective enforcement without human bias or risks associated with stopping people and at low cost. Please double, triple, and beyond, the number of cameras.