Red Light Camera News TN Right turn on Red law cuts "violations" in Johnson City! PLUS TOWN IS "DEFINING" RIGHT TURN VIO
New law results in fewer red light camera citations
By: Nate Morabito
Published: September 09, 2011
JOHNSON CITY, TN --
Two months after a change in Tennessee law fewer drivers in Johnson City are getting red light camera citations in the mail.
The law, which went into effect on July 1, prohibits traffic cameras from ticketing drivers who illegally turn right on red.
“We’ve gotten in touch with the vendor and the vendor has rejected all of the right turn on red violations at the six monitored intersections,” Johnson City Police Department Maj. Mark Sirois said.
In the first six months of 2011 Johnson City averaged nearly 750 red light camera tickets a month. However, in the two months since the change took effect, that monthly average dropped by more than a third, down to 480 citations.
Maj. Sirois is not surprised by the decrease, but he has concerns.
“What we don’t want is a mixed message,” Maj. Sirois said. “We don't want the motoring public to think that because of this law they can just go through the right turn on red without coming to a complete stop. That's still in effect. If an officer sees someone rolling through then they can issue a citation.”
(Ban the Cams note: Looks like it would be more of a DROP if they STOPPED ALL RIGHT TURNS ON RED SCAMERA TICKETS!)
Rep. Tony Shipley (R-Kingsport) was one of the many legislators who pushed for the change in law. He says he’s not necessarily against traffic cameras, he just wanted more standardized rules and regulations for them statewide.
"I just think that what that does is it treats our citizens more fairly,” Rep. Shipley said. “None of us are trying to say that you should run a traffic light, but we're saying that our citizens should be treated fairly. We probably are approaching that medium point where citizens are going to be happy with it and the cities are going to be happy with it as well."
According to Rep. Shipley, the drop in the number of citations is significant.
“There’s a message in that and I think we need to look into that and see what it is,” Rep. Shipley said. “I don’t think within the last two months everybody has gotten safer. I think they’re continuing to do what they did all along. With citations dropping, have we seen accidents going up? I doubt very seriously that we have seen that.”
Maj. Sirois hopes crashes don’t increase because of the change.
“The effects of the law, we’ll see where that goes as far as the effects on the crash rate, etc over the long term,” Maj. Sirois said. “What we’re mainly interested in is the safety of the intersection and hopefully, the law won’t have a great effect on safety at intersections.”
Although Maj. Sirois says the department is not concerned with revenue, the change in law will also have an impact on Johnson City’s finances. It limits the amount a city can collect per a driver’s first traffic citation to $50. Johnson City had previously been collecting $100 per ticket, which includes a $50 processing fee. On average in 2011 Johnson City made roughly $32,000 a month from its traffic camera program.
“Our main goal is to reduce crashes and to reduce injuries as the result of crashes,” Maj. Sirois said. “If we’ve done that then we’ve done our job.”
(Ban the Cams note: Just keep the spinning going Sirois, we know a lot of the scamera towns are UPSET the Grandfather clause wasn't there!)
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