I didn’t ask you to repeat your argument. I asked you to support it with some sort of evidence. As noted, you don’t have any.

if people run red lights on purpose today, what incentive does a longer yellow give them to suddenly become law-abiding?

Again, that misses the point. The fact remains is that study after study demonstrates that a light of appropriate length increases compliance. You have not proven that to be wrong, not at all.

The issue here is with compliance rates. That’s how rational people measure results. The studies show improve compliance with appropriate timing.

So I have no idea what your objection is. If there are standards for light timing, there is no good reason to avoid using them. If the compliance rates increase, there is no reason to dispute the outcome.

Your ideological blinders are preventing you from seeing the very simple reality in front of us: most people do it on purpose. And it’s difficult to concoct a reasonable scenario where people who used to run red lights on purpose won’t continue to do so even when faced with longer yellows.

We obviously cannot solve this problem, not even with good scientific work and engineering studies.

We obviously don’t give a rat’s ass about common sense, so we should just give it all up. As a society, we’re no longer fit to accept reality! Therefore, we’re unprepared to accept the responsibilities of driving.

It’s evident now that we must immediately stop allowing people to drive. No driving, no red light runners. No tickets. No accidents. No need for police or EMTs, or the evil short yellow lights and the evil bureaucrats who implement them! Also, no fuel consumption; therefore, no pollution. And no need for bailout money, since nobody will need cars anymore.

We must make everybody live in their cars and we can knock all the houses and red light intersections down to make room for farmland. Cows and horses never needed any damned traffic lights!

Problem solved. In lieu of a check, I’ll take a horse, thank you very much.

You have absolutely no proof for this statement. Not a single solitary bit of reliable data can be found to support that contention.

No offense, but I don’t want laws based upon your gut instincts. Your omniscience doesn’t make for suitable public policy.

For a brief time. Until people adjust. And, of course, you’re giving up a lot of efficiency of your traffic system by doing that; the good drivers will continue to stop when they always did; but now they’re stopped for longer.

your willingness to do whatever it takes to raise money

Pch, I will continue to attribute loathsome misrepresented statements to you as long as you do to me. Why do you want little kids to die in fiery collisions just so you can continue to run red lights?

The tendency to risk our lives indirectly with bad traffic legislation is nowhere near as grave a misdeed as that. Either should be sufficient to remove camera enforcement from serious consideration as far as I’m concerned.

You’re confusing a number of issues here. Maybe we should bullet point them for the sake of clarity.

-Point #1: The length of the light should be determined by engineering standards and the pragmatic question of what works. The intervals should be consistent at all intersections, cameras or not. Enforcement should be based upon these standards, irrespective of the enforcement method.

-Point #2: There are due process issues related to photo enforcement. This is true, regardless of the light timing.

-Point #3: The usage of cameras tempts officials to monkey with Point #1. The motivations to do this are clear, and examples of these breaches are demonstrable. Money can pervert incentives, as we can see with this.

The conclusion is that appropriate light timing does matter, that there is no good reason to do it badly, and that cameras create a motivation to do it badly on purpose.

If you want to be a camera fan, that’s your business. But the fact that you don’t mind playing fast and loose with the rules only confirms the worst fears of the rest of us. The intrusiveness of the program and your willingness to do whatever it takes to raise money puts your intentions into doubt.

You’re waxing the skis on the slippery slope. It’s no wonder that civil libertarians on all sides of the political spectrum are against you. We see where you’re coming from, and we don’t like it.

Also, as reported on TTAC, we recently had a study here in Houston compromised because the pro-camera mayor sent it back to the professor for a rewrite. Surprisingly, the red cameras went from having no effect on accidents, to reducing accidents when they reparsed the data to show it that way.

Do you really believe that something which so easily corrupts our civic leaders (our mayor previously enjoyed a really good reputation), is worth it? I personally can no longer believe any state sponsored study that shows these things reduce accidents.

Also, I’m hugely impressed with anything that reduces red lights runs by 50%, no small percentage of the driving public would be affected by that, and even if a few people revert to light running later, it’d be an unqualified success. I don’t understand why this is presented as, “no more than a 50%,” as if that wasn’t a drastic change in driver behaviour.

The supposed ‘bad’ effect of red-light running is an increase in rear-end collisions, which the most credible researchers (the FHWA) consider to be more than offset by a decrease in broadside collisions.

What other possible priority takes precedent over reducing crashes? These traffic laws don’t exist in a vaccum.

It’s clear to me that you’re the one with the ideological dog here – because if yellow light extensions were really all about safety rather than just being a diversionary tactic, you’d say “extend the yellow light and then stick the camera up”.

Here’s a link that will help you to do that, should you choose to use it: http://www.google.com/

You obviously don’t want to see it, because you entered this fight with an ideological dog and have no desire to be compelled by the facts. That’s what goes wrong when you begin with a preconceived premise, instead of a willingness to learn about the subject.

In the meantime, I’ll continue to misrepresent you as you misrepresent me: You just don’t care how many people die, as long as you can keep running red lights.

Also, if you are concerned about efficiency, then the proper yellow needs to be there. Accidents are not good for efficiency.

Now, I have lived near am intersection where 3 or 4 people would squeeze through. A camera might help the other directions be more efficient, but the reality I that those peole are doing it on purpose because they have likely been waiting too many cycles and the intersection is already screwed up ( or the area is ALL screwed up).

I don’t doubt your evidence, I just think you are missing what is best due to what is going on in your local area.

I know that you said this. And it’s wrong.

It doesn’t matter why they do it. What matters are real world results, which means increasing compliance.

The data clearly indicates that appropriate timing leads to higher compliance. Chances are good that the increased compliance comes from some combination of helping those who made legitimate mistakes to make fewer mistakes and some who get converted to the cause when the light timing is more reasonable.

Just so long as it works without violating some other broader principle, there is no reason not to do something that works. We benefit from real world effectiveness, not your preachy morality.

I haven’t even gone to supporting arguments like the fact that citing drivers who run red lights (again, most of whom do so on purpose) is a good thing in the long-run; they’re the kind of drivers who are likely causing a disproportionate number of accidents down the road. Making driving more expensive for bad drivers is a good thing in my book.

In any case, there is no reason to have a yellow light of inappropriate duration. It makes no sense at all to argue for that. It might be fun to be on a moral soapbox about red light running, but I would prefer to reduce the number of incidents, rather than pontificate about the lack of perfect citizens.

And that’s just rich. I might as well turn this around and make it all about you: you just want to keep running red lights, and don’t care how many people get smashed in the side in the process. Doesn’t feel so good when people are misrepresenting you, does it?

Again, you miss the point. There is no system on earth that will achieve 100% compliance. To use that as a benchmark is simply ridiculous, as it isn’t achievable, no matter what.

The best that the system can do is to increase compliance from current levels. A yellow light of appropriate duration does that, and you can’t prove otherwise.

In any case, there is no reason to have a yellow light of inappropriate duration. It makes no sense at all to argue for that. It might be fun to be on a moral soapbox about red light running, but I would prefer to reduce the number of incidents, rather than pontificate about the lack of perfect citizens.

Now my take on cameras is that “IF” they were used legitimately, there should be no issue, however no instance I am aware of are they installed for any reason except to collect revenue.

There are plenty of jurisdictions which have outlawed the forms of contracts which incent shorter yellow times, and have maintained the cameras (or installed new ones). Mine is among them. Your claim is obviously false.

Increase the yellows. Have a couple of seconds where the whole road is red (as posted elsewhere – I remember them too). The point shouldn’t be to make money – it should be to save lives (and classic cars from being destroyed).

So you sacrifice the efficiency of the traffic system for people who just want to run red lights – assuming that they won’t adjust, even though the best study that your side could find found that 50% had adjusted fairly quickly anyways.

The Texas study is not unique in its findings. If you want to refute it legitimately, you’re going to have to do a lot better than that.

When you hold people on your side to a similar level of vigor with their obviously false claims that red-light cameras don’t reduce accidents (they do; there’s studies out the wazoo), we’ll talk about “unique in its findings”. But your whole argument that people don’t run red lights on purpose looks kind of weak when the best study you could find says, uh, at least 50% were apparently running them on purpose.

Your unverifiable anecdotes are not a good basis for public policy. No one here has any idea whether your analysis is correct, and given your lack of a clear methodology for determining it, it sounds like nothing more than a kneejerk reaction based upon your gut, whatever that means.

The Texas study is not unique in its findings. If you want to refute it legitimately, you’re going to have to do a lot better than that.

It is a huge nail in the coffin for cameras that they incentivize shortening yellows. Not only do they cause accidents, they set up conditions likely to result in future increases in crashes. It’s really hard to see past that consideration when all I’ve got on the other side is a sense of justice served.