Speed cameras for SF? We already have them!

Photo: Kevin Hume

Regular readers of this blog know I have a low opinion of the folks who make city traffic policy, particularly the Vision Zero fantasy---no more traffic fatalities by 2024!---that makes everyone who writes about it sound dumb. 

But the long SF Examiner story last Sunday in favor of red light/speed cameras as a safety measure in the city is remarkable (Speed cameras could be key to achieving Vision Zero goals). 

Neither the reporter nor anyone she talked to---the executive director of the MTA, Assemblymen Chiu and Ting, the SF Police Chief, and of course the the Bicycle Coalition and Walk SF---apparently knew that San Francisco already has speed cameras.

I may be the only one who reads the city's Transportation Fact Sheet, but the last one---the final one?---was issued in August, 2016. 

On page 4, we learn that the city already has 27 of what it calls Red Light Cameras at intersections, and 47 cameras at "approaches" to intersections. What's more the city's cameras have "recorded" 33,049 for Red Light "violations" and issued 11,851 "violations," which I interpret as "tickets."

When you enter "Red Light Camera Program" in the MTA's site, you go the program's site. We learn there that the program began in 1996 and has had significant success in reducing accidents:

The Automated Enforcement Program is a combined effort of the SFMTA, which manages the program’s administration and equipment maintenance, with support from the San Francisco Police Department, the Superior Court of San Francisco, and the San Francisco City Attorney's Office. The SFMTA's combined automated enforcement, engineering, and education efforts have resulted in a 66% citywide drop in injury collisions resulting from red-light running between 1996, when the Program was implemented, and 2017.

The Examiner story claims, without contradiction from the officials named above, that the city needs a new state law to allow the red light/speed cameras the city has had for years.

The state legislature, the Highway Patrol, and the American Civil Liberties Union are all blamed in the Examiner story for a non-existent legal problem.

Tumlin is quoted extensively showing that he evidently doesn't know about the Red Light Program that has been in his agency since 1996:

“As we tamp down speed and bad behavior on one street, it shifts to another street to a certain degree. If we look at global case studies and see what works […], we only have half of the tools that really make a difference available to us,” Tumlin said of speed cameras’ continued illegality in California...Tumlin, though, thinks the tides[sic] might be changing for action in Sacramento given the current confluence of frustration and fear over racial bias in law enforcement and pedestrian safety. The director told the SFMTA Board Tuesday the agency is “hopeful” there might be an opportunity to move forward in the coming months...

Keep hope alive! Examine some "global case studies"! Not clear how you move "forward" if you don't know what your starting point is. 

Instead, what we'll see is more "Slow Streets" projects to make traffic congestion worse than it has to be---taking away traffic lanes and street parking---by using the pandemic as cover for pushing through an anti-car agenda that bike guy Tumlin of course supports.

Jeffrey Tumlin

See also More Vision Zero failure and Vision Zero: Dumb and dishonest.