Scotland's Speed Cameras Are Too Effective
According to The Scotsman, speed cameras fines fell by as much twenty percent in some areas of Scotland. In most parts of the country, the number of drivers being caught by cameras has dropped for the third year in a row. The director of the Scottish Safety Camera Program says he knows why: "There has been a fall in speeding fines detected by cameras because of better adherence to the speed limits by drivers." Math-savvy anti-camera groups claim crash rates diminish naturally over time "due a phenomenon known as regression to mean." Bruce Young of the Association of British Drivers says it's simpler than that. "Drivers are increasingly aware of both fixed and mobile camera locations." Neil Greig, the of the Institute of Advanced Motorists' Motoring Trust, says who cares? Speed cameras rock! "In our view the best safety cameras slow 100 percent of the traffic down and catch zero per cent of drivers." In any case, over the past two years, Scottish police [automatically] issued 114k fines, generating some £6.8m ($13.4m) for the Treasury.
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I guess they'll just have to raise the fines to make up for the lost "revenue stream."
I'd be curious to see if the accident rate dropped with the reduction in speeders. If the accident/fatality rate doesn't fall or goes up, there might be an argument against these types of speed cameras. -ted
What do you do when you aren't dominating the cat and mouse game? Get a better cat. And they will keep winning until people start fighting back.
I suppose if you have a need for speed in Scotland you don the cap & sunglasses and borrow a friend's car... Funny how whenever I read something about Scotland all I can think about is the quote from Longshanks in Braveheart : "The trouble with Scotland is it's full of Scots!" Ohh, that rabble rouser Longshanks....