Skip to main content

US and Canada extend use of safety cameras

Orange Park is the latest town in north Florida to invest in red-light cameras. Over the next 20 days, crews will be installing, setting up and unveiling the machines at three intersections. A 30-day public awareness campaign will begin in March and the cameras will go live on 1 April. "Hopefully these red-light cameras will not only make people aware of running the red lights, but make them aware they need to slow down," Orange Park Police Chief Gary Goble said. York Region, Ontario is to install twenty r
February 7, 2013 Read time: 2 mins
Orange Park is the latest town in north Florida to invest in red-light cameras. Over the next 20 days, crews will be installing, setting up and unveiling the machines at three intersections.  A 30-day public awareness campaign will begin in March and the cameras will go live on 1 April.

"Hopefully these red-light cameras will not only make people aware of running the red lights, but make them aware they need to slow down," Orange Park Police Chief Gary Goble said.

York Region, Ontario is to install twenty red light cameras at intersections throughout the region.

The various sites were selected based upon the number of right-angle, or T-bone, collisions that occurred and to ensure a reasonable geographic distribution, transportation commissioner Kathleen Llewellyn-Thomas and traffic management and intelligent transportation services director Steven Kemp explained.

A progress report on the program is expected in the autumn and another batch of sites is scheduled to be considered in 2017. Any additional revenue generated by the program, over and above its operating costs, will be set aside in a reserve intended to install additional red light cameras at intersections around the region.

The city of Frisco in Texas will activate its fourth red light camera at a location based on crash data and selected unanimously by the Citizen Advisory Committee for the traffic signal enforcement systems.  Crash data showed that in the previous 18 months the intersection had five crashes caused by a motorist running a red light.

The first of the city’s cameras was activated in March 2011.  City officials say that in their first year of operation, crashes declined 47 percent the two intersections at which the cameras were deployed. Additionally, the average monthly number of red-light violations at intersections the cameras are located at has been reduced 29 percent.

"It is our committee's hope that by implementing the camera at this intersection, we will obtain a similar level of success that we have experienced at other red light camera intersections in Frisco, by significantly reducing red light running and collisions through greater driver awareness." said Rick Fletcher, a member of the Citizen Advisory Committee.

Related Content

  • January 23, 2013
    Florida cities expand red light cameras
    West Palm Beach is to significantly expand its red-light camera program in 2013 after commissioners approved plans to install cameras at twenty-five new intersections, bringing the number of intersections equipped to catch drivers who illegally run red lights to thirty-two. The move comes despite a recent city police report that tracked five of the existing seven red-light cameras and found crashes nearly doubled in those locations between February 2011 and January 2013, to 66 from 36. Police Chief Vince De
  • January 28, 2013
    US study finds cameras reduce red light running
    The latest research by the US Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) found that red light running rates declined at Arlington, Virginia, intersections equipped with cameras. The decreases were particularly large for the most dangerous violations, those happening 1.5 seconds or longer after the light turned red. "This study provides fresh evidence that automated enforcement can get drivers to modify their behaviour," says Anne McCartt, senior vice president for research at IIHS and the study's lead au
  • January 6, 2015
    Decrease in Florida’s red-light running crashes
    The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles' (DHSMV) recently-released third annual Red-Light Camera Summary Report analysed data from 68 police agencies in the cities and towns in Florida where red-light safety cameras are deployed. The report shows a decrease in red-light running violations and crashes at intersections with red-light safety cameras and is consistent with results from previous state reports affirming the effectiveness of this important law enforcement tool. Total violations
  • October 7, 2014
    Orange County red light crashes decrease
    Red-light safety cameras are reducing traffic dangers in Orange County, Florida, according to a recent program update presented to the Board of County Commissioners that showed drivers are stopping on red and crashes are diminishing. The presentation from the Traffic Engineering Division of the county's Public Works Department included two years of red-light camera program data (July 2011 to June 2013) from the annual reports submitted to the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, which