Instead of wasting money on speed cameras and reducing speeds, we should be aggressively ticketing distracted drivers and pedestrians, and people who struggle to reach the limit in the first place.
this post was submitted on 03 Jul 2025
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Traffic calming designs and devices should be preferred over speed cameras.
Narrow streets, chicanes, pedestrian zone height transitions, narrowing the street at pedestrian crossings, etc.
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UK we have had speed cameras for ages. There was a trend for people to either spray paint the lens or even firebomb the camera. So they had to put in a second (video) camera mounted as high as possible to protect the first camera, quite amusing that a safety camera has to be kept safe by another safety cameras, its cameras all the way down.
Personally I think speed cameras that monitor a fixed point are pretty dumb unless that fixed point is an accident black spot such as outside a school or a red light camera for dangerous set of traffic lights. Its far better to have average speed cameras for a large section of road but those are more costly as you need way more cameras to make them work outside of motorways as you need to cover all the junctions properly.
Latest cameras we have in testing can see if you do not have your seat belt done up or are using your phone. Just stopping people from using their phone has to be the biggest step forward we can make with modern road safety.
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Fuck it, gotta go fast. It would go faster though if all the office workers just took a bus or train. As a service tech, the traffic caused by unneeded trips is maddening when It takes me 45min to go 10km.
Best of luck with that. Many drivers don't like walking. People will fight for the closest parking space to the door of a gym, for crissake.
Surely with Toronto Police Services' budget they could better protect speed cameras if they wanted to
They just have to pretend that every speed camera is a Millionaire. Considering anticipated revenue they may as well be.
I’m sure the city loves these cameras. Did you speed? Doesn’t matter, the camera says you did so pay up. Also these will ticket you for going even half a kilometer over, you can get a ticket for going 71 in a 70 where a human cop would just let that shit go
... Where a human cop would light you up, slowing down all the traffic around you to safer levels, and give you immediate feedback.
But no you'll just get the same ticket for 10 over 5 days in a row before you notice the camera, and then get 5 tickets in the mail a month later.
How about instead of speed cameras you change your road designs? People won't speed if they cannot speed safely.
Make your roads less wide. Add some curves, depending on required max speed, you make the curves larger or smaller. On lower speed roads, add obstacles to drive around.
There are many forms of traffic management that don't require speeding cameras but then again, speeding cameras are for making the government money, not for traffic safety
People won’t speed if they cannot speed safely.
...
I get it, good road design helps stop speeding but the idea that safety even crosses the mind of people going 80 in a 60 is laughable.
The fines should be compounding, after each ticket the fine goes up 10% until people learn to just drive the fuckin limit.
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Honest to god, it's not that hard to do 40 km/h in these zones. They post a sign telling you there's a speed camera coming up. You just have to go 40 for like 20 meters to avoid a ticket.
Why should we socialize the cost of "fixing" the road design, when we can instead make the individuals who speed pay?
There will always be new people that speed. And people not knowing the place that speed.
Both is good, because the way our streets are designed are both dangerous and expensive. Narrowing that 40 zone by the school can remove excess road space that now doesn't need to be maintained, cleaned, plowed, or salted. The excess space could be used by school, have trees planted, or be used for alternative transport like transit or bikes.
The roads are currently designed to prioritize driver throughput and provide "wiggle room" for driver error, often at the expense of people outside of the vehicle. Many of the concepts that engineers use to make highways safe were applied to city streets, which in hindsight maybe we don't want our city streets to be designed like highways.
The problem is that people are AWFUL at evaluating their own risk when driving, and drive at speeds that ARENT safe. Look at how few people leave appropruate stopping distances between vehicles, which is the #1 factor in preventing accidents.
The methods you proposed would likely decrease the speed vehicles travel at (ie from 80 to 60) because drivers feel like they can't travel at that speed, but the road likely still isn't safe for vehicles to travel at 60 when its that narrow.
Speed cameras catch everyone speeding, 24/7, and are the single best, economical, way to eliminate speeding from a road. Cop can't pull over every vehicle going 80 on a 4 lane road rated for 60, but the camera can ticket them all.
For sure, promote a narrower road, encourage MUP over sidewalks, and encourage safer driving when you talk to your councilors, but road reconstruction happens, generally, once every 25-50yrs. We can't wait for that timeframe to fix these problems.
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