Have you received a red light camera ticket? If you haven’t, there’s a good chance you know someone who has.
Saskatoon police say the number of tickets being issued at intersections with cameras in the city are on the rise and this trend needs to stop.
“People must obey the rules of the road to keep everyone safe,” said Staff Sgt. Judy McHarg, with Saskatoon Police Service’s traffic unit.
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More and more it appears law-breakers in our city are forgetting the rules of the road and cameras are right there to capture them.
“Usually there’s about 250 tickets issued a month at each location and there’s four locations in the city,” McHarg added.
That’s 12,000 tickets a year being issued to drivers, leaving their wallets $230 lighter.
It’s a startling number – yet it doesn’t come as a surprise to many motorists.
“When you watch how some people drive in the city here – there’s lots of people that are distracted or they just don’t come to that complete stop,” Lisa Owen said.
She admitted to getting a ticket after turning left when the light already turned red and paid up without thinking twice.
“I was already in, I went too far in to stop on ice – it was fair.”
Police say the worst traffic infraction they’re seeing is something similar to Owen’s case but rather than turning left – motorists are being busted at rapid rates for rolling through red lights while turning right.
“I think people don’t realize they must stop at a red light before turning right and that’s why it’s not going down.”
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Jim Clark wasn’t taken aback by what violation is the most common when it comes to the right light cameras, and he confessed to being an offender.
“I’ve done it but not at those lights yet, not in front of the camera yet but my day might come,” Clark said.
“You know if you’re not thinking about it – I’ve seen lots of people do it.”
Police say increased traffic volumes could be contributing to the influx of tickets as well but if numbers don’t come down anytime soon – more education for motorists maybe required.
“The people going through on green lights are expecting the traffic to stop – there’s the increased collisions, pedestrians might be walking through on a red light and that’s the danger.”
In fact, one report shows that a person struck by a motorist travelling 48 kilometres an hour is 74 per cent more likely to die than if the driver was going 40.
So one can just imagine what survival rates would be – if drivers were to stop when they’re supposed to.
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