<i>Liberati says the cameras aren't a case of Big Brother nor a cash grab, police are simply trying to keep the public safe from reckless drivers. </i><p>Ha ha, very funny! If that were the case, for red light cameras at least, then they would just increase the length of the yellow light. That's cheaper than a camera, for sure, and has been proven empirically.<p>As far as speeding cameras, I might buy it except that in Denver they only show up in swanky neighborhoods that have a high-traffic street through them. Like on 1st Ave in front of the Denver Country Club. Or University by the gated "Polo Club" neighborhood. Never seen one on S. Federal, or Santa Fe Boulevard.<p>on the whole, I don't believe that an honest citizen can treat pronouncements about traffic cams with anything other than utter suspicion.
The really insidious thing about these cameras in many if not most cities is that they are owned and operated by a private corporation and then the government splits the profits. In some cases the private company is paid per ticket issued which doesn't take much thought to realize how to maximize profit. <a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/court-md.-drivers-cant-get-speed-camera-fines-back/article/2505967#.UFOLvUJvQqY" rel="nofollow">http://washingtonexaminer.com/court-md.-drivers-cant-get-spe...</a><p>I've gotten tickets from these things before simply because my car was the only license plate visible in the frame even though the little yellow triangle designating the vehicle speeding marked a car on the opposite side of the road traveling in the other direction. The highway guard rail was obscuring the speeders plate though so they just sent it to me instead.<p>Speed cameras are akin to a lottery tax system where by motorists are randomly chosen to pay an extra tax and it's justified by the fact that some of them may have been speeding.
'The cameras work to slow people down' is the most annoying, nonsensical BS. If the cameras were supposed to slow people down they would not be cameras that capture information that leads to a citation; nor would the money go into local government coffers. I f-ing hate pathetic liars.
Only a $40 fine... that's a bargain! It does make it seem silly that people would respond by recking the cameras. I wonder if it's more a case that some people will vandalise anything they can.<p>(Here in Australia we pay at least $200 for a speeding fine).
On a seperate note, would anyone actually visit a website that had a private non fine generating camera over the freeway you take to work, and would pop up the speed and time you passed when u enter a license plate<p>just thought it might be a fun thing to learn opencv on - thoughts?
<p><pre><code> It costs us $30,000 to $100,000 to replace a camera.
</code></pre>
What?!
At those sort of prices, Big Brother will be Bankrupt Brother before 2012 becomes 1984.