Skip to main content

Debate on red light cameras in Florida hots up

University of South Florida researchers have published a report claiming that red light cameras do nothing to improve road safety, directly contradicting a national study by the Institute for Highway Safety that showed a major drop in fatal crashes in cities using red light cameras.
March 15, 2012 Read time: 1 min
3953 University of South Florida researchers have published a report claiming that red light cameras do nothing to improve road safety, directly contradicting a national study by the Institute for Highway Safety that showed a major drop in fatal crashes in cities using red light cameras.USF researchers Barbara Langland-Orban, Etienne Pracht and John Large in a report published this month in the peer-reviewed Florida Public Health Review say cities could do more to prevent red light running before resorting to cameras. They say the key is the length of the yellow light phase: extending it by just one second can virtually eliminate red light running.

Meanwhile, a National Coalition for Safer Roads (NCSR) survey, conducted by national research firm, FrederickPolls, has just been published and concludes that 72 per cent of Floridians support red light safety camera laws. Its website also features the latest study from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety hotly contested by the researchers from USF.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Analysing intelligent speed adaptation benefits
    April 12, 2012
    Oliver Carsten, Professor of Transport Safety at the Institute for Transport Studies (ITS) at the University of Leeds, UK, discusses Intelligent Speed Adaptation, looking at its safety potential
  • TISPOL Conference: autonomous vehicles high on safety agenda
    February 2, 2017
    Safety and autonomous vehicles exercised the minds of some of Europe’s senior police officers at the recent TISPOL European Traffic Police Network Conference in the UK. The European Union looks like missing its target of halving the number of people killed on its roads each year by 2020. Just when European police forces are trying to get back on target, along comes the autonomous vehicle with all its inherent safety issues.
  • AECOM seatbelt and phone use trial expanded
    March 8, 2024
    More police forces in the UK are joining the National Highways’ trial of safety cameras that automatically detect motorists breaking seatbelt and mobile phone use laws.
  • Denmark pulls the plug on Hikvision cameras
    August 22, 2024
    Around 170 new road surveillance cameras were purchased by the Danish Roads Directorate – Vejdirektoratet - in late 2022 from Hikvision at a cost of around €670,000.