The traffic light camera controversy intensifies with the report that some cities are illegally tampering with traffic lights to increase revenue from traffic light cameras.By using shorter yellow lights in order to issue more traffic tickets, cities are also creating accident hot spots.
If the yellow-light times are set below recognized standards, two things will happen -- traffic tickets will increase and accidents, that otherwise wouldn’t have happened, will increase.
The cities that are using their red light cameras as “ticket traps” are:
1. Chattanooga, Tennessee. The city of Chattanooga was forced refund $8800 in red light cameras tickets issued to motorists trapped by an illegally short yellow time.
2. Dallas, Texas. An investigation by KDFW-TV, a local TV station, found that of the ten cameras that issued the greatest number of tickets in the city, seven were located at intersections where the yellow duration is shorter than the bare minimum recommended by the Texas Department of Transportation.
3. Springfield, Missouri prepared for the installation of a red light camera system in 2007 by slashing the yellow warning time by one second at 105 state-owned intersection signals across the city.
4. Lubbock, Texas. KBCD, a local television station, exposed the city’s short timing of yellow lights at eight of the twelve intersections where the devices were to be installed.
5. Nashville, Tennessee. Even without red light cameras, police in Nashville, Tennessee have been earning hundreds of thousands in revenue by trapping motorists in conventional ticket traps at city intersections with the shortest yellow warning time.
6. Union City, California was caught trapping motorists with a yellow signal time 1.3 seconds below the minimum established by state law. As a result, the city was forced to refund more than $1 million in red light camera fines.
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