Speed cameras seem to be a common occurrence nowadays. On your way to work, school, or just out and about, you’re sure to see a “Photo Enforced” sign somewhere along the way. These things seem to be everywhere, but are they effective in what they’re put in place to accomplish? What are they there to accomplish, one may ask? Some say to make roadways safer by curbing speeders with moderate fines while others think it’s purely a revenue generator for the local and state governments. A fine of $100 or less isn’t going to keep a driver from speeding, at some point or another they will speed therefore deeming the cameras useless. Speeding cameras are a burden to people and have no benefit to anyone other than the local governments and the people …show more content…
The government is forbidden from engaging in continuous surveillance systems without warrants to look for offenders of crimes. As of now only career criminals are currently considered bad enough by the state legislature to justify such a system. It is possible that the cameras, or the data they collect, could one day be used for purposes other than speed enforcement, which may already be happening. This is a breach of privacy and should not be allowed. There are other ways to reduce speeds, such as the use of radar speed signs, that are every bit as effective if not more so than speed cameras. The profit motive of speed cameras encourages the government to ignore equal or better alternatives. Speed cameras do not remove the worst drivers from the roads the way a police officer can. Drunk drivers or a reckless criminals in a stolen vehicle, who might pose an immediate risk to pedestrians and other motorists, could ignore a speed camera completely therefore deeming it ineffective, and since the current system issues no points for citations, a wealthy but extremely bad driver can receive dozens of speed camera tickets without losing their license, if they pay the fines. Speed Cameras are magnets for legally bribing governments, essentially corruption. Speed Camera Contractors lobby heavily each year for statewide speed cameras. Many can agree that everyone has their own “price” and governments are literally …show more content…
I am going to address many below and give you a new outlook on how corrupt speed cameras are and the people behind them. Speeding cameras are computerized machines as some of us may know. This means there is no sure fire way to know whether the camera is ticketing properly. It could have fallen out of calibration leaving innocent speeders with a ticket they don’t deserve. The lack of human oversight means that no one person will be held accountable if there are widespread errors or misconduct by officials. Since tickets are received weeks later, the accused have a very limited ability to gather evidence in their defense. This is particularly true of mobile cameras which may no longer be in the same location, or work zone cameras where the location may have been substantially changed by the time the defendant becomes aware of the alleged offense. Tickets are issued to the owner of the vehicle even if they are not the driver. A third of speed camera tickets are going to people who did not in fact commit the offense because someone else was driving at the time. This is of even more concern now that courts in Maryland have declared paying a citation to be an "admission of speeding". Ticket Recipients who challenge citations have their cases heard in an unfair court proceeding commonly known as District Court 'Speed Camera Day ', where dozens of defendants have their cases heard in an assembly line manner.
In Houston, Texas alone there are around one hundred stoplights. Recently, a law has been drafted to place cameras on the stoplights and Houston and the surrounding suburbs. These "red-light cameras" or RLCs as they are called automatically take a picture of a vehicle breaking the law by running the stoplight and sends the owner a seventy-five dollar ticket. This method of ticketing is incredibly inefficient and should be removed. The camera system fails to notify the recipients of the tickets in a fair amount of time, does not take into account if the owner is driving, and according to the people of Houston should not even be in place. The current system that the red-light cameras are under is flawed and should be removed completely.
A speeding ticket is an effective form of discipline: paying for a ticket, traffic school, and higher insurance rates. Paying for a speeding ticket is an unpleasant experience. A ticket can be outrageously expensive depending on how fast you speed. Some states charge ten to twenty dollars per mile an hour over the speed limit. The officer assigns you a day to appear in court, if you choose to fight the ticket rather.
One of the sources used to disprove that body camera isn’t the answer includes Jamelle Bouie article, Keeping the Police honest. Mr. Bouie is the chief political correspondent at Slate who graduated from the University of Virginia with a political and social thought degree (Tumblr.com). His work consists of issues relating to national politics, public policies and racial inequality. His work has also been published in Slate online magazine, the New Yorker, the Washington Post and TIME Magazine (Tumblr.com). Slate is an online magazine that post about the news, politics, business, technology and culture (slate.com). In Jamelle article, Keeping the Police honest he talks about incidents where police officers were being recorded and took excessive
Police Body Cameras Due to devastating events that have occurred between policemen and civilians, law enforcements find it liable for police officers to be fitted with body cameras. In doing so it is thought to bring an increase in trust in the community, reduce brutality and crime, as well as elucidate good cops still around. I feel body cameras will bring more awareness to police departments when it comes to the honesty in their staff’s actions when they are unsupervised. They can be used as hard evidence in courtrooms, to help make the correct judgment on the situation in question.
Obviously even five miles per hour over the speed limit is still speeding, but what would bring two cops to pull over a car traveling at a speed that almost everyone drives? Statistics from New York City’s Police Department have shown that the number of tickets for miniscule offenses is on the rise, and even though it is illegal for a city to set a formal quota for police to meet, many people believe it is still a common practice to have “under the table” quotas. According to Compstat, a crime analysis and police management process developed by the New York City Police Department, officers wrote 912,414 parking tickets between January 1 and May 11 of this year, as compared to 877,443 parking tickets during the same period last year, which represents an increase of 3.9%. A spokesman for the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, Al O’Leary, said, “The apparent increase in summonses (in New York City) was fueled by quotas. You can call them goals or targets or management productivity levels, but in a practical world, those are quotas" (Mauldin).
Surveillance cameras have helped hundreds of law enforcement agencies solve thousands of crimes throughout the nation. They have become so helpful that most law enforcement agencies are planning on setting them up on street corners, buildings, publication parks, and on their own officers. There are many cities across the nation that have began to use surveillance cameras. Setting up cameras is a pivotal technique to solving and preventing crimes. Although, it is often argued that having law enforcement surveillance cameras set up throughout the nations communities is an invasion of privacy, citizens should sacrifice a little bit of privacy in return for their safety and protection of civil rights against criminals and police officers.
Due to recent cases of police brutality in America, activists are urging police departments across the country to start using body worn cameras, or BWCs. BWCs are devices that can be worn by police officers to collect video evidence while they are at work. There are numerous studies proving the effectiveness of these devices, but many critics claim that they risk the citizens’ privacy by opening the possibility of tapes being released without their consent. Although many activists claim that there are already strict standards set for the release of BWC tapes, some worry that the current standards are insufficient for securely protecting the privacy of citizens.
By adopting body cameras, officers can do their job without having to worry about getting punished or fired for doing the right thing, even if the events take a turn for the worst, as long as the officer is taking the correct actions they will be protected. Police officers are required to go through months of training and multiple probationary periods before being put out on the streets. The officers know right from wrong, the camera is just there to remind them, someone is always watching.
Speeding is the third most common factor in vehicle accidents in the US, costing 13,000 lives a year. Some of the reasons behind speeding include: driver's being in a rush, the need for adrenaline, and their belief that they won't get caught, or that laws don't apply to them. Speeding not only shortens your reaction time, but also your control of the vehicle as the faster the vehicle goes the more any sudden movements can affect it causing to flip or slide into another car, which may cause a fatality, maybe not to yourself but to
Technology is evolving faster than ever these days, however there is one technology that could revolutionize the transportation industry. This technology is called autonomous cars, also known as self-driving cars. Autonomous cars can be defined as a vehicle that is capable of sensing its environment, and navigating without human input. Using different techniques such as GPS and radar, autonomous cars can detect surroundings, thus removing the human element in driving. This would have a positive effect in more ways than we could ever imagine. Research suggests that self-driving cars will become more abundant in the future because they will be more cost-effective, enhance safety, and decrease traffic congestion.
There are some major upsides in having cameras in public places. In early 2013 two people set off bombs at the Boston marathon, which killed several people and injured hundreds. The city of Boston had cameras monitoring the streets, and was able to identify the bombers within two days. (La Vigne, Nancy) The FBI was able to catch them before they were able to carry out another planned attack in Times Square, which could have been much, more devastating. In addition to being able to solve crimes that have already happened by using cameras, we are also able to use them and the other technologies that go with it to prevent crime. The National Security Agency has reported that it has prevented several terrorist attacks since 2001 using new technology put in place to prevent the attacks. However, much of the NSA’s tactics have been criticized lately, though the majority of people still agree that it is worth it. Using cameras is also a cheap way to monitor an area. Having to employ several police officers to patrol an area can be expensive and those officers could be out doing more important jobs. When you have cam...
Having a network of cameras on every street in the city increases the chances of preventing a crime, along with the ability to capture a criminal on video. Some people argue that the cameras generate an overwhelming amount of evidence to sift through.... ... middle of paper ... ... However, because all this technology is relatively new, there are not really any policies that have been enacted yet.
Since surveillance cameras have been invented for security reasons at shopping malls and stores they have also been place in public areas such as stoplights, parking lots, hallways, bus stops, and more.
There is one practice that really irritates me during my morning commute to work in downtown Phoenix, Arizona, are the drivers who are in the “fast lane” without keeping pace with the other cars sharing the lane, and who are also failing to yield to a faster driver and allowing them to pass. The passing lane is commonly referred to as a "fast lane" because it is often used for extended periods of time for through traffic or faster traffic. In theory, a passing lane should only be used for passing, thus allowing, drivers to travel at their own pace. There are three important reasons why I believe law enforcement should spend more time ticketing drivers that impede traffic flow instead of ticketing the ones exceeding the speed if conditions warrant because the people going slow are the one’s causing the root problem and the people being erratic trying to get around are only responding to the improper use of the passing lane, making them victims and not perpetrators.
...s to make traffic more efficient. For example, the Ohio Revised Code in section 4511.21 states clearly that "No person shall operate a motor vehicle, trackless trolley, or a street car at a speed greater than reasonable or proper due regard to the traffic." Road speed limits are used to regulate the speed of vehicles. Sometimes people try to get somewhere and they go over the speed limit not realizing that they are putting themselves in danger. Now every time I get in a car with a friend or a family member, I make sure that they are going by the speed limit, not texting and paying attention on the road. It is very important that we follow this rules because they are only protecting us, and keeping us safe. If we want to reduce the millions of deaths that are caused by this imprudence every year we need to start being more responsible when we get behind the wheel.