Chicago’s red-light cameras don’t always deter accidents
[From Chicago's red-light cameras don't always deter accidents -- chicagotribune.com]
I am hoping to review this data in a more detailed post later. But for now, here are some important snippets:
Cameras are said to reduce accidents, but collision records compiled by the Illinois Department of Transportation indicate that accidents increased at many city intersections the year after red-light cameras were installed. In fact slightly more intersections saw an increase than a decrease, the data show. The city tells a very different story. Crash statistics compiled by the city reflect broad success in reducing accidents with cameras, and the city could not explain why the numbers are so different.
The read from the state numbers is this: Although some Chicago intersections indeed appear to benefit from the presence of cameras, nearly 60 percent do not.
By year’s end red-light cameras will be installed at 189 Chicago intersections, the most of any big U.S. city. Sprawling Los Angeles, where the car is king, has 32; New York, 150.
This work casts doubt on the city’s claim that the cameras reduce accidents. (If the cameras don’t reduce accidents, then they aren’t providing the promised safety benefits.) Read the city’s claims here:
The City of Chicago reports crashes have been reduced by 20 percent in the two years since the camera technology was installed in early 2006 at 10 intersections. . . . Crashes decreased 30 percent, from 1,055 in 2004 to 736 last year, at intersections where red-light cameras were installed in 2004 and 2006, according to the Chicago Office of Emergency Management and Communications.
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