Vigilantes set fire to a speed camera in Dorset, UK at around 2am on Thursday. The automated ticketing machine had been operating in the Longham area of Ringwood Road until a burning tire put the device out of commission. This is the fourth attack in the area since August when vigilantes also eliminated cameras on Magna Road in Bearwood, Ringwood Road in Verwood and Horton Road in Three Legged Cross. Cameras were also destroyed in 2006. “The cameras also cost a lot,” Ferndown Mayor Queenie Comfort told the Bournemouth Echo newspaper. “When you set tires on fire they make a most ghastly smell and they are toxic.”

Source: Longham speed camera torched by vandals (Bournemouth Echo (UK), 11/13/2009)

[courtesy thenewspaper.com]

Inspired by the success of the College Station, Texas initiative banning red light cameras, activists a hundred miles away in are collecting signatures to do the same in Baytown. Officials in the Gulf Coast city of 72,000 allowed American Traffic Solutions to set up the cameras in April 2008, but resident Byron Schirmbeck is circulating a petition in the hopes of giving voters the opportunity to take them back down. “The response has been absolutely overwhelming,” Schirmbeck told TheNewspaper. “I am conservative in saying that I have had less than ten percent of people I asked at public places refuse to sign because they support the cameras. The usual response to the question, ‘Would you like to sign the petition to ban the red light cameras?’ is ‘Hell yes’ and ‘Can I get my wife to sign it too?’”

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Speeding tickets are beginning to cross international borders in Europe, thanks to the European car and driving license information system, or EUCARIS. At the beginning of the year, Swiss motorists began being charged for speed camera tickets issued by French authorities. As of October, the French government had collected on a total of 10,000 citations from violations allegedly committed by vehicles registered in Switzerland. A total of 1800 tickets were issued last month alone.

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A lawsuit funded by a photo enforcement company succeeded yesterday in temporarily blocking the results of the vote to end red light cameras in College Station, Texas. Judge Suzanne Stovall granted a temporary restraining order preventing the city from ending its contract with American Traffic Solutions, despite the November 3 vote of a majority of residents demanding that the cameras come down. The law firm of Bovey, Akers and Bojorquez ostensibly filed the lawsuit on behalf of the Keep College Station Safe Political Action Committee (PAC), a group entirely funded by College Station’s camera vendor, American Traffic Solutions (ATS) and its subcontractors. Of the PAC’s $67,100 in reported funding, the largest chunk — $30,000 — came directly from ATS. Garry Mauro, a paid ATS consultant, gave $5000. Another $8000 came from Signal Electric, a Washington-based contractor that installs red light cameras for ATS. ForceCon Services, a Texas-based red light camera installation subcontractor, gave $5000. Questmark Information Management Inc, a company that prints citations for ATS, provided a $16,600 in-kind donation.

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Rhode Island Governor Donald Carcieri (R) on Monday vetoed legislation that would have imposed privacy restrictions on the use of E-ZPass toll transponder data. The scuttled bill also included a ban on schools and government agencies from using the same Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) transponder chips to track schoolchildren. Carcieri focused on the positive aspects of tracking children in his veto message. “Why would the General Assembly therefore place restrictions on the use of this technology as an option for all students?” Carcieri wrote. “In certain circumstances, it may be helpful for schools to have the ability to quickly identify where each of their students is located… Such circumstances may include weather-related natural disasters, terrorist or criminal events or even a need for use during field trips and outside school activities.”

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Voters in Denver, Colorado last Tuesday overwhelmingly rejected a ballot measure that would have forced police to impound cars whenever a driver failed to produce a driver’s license. The measure was designed to expand a 2008 impound ordinance in a way that would have increased pressure on illegal immigrants. “They are responsible for about half of the fatal accidents and, of course, they are uninsured,” initiative sponsor Daniel Hayes argued. “Illegal aliens, like all unlicensed drivers, will be towed just as a domestic driver under suspension or revocation.”

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A German court last month overturned a traffic citation after prosecutors failed to prove the accuracy of a new laser-based speed camera technology. The district court of Dillenburg heard testimony from four experts, each of whom cast doubt on the system. The judge concluded that the motorist accused by a Poliscan automated ticketing machine of driving 96km/h (60 MPH) in a 40 (25 MPH) zone was not guilty.

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Among the 15,000 Maryland state employees who drive on area toll roads without paying are judges, lawmakers and powerful bureaucrats. The Maryland Politics Watch website used a freedom of information request in August to discover that 128 of 188 legislators took advantage of a perquisite giving officials a scrutiny and bill-free E-ZPass transponder—despite already receiving a $600 yearly travel expense allowance from taxpayers. After being exposed, the General Assembly leadership moved to limit the fallout by abruptly canceling the program on September 25.

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An early look at the performance of the red light cameras in Temple Terrace, Florida shows that they have done nothing to improve safety. Instead of merely repeating city claims on the topic, investigative reporters for the Tampa station WFTS ordered accident reports and checked the data for themselves. Although the program has been operational for a year, police only released enough data to produce a limited snapshot of the effect on accidents. Over the first five months of the program, accidents decreased citywide by 13 percent compared to the same period a year earlier without cameras. At intersections with cameras, however, the number of accidents more than doubled from six to fourteen. Contrary to claims that red light cameras decrease accident severity, the average police estimate of damage costs for each accident increased by twenty percent after cameras were installed.

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California motorists hit with massive fines for minor, alleged toll infractions won a settlement last month from the Orange County Transportation Agency (OCTA) and Transportation Corridor Agency (TCA). The toll road operating entities agreed to pay $1.4 million in restitution and waive $41 million in unpaid toll penalties after admitting the fines were “excessive” and that the denial of due process to the accused was “unconstitutional.” Over a dozen motorists sued in 2007 claiming that fines of up to $123,000 for skipping tolls were outrageous. In several cases, such as that of Stephanie and Brian Young, the violations were inadvertent. The couple racked up $580 in unpaid tolls in 2003 after the credit card linked to their toll transponder account expired. For this mistake, OCTA demanded that they pay $53,550 in fines. Similarly, Maria and Pablo Gonzalez allegedly failed to pay $60.14 in tolls and were billed $78,780.

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