US research and education charity Frontier Centre for Public Policy has released Speed or Greed: Does Automated Traffic Enforcement Improve Safety or Generate Revenue?, a study on the effects of automated traffic enforcement (ATE).
Report authors Hiroko Shimizu and Pierre Desrochers state that the decline of road fatalities by 58 per cent is largely due to better engineered vehicles, seat belts and other safety measures.
Although there is little credible evidence, the report says some ATE supporters assert that lower speed limits, increased fines and rigorous enforcement will improve public safety. Shimizu and Desrochers claim evidence shows that strategies including better signage, longer yellow light times and speed limits that reflect actual driving practices are more effective at reducing traffic violations and collisions.
The authors question the ethics of budgeting fines and penalties as regular revenue sources and the attempt to justify them as public safety measures using rhetoric like ‘speed kills’. Indeed, highly punitive fines are often imposed for very minor offences, leading many to suspect the motivation behind these penalties might be budget shortfalls. An unintended consequence might also be a growing distrust of governmental authorities and politicians.
Shimizu and Desrochers conclude that government's ultimate goal regarding road transportation should be safety, not revenue generation. Further, if there is additional revenue generated, those funds should be dedicated towards promoting road safety and not simply another form of taxation.
The full report can be found2 External <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?><dictionary /> 0 0 0 oLinkExternal here Visit report page false https://fcpp.org/speed_or_greed false false %>.
Report authors Hiroko Shimizu and Pierre Desrochers state that the decline of road fatalities by 58 per cent is largely due to better engineered vehicles, seat belts and other safety measures.
Although there is little credible evidence, the report says some ATE supporters assert that lower speed limits, increased fines and rigorous enforcement will improve public safety. Shimizu and Desrochers claim evidence shows that strategies including better signage, longer yellow light times and speed limits that reflect actual driving practices are more effective at reducing traffic violations and collisions.
The authors question the ethics of budgeting fines and penalties as regular revenue sources and the attempt to justify them as public safety measures using rhetoric like ‘speed kills’. Indeed, highly punitive fines are often imposed for very minor offences, leading many to suspect the motivation behind these penalties might be budget shortfalls. An unintended consequence might also be a growing distrust of governmental authorities and politicians.
Shimizu and Desrochers conclude that government's ultimate goal regarding road transportation should be safety, not revenue generation. Further, if there is additional revenue generated, those funds should be dedicated towards promoting road safety and not simply another form of taxation.
The full report can be found
