Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Red light camera supplier determines we should buy their product


Unknown to most in Manteca, Redflex Inc. set up cameras to "survey" some intersections in Manteca. They wanted to determine if there were enough red light violations to make installing a "red light camera" system feasible.

Redflex is the company that contracts with Modesto and Stockton to supply their red light camera systems.

After videotaping various intersections in Manteca. The company that profits from the installation of their red light cameras came to the none too surprising conclusion: By Jove! You need to purchase our product! Lives are at stake!

Doesn't this sound a little suspicious to anyone?

My guess is that the guys who drive around servicing the cameras were going from Modesto to Stockton and noticed that Manteca was right in between, they probably figured wouldn't it be great if we could set up some of these red light cash generating machines in Manteca.

A lot has been written about red light cameras, and I'm not going to repeat all those words here. Like a lot of things, I'm sure neither side of the issue is the absolute truth. Here you can read the various comments yourself.

The best report on the issue is a massive five part series by Matt Labash of The Weekly Standard. This report can be summed up:
Red-light cameras are ... coming to a city near you. The science behind them is bad and the police are using them to make money, not save lives. It's much worse than you thought.

This report was "blasted" by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, which
represents the interests of the auto insurance industry. The IIHS simply asserts that
all the critics are "not scientific." For example, they criticise the Labash data as
"unreliable" and say things like his data shows some accident rates going up
after the installation of red light cameras -- and since "we know this can't
possibly be true" those studies should be disregarded. In other words, to the
Insurance Institute, only data or studies that support their position can
possibly be considered "true." hmm. I should point out that the IIHS represents the
companies that sell automobile insurance. And since the premiums
insurance companies can charge is regulated, each red light ticket permits them
to charge more for auto insurance. Red light cameras are a cash cow for the
insurance companies -- regardless of their effectiveness.

Some of the "studies" that show positive effects were done at the same time the State of California increased the fines for red light violations from $104 to $271. But the IIHS attributes the decrease in red light running to the product they help sell. They can't explain how red light running decreased by about the same amount at
intersections where there was no cameras installed. Sometimes they pull out the
term "spillover effect." Maybe. But the effect was seen all over the state.
That's some major "spillover!"

Actually, I am repeating some of what was written on the subject. But if you take the time to study the subject, you'll be struck by the overall lack of data, one way or another. This is acknowledged in one of the few semi-scientific studies done by the federal DOT.

Note how this study talks about "the paucity of definitive studies..." Other points from this study:


  • Crash effects detected were consistent in direction with those found in many previous studies: decreased right-angle crashes and increased rear end ones.

  • There were weak indications of a spillover effect that point to a need for a more definitive ... study of this issue.

  • ... estimates of the safety effect ... vary considerably. The bulk of the results appear to support a conclusion that red light cameras reduce right-angle crashes and could increase rear end crashes; however, most of the studies are tainted by methodological difficulties that would render useless any conclusions from them.

  • Check out the tables of costs. They attempt to put a dollar value on each type of accident, and more or less decide that that since the side impact crashes cost more, even though the rear end crashes are increased there's a marginal benefit. That's reassuring. Except that this analysis depends on carefully choosing which accidents to "count."

  • The DOT study revealed one other negative effect that no one had detected before. Paradoxically, they found that although right angle crashes were decreased, those that did occur were more serious. The conclusions of this study are tempered with the caution that they may not be valid if "the statistically non-significant shift to slightly more severe angle crashes remaining after treatment is, in fact, real." "Non-significant" is a statistical term that means there wasn't good enough data to tell if this increase in severity of the accidents was just "a fluke" or if it was real.


There were a few other points I wanted to bring up at the meeting, but didn't get to them with the time constraints:



  • What about people driving around without licenses? The local scandal sheet says about 40% or more in Manteca don't seem to have valid "papers." I don't know if that's true or not, but if it is, isn't it a little unfair to send violations to the legal people with valid license and registration and let the illegal drivers off the hook? That's what, in effect, the red light camera program would do.

  • This type of program is open to abuse. The pictures taken by the cameras are collected and sorted by this private company. The company sends the ones they like to the police department for further review. All this is done in secret, there's no independent record or audit of what pictures have been taken. So, we must trust that if the mayor's son is snapped going through the light that it will be treated just the same as a picture of one of the politically unpopular people. Bear in mind, the pictures are viewed, the license plates are run, the owner or driver is identified -- all this before anyone outside the police dept or the company knows about the existence of the photograph.

  • Manteca people will now be vulnerable to more fraud schemes. Already, there are scam artists sending out fake "violation" letters to people who live in cities with these cameras. The letters look official, they demand payment, except that the payments go to a post office box in some mail drop. People in Manteca and in the San Joaquin County are already getting deluged with fraud attempts -- this has been noted in several of the local newspapers. (examples: Bank fraud schemes and money from Nigerian diplomats and fake checks with instructions to wire funds and "keep" some of the money, etc.) The presence of the red light cameras will open up a new opportunity for fraud that affects the poor and old most. You can read about one such case here. Notice how authentic this fraud looked, and how many people people were defrauded even though the letter was "sloppy." It's only a matter of time before these letters get better. If fact, the extent of this red light camera fraud may not be known. This is hinted at in the article in the The San Bernardino Press-Enterprise. Notice the police didn't want to identify the suspect. This suggest this case was just part of a larger network of fraud or that there are others doing the same thing (the police didn't want to tip off the fraudsters.)

On the plus side, the council did ask some tough questions during the meeting. They didn't sound 100% convinced. Councilman Hernandez is commended for voting against the step toward the red light cameras. Also, contrary to the press reports, it's not a forgone conclusion. There is still another public hearing on the issue and I think some other council actions needed to actually implement the red light camera scheme. I'm hoping that maybe after thinking about it some more, the council will decide against this questionable program that promises so much, costs so much, and gives so little benefit.

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