Ready or not, here they come.
League City council members gave the green light Tuesday to red light cameras at five intersections throughout the city.
The cameras will capture drivers who run red lights at intersections at:
- FM 518 and Marina Bay Drive;
- Egret Bay at FM 518;
- Egret Bay at League City Parkway East;
- West Main at Gulf Freeway (highest rate of red light runners); and
- State Highway 3 at FM 518.
More than 600 accidents happened at those intersections from October 2005 to January 2009, according to a report by Police Chief Michael Jez.
Motorists caught running red lights will be issued a $75 ticket that will not count against their driving record, Jez said.
“I think we’re at a point where we have no other choice in this city but to use every tool in our arsenal to address traffic congestion,” he said.
Like them or not, these things aren’t going to go away.
Ironic that they would claim they must “use every tool in our arsenal.” It’s been compellingly argued that traffic signals inherently represent an admission of failure by traffic engineers.
Let me try and wrap my head around this concept.
You install red light cameras, give people tickets for running red lights, but it doesn’t show up on their driving record. So, other than making the camera company rich, what exactly is the benefit of this on driving safety?
How about they increase the yellow light time by .5-1.5 seconds and see if that reduces accidents?
Mesa, Arizona found a 73 percent drop in citations after the yellow light was extended. In testimony before the Kentucky State Senate, IIHS study author Richard Retting reported that, on average, someone runs the red light at US50 in Arlington, Virginia every 12 minutes. Yet just a few miles down the road at the intersection of westbound US50 and Fair Ridge, the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) raised the yellow to 5.5 seconds from 4.0 seconds last summer. Since the change, red light running has almost disappeared at the location.
Why use traffic cameras? San Diego, CA. A single camera collected $6.8 million in revenue in 18 months.
League City is an unethical place run by immoral and unethical city operators. The police refuse to intervene while felonies occur, the judges are slackers and refuse to do their job, and the mayor and city council surely received kickbacks from the red light company. You have to know these people to know why this is true. To top it off, the school system is about as idiotic as they come. While there is some wealth in the area (all created by NASA and OIl companies, not one outfit in League City proper), the money is squandered and wasted on foolish things.
No one should ever raise their kids in League City. No one. The sun is setting on League city. There is no new land to annex, and decline and demise are words which will be used often when referring to this cesspool in the future.