Speed Camera News In Montgomery County, cameras are frequent victims of accelerated tempers
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/04/AR2010110406913.html
In Montgomery County, cameras are frequent victims of accelerated tempers
The top speed cameras in Montgomery County, according to police.
By Petula Dvorak
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, November 4, 2010; 7:11 PM
Did you hear that sound drifting out of Montgomery County this week?
It was a little bit like "wooo-hooo!" or "yesssss!" Or maybe it was just the thwack of fist pumps hitting car ceilings as drivers heard the news that yet another speed camera has been torched.
"I'd love to shoot one of them," volunteered a guy eating lunch not far from the charred remains of a speed camera on Quince Orchard Road in Gaithersburg.
Online, some driversvowed to buy the arsonist a beer - a case of beer, even!
So far, it doesn't appear that anyone has gone sniper on the sneaky devices. But two were set ablaze about five miles apart this week, and earlier this year, two others in the county had their lenses spray painted black.
The antipathy in Montgomery - which drivers regard as the speed camera capital of our region - isn't hard to fathom. What started small in 2007 with a dozen or so speed cameras has morphed into gargantuan gotcha, with 109 cameras raking in almost $21 million for the county's recession-depleted coffers in fiscal 2009.
But the rage against the machine can be found almost everywhere there are speed cameras.
Across the nation, the robotic long arm of the law has been cut down, torched, painted, silly-stringed, paint-balled, foiled by a simple Post-It note over the lens and repeatedly capped with styrofoam cups and boxes.
Those horrid contraptions are the source of those hateful little ransom notes that come in the mail about two weeks after you went too fast.
The letter has a photo of your car, a close-up of the plate, the time, date and the speed at which you were trying to get to the church benefit to help homeless orphans (at least, that's where I'm always going when I get one) and the demand for about $40.
Don't worry, this won't go on your driving record; nor will we call your insurance. Just give us the cash and all will be fine, k?
So, I guess what that means is that according to the law of speed cameras, it's cool to go fast as long as you're willing to pay for it.
Woo-hoo!
And it means that the dude going 135 miles per hour in an elementary school zone gets tagged for the exact same amount - $40 - as the dad rushing 47 miles per hour to get his kid to the emergency room. Got it.
There are many groups, most with a libertarian bent that simply don't like cameras enforcing laws, that rail against the speed cameras.
One, Maryland for Responsible Enforcement - Ban Speed Cameras, nearly got a measure on Tuesday's ballot to ban them. They missed the mark by about 1,000 signatures, organizer Dan Zubairi, of Bethesda, told me.
(Ban the Cams note: MD has a VERY restrictive law on public referendums about 2 months from law for citizens to challange it. Really UNDEMOCRATIC! http://www.mdscamera.com/Petition)
They tried a Hail Mary by endorsing Bob Ehrlich (R) in the Maryland gubernatorial race because he told them he doesn't support them. But we know how that election went.
There is also StopBigBrotherMD.org, where editor Ron Ely (who has never received a speed camera ticket) investigates local governments that use the cameras and dings them for not obeying all of the restrictions on how they are supposed to be used.
The thing that really stings is the fact that most of the fines are just at that price point where it's easier to just pay it than to take a day off of work to fight it. And it's usually hard to fight with that photo of your car, since it's the vehicle owner, not the driver, who is responsible for payment.
And speed cameras are primarily placed in school and construction zones as well as traffic trouble spots that have been known to maim and kill. But whether they actually reduce accidents is questionable.
When the county evaluated the program's first couple years, officials said collisions went down almost 30 percent in the sites near the cameras. But others argue they aren't very effective at curbing reckless driving.
"I know people slow down when they see the camera," said Brandon Gaither, whose BMW coupe has helped him earn him several speed camera tickets. "But let's get real. As soon as they know they're past it, they gun the engine, sort of like 'nanny nanny boo boo.'"
And while getting that ticket in the mail bites, it doesn't compare to the gut-wrench of hearing a siren behind you, seeing those lights in the rearview and the officer's long walk to your car as you squirm, keeping both your hands visible on the wheel.
"Ever since those cameras came, I don't see officers out here. Not. At. All," Jack Phillips, a construction worker from Frederick, told me on his coffee break at a Dunkin' Donuts encircled by speed cameras. Imagine that - doughnuts, but no cops. The 7-Elevens near those cameras must be hurting too.
The one thing we know for certain they do spectacularly well is raise money. Between September 2009 and August 2010, the top five ticketing cameras in Montgomery county generated 77,668 tickets. The biggest cash cow in Montgomery County is the 17700 block of Georgia Avenue northbound, which gave out 22,951 tickets.
The county pays its subcontractor, which is owned by Lockheed Martin, $16.25 for each ticket it processes. That means that little camera on Georgia Avenue earned about a half-million dollars for the county last year.
The things make millions. Montgomery County now operates 115 cameras. Oops, make that 113.
On some level, that's not a bad way to squeeze a tax out of folks when local governments are straining to meet basic services during tough economic times.
So how about this - let's just call it what it really is: a speed tax.
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