Opinion
A pretty clear picture on why red-light cameras retained

Oct. 29, 2015

Updated Oct. 30, 2015 11:24 a.m.
By ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER EDITORIAL

    

The Garden Grove City Council must know something that everyone else in the county, except Los Alamitos, doesn’t. On Tuesday, the council voted 3-2 to maintain its contract with the company that provides Garden Grove’s red-light cameras, Redflex Traffic Systems Inc.

In August, the council chose not to act on its camera program, allowing the contract to automatically renew while asking staff to respond to data compiled by Jay Beeber, executive director of Safer Streets L.A., a grass-roots coalition for motorists that has had success in removing red-light cameras in that city.

Staff returned with their findings. Although they did not seem to dispute Mr. Beeber’s numbers, they did take issue with his methodology. But, then, Mayor Bao Nguyen and Councilman Phat Bui, who tripled-majored in mathematics, physics and electrical engineering at the University of Minnesota, took issue with the staff’s methodology, too.

Mr. Bui noted that there were not consistent declines in collisions year-over-year. In some years, the number of collisions was higher, some years were lower, and many were about the same. It suggested to him that other factors were likely involved in the number of collisions per year than the introduction of cameras.

He also found staff’s sampling of data, two to three years before red-light cameras versus, in some cases, nearly 16 years of data presented after their installation, to “not be appropriate for statistical analysis.”

That is why we continue to hold Mr. Beeber’s findings in higher regard. He counted all collisions caused by motorists running red lights, using the Highway Patrol’s traffic records system, not simply the ones that would offer the most dramatic statistics. He found overall collisions at photo-enforced intersections either increased, or the decrease was not statistically significant enough to attribute to the use of cameras.

But the majority of the council seemed disinterested in the mathematical exercise, preferring to defer to the wishes of the Police Department, where the program funds two full-time positions.

Overall, red-light cameras have proven a poor traffic-safety enhancement, and, we surmise, were installed largely for the money they generate. That looks to remain the case in Garden Grove.


 

    

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