Red light and speed cameras are popping up in several towns across Connecticut with more in the works.
The two most recent approved municipal plans included New Haven and Milford. Communities with previous approvals include Washington, Middletown, Marlborough, Greenwich, Stratford and Wethersfield. Residents in Orange are pushing for them, and in addition, Beacon Falls, Fairfield, Hamden and Stamford have municipal plans submitted and under review by the Connecticut Department of Transportation.
Some of the earliest communities to install speed cameras have reported positive results.
Middletown leaders are calling the cameras a success since installing them this summer. Middletown placed speed cameras on a well-traveled area on Route 66 between Woodgate Drive and George Street in a 35 mph zone. Since July 9, 38,830 citations have been issued, according to Police Chief Erik Costa of the Middletown Police Department.
“There has been a 94% reduction in high-speed driving from July to September,” Costa said. “We are seeing a change in driving culture on Route 66, and we are excited with the data.”
Costa said this area has been known for speeding and dangerous driving for years. He noted that every seven days, 180,000 cars travel east to west on Route 66 and of those vehicles 144,000 were going 10 miles per hour or more over the speed limit during the study leading up to the instillation of the speed cameras.
“We felt that overwhelming feeling that this was out of control,” Costa said.
“When the cameras started, it reduced 94%, and I think that’s the point of the camera system. The expense would be immense to put an officer at that location 24 hours a day and seven days a week,” Costa said. “This is a situation when there’s no tax dollars, expense to run the program because the program runs itself. It’s basically changed the culture of the driving in the high retail, congested area of Route 66. It definitely helps slow down traffic and makes it flow much better. So that’s the eyeball look to it, but the data also shows that reduction.”
Costa, who is on the state’s Highway Traffic Commission with state senators and state representatives, said the cameras are about safety.
“The law is perfect,” Costa said. “Its purpose is to increase road safety. We had a record number of pedestrian fatalities, and now numbers are rising for e-bicycle fatalities.”
Middletown has two other speed camera locations in place but not yet active. One is in the area of Spencer Elementary School and the other near Moody Elementary School. Costa said those cameras could be turned on sometime next month.
Middletown has issued more than $1 million in tickets from the speed cameras since July and collected between $700,000 to $800,000 at this point.
Costa said the reduction of motor vehicle crashes on Route 66 has allowed officers to respond to more pressing matters. The police chief said crashes can take about 25 minutes to an hour to investigate for the smallest of fender benders and fewer crashes will allow more officers to be readily available.
Middletown Mayor Gene Nocera noted that Route 66 was a “highly problematic area for residents and drivers.”
“It’s costly to put a cruiser out there 24/7 and the results aren’t good,” Nocera said. “One guy might get ticketed, but the next 10 that go by are above the speed limit. It’s just dramatically changed the behaviors for the better. I think our residents see that. You’re traveling in that area now and you think, ‘This is much safer now.’
“The data showed on average people were going about 25 miles over the speed limit, and that was pretty consistent, and in some cases well over that,” Nocera added. “It was highway speeds, which made it treacherous. We’ve tried lots of different warnings and billboards, police vehicles, but it was treated like a highway. Once we started to warn our residents and visitors that speed cameras were in place, you started to see a dramatic change in the speeds to make it so much safer.”
Nocera said he was initially skeptical of the speed cameras and if it was going to produce this type of reduction. He said before the cameras were put in, Middletown police were in that area almost daily with multiple crashes.
“The change of behavior is dramatic,” Nocera said. “Cars are slowing down appropriately without a lot of fuss. The citations are dwindling. At first, they were high and that’s what we predicted when we joined this that the citations would decrease, and that is very reassuring for the community.”
Statistics show the dropping number of speeding drivers on Route 66 in Middletown. (Courtesy of Middletown Police Department)
Marlborough also installed speed cameras this summer in the area of the 200 block of North Main Street.
“From my perspective, it has been enormously successful,” Marlborough Town Manager David Porter said. “The first month we were sending out warnings to let people know that they were there and to slow down. After that we started issuing tickets and within the first two weeks of when we actually started issuing tickets, the number of cars speeding decreased by 65% and it’s continued to drop significantly since then.”
Porter said the road is “a great deal safer” for motorists and pedestrians that use the five crosswalks in the area where the speed cameras are located. The town manager said the area had previously had habitual speeders and anecdotal near misses.
“Prior to the instillation of the cameras people were just tearing through the area and people have slowed way down from my perspective,” Porter said. “Before people would say that they didn’t feel safe walking on the sidewalks in that area.”
Marlborough issued 5,115 citations over its first 11 weeks. From July 18 to July 24, there were 579 citations; 666 from July 31 to July 31; 560 from Aug. 1-7; 505 from Aug. 8-14; 529 from Aug. 15-21; 473 from Aug. 22-28; 434 from Aug. 29 to Sept. 4; 368 from Sept. 5-11; 305 from Sept 12-18; 361 from Sept. 19-25 and 335 from Sept. 26 to Oct. 2.
“Nothing would make me happier than have these cameras up there and not have to issue a single ticket,” Porter said. “I think a reasonable expectation is that it sorts of levels off at hopefully a very, very small number.”
Contesting a speeding ticket from a camera is different from contesting a standard ticket from an officer. The process is completely online. Porter said the tickets can only be contested on very limited grounds. The person who was ticketed must write a few sentences why he or she believe they were wrongly ticketed. The ticket is then reviewed by a law enforcement officer.
“If you are still unhappy with that, then you can further appeal it to a citation hearing officer,” Porter said.
Porter said the vast majority of those ticketed are from out of town. In the first two weeks going live in July, fewer than 10% of the people ticketed were from town. He said the most recent number is less than 2%.
“Now, everyone is slowing down,” Porter said. “We are required to have two signs that say the speed limit and speed is photo enforced in advance of the camera. These are very large signs. If you are going anywhere even close to the speed limit, you should be able to see them very clearly. They’re highly reflective. We’ve added even more reflective material to the poles. The only way that you’re going to miss the three signs in advance of the camera is if you are just racing through there.”
Town officials in Marlborough say North Main Street is “a great deal safer” for motorists and pedestrians since the instillation of speed cameras over the summer. (Courtesy of David Porter)
Washington was the first town in Connecticut to install speed cameras. The cameras are located on Route 109 and Old Litchfield Road. Those cameras went up in late April, with the town issuing warnings for the first 30 days.
Washington First Selectman James L. Brinton said August was the peak for citations issued with 2,639 but dropped down considerably to 710 in September. The initial months of the program netted 34 citations in the end of May followed by 524 in June and 537 in July. In all, Washington has issued $569,000 in citations since late May and has collected $384,000.
Initial tickets are $50 and a second offense and every offense afterwards is $75. Unlike getting pulled over by a police officer, these fines remain the same even if a driver is going well over the speed limit, according to Brinton.
“The volume has been dropping, and the devices are working. People are starting to slow down, and you see it when you drive around town,” Brinton said. “There are still citations being issued, but it’s definitely dropped dramatically.”
Brinton said these two areas have been known for speeding in areas where residents walk and bike regularly. Brinton also noted that a majority of those ticketed have been from out of town.
“This has absolutely been a success,” Brinton said. “It’s not to say we haven’t had bumps in the road, and it’s been a lot on our staff for a time with the volume, but by in large the vast majority of the people, even when they complained about it, were civil. But we’ve had some nasty incidents. Most people, when you explain it to them that it doesn’t go to DMV or your insurance company and there’s no points on your license, there’s a big sigh of relief there.”
Brinton said the speed cameras are especially valuable for smaller communities like Washington that have a limited police force.
“They have to patrol 93 miles of roads,” Brinton said. “We’ve tried everything from education to outreach to signage and nothing worked (to slow drivers down) until this came along.”
“These devices, red light cameras and speed safety cameras, can change driver behavior and make condition safer for everybody,” said Connecticut Department of Transportation spokesperson Josh Morgan. (Courtesy of David Porter)
Connecticut Department of Transportation spokesperson Josh Morgan said data has been very clear. “These devices, red light cameras and speed safety cameras, can change driver behavior and make condition safer for everybody.”
Morgan said the DOT first saw the effectiveness of speed cameras when they were placed on highway work zones, as speeds dropped 20% when the devices were active.
“We know talking to the workers who were out there, they felt safer when those cameras were deployed,” Morgan said. “It’s still new technology for Connecticut, but it’s not new for most of the country and most of the world and we’re definitely supportive to seeing the limited use of them in towns and cities across Connecticut.”
Morgan said the process is deliberate and it is all spelled out in the legislation. The legislation is permission structure and starts on the local level with a proposal, a public hearing and after that the plan goes to the DOT for review. Each approval is good for three years and then the community would have to reapply and go through the process again.
“It’s sad in a sense that people seem more concerned about their bank accounts instead of human lives that are at risk,” Morgan said. “If they are concerned about the $75 citation coming in the mail and that will get them to slow down, that’s a win in our books,” Morgan said.
Michael Lawlor, a criminal justice professor at the University of New Haven, said speed cameras and red light cameras are a sign of things to come, and people should get used to seeing them on roads.
“It’s very controversial but technology can be so useful in solving a whole assortment of problems. And it’s available in ways that can make policing a variety of sort of nuisance-type issues, quality-of-life-type issues very easy,” Lawlor said.
“For a lot of issues people are concerned about, speeding, running red lights, it’s going to become really easy to enforce that,” Lawlor added. “It’ll be controversial because people are talking about Big Brother and everything else like that. But nonetheless, it’s a very straightforward solution to a problem, and it’s very effective.”