Against a tide of lawsuits, angry motorists, and hard evidence proving the danger of red light cameras, American Traffic Solutions has gone on the offensive, running television advertisements pretending to be public service announcements funded by the “National Coalition for Safer Roads”, a group backed by ATS and revenue-hungry government officials.
(Even their logos look alike.)
NCSR’s affiliation with American Traffic Solutions is quietly hidden at the bottom of their “About” page:
http://saferoadssavelives.org/about-us/
The so-called “coalition” asks the public to “tell Missouri leaders we want safer roads.” Its a vaguely uncontroversial statement; the ad offers testimonials from police, fire fighters, and doctors (trauma centers receive a share of ticket revenue, by the way).
ATS installs the cameras and handles the billing and collection of tickets, which generally stay off driver records but can be sent to collections if left unpaid. A percentage of the revenue is retained by ATS as a fee while your local government collects the rest.
You may be thinking, “What harm can a camera do? It catches people who break the law.”
Consider that the cameras purported to save lives actually cause more accidents and deaths:
http://www.gosanangelo.com/news/2011/fe ... lives-151/
To boost ticket revenue, yellow lights in some municipalities have been shortened to catch more drivers. While longer yellow lights do nothing to generate revenue and line the pockets of surveillance companies, they’re proven life savers:
“Honest yellows are Kryptonite to dishonest cameras. One added second of yellow to any signal reduces violations 40-80 percent and, unlike cameras, actually reduces crashes 25-50 percent. Honest yellows killed red-light cameras in 12 Georgia cities, Dallas and Mesa, Ariz.”
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUXPPofc_Wk[/youtube]
And for the few you who still care about your freedom and the little rag known as the constitution, the cameras and their automatic fines are a violation of due process. In the state of Florida, the tickets and camera footage are not required to be reviewed by a member of law enforcement.
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2010/0 ... solutions/
The voters in the city of Houston (NOT the politicians) voted to disable red light cameras:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CT8AvMgJO_8[/youtube]
Nearby in Jefferson County, ATS voluntarily ended its contract to save face as the newly elected county council was prepared to void it.
http://blogs.riverfronttimes.com/dailyr ... county.php
If you want hard evidence on the dangers of red light cameras, here you go:
http://www.bhspi.org/mauz/
So, consider this my own public service announcement: Tell American Traffic Solutions and your legislators how you feel about this invasive, dangerous, ineffective, and expensive technology and their underhanded advertisements masquerading as PSAs.
Click “Like” on their Facebook page (you have to click Like to be able to post) and leave comments on their Youtube channel:
http://www.facebook.com/SaferRoadsUSA
http://www.youtube.com/user/SaferRoadsUSA
http://jesda.com/2011/03/24/red-light-c ... he-public/
