Seeing red

David Kihara

Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2005 | 10:58 a.m.

Drivers who run red lights are so common in Southern Nevada that some traffic experts and Metro Police have a joke about it:

Red lights mean speed up and green lights mean slow down.

The results of that behavior are no laughing matter, however. Every day drivers throughout the valley run red lights and risk getting into serious accidents and, in the worst cases, hit pedestrians or other vehicles.

"It's a huge problem in Southern Nevada," said Erin Breen, director of the Safe Community Partnership at UNLV.

Last week the National Campaign To Stop Red Light Running, an advocacy group, held an observance for "National Stop on Red Week" to raise awareness of the issue and highlight the dangers of running red lights in America.

Leslie Blakey, executive director of the National Campaign To Stop Red Light Running, said running red lights has become so common throughout the country that many people don't even consider it a serious violation with potentially deadly consequences.

"It's surprising how many people don't think about this problem while driving," Blakey said.

In 2003 more than 900 people were killed across the nation in collisions resulting from vehicles running red lights, according to the nonprofit Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, a research organization funded by auto insurers. Half of those deaths involved pedestrians and occupants in other vehicles who were hit by someone who failed to stop at a red light, the IIHS reported.

About 176,000 people were injured in accidents involving drivers running red lights, the IIHS reported.

Although Metro Police could not provide statistics on the number of people killed or hurt as a result of failures to stop at red lights, a check of the Sun archives found reports on least 13 people were killed or injured in collisions involving drivers allegedly running red lights in the Las Vegas Valley since June.

Three-year-old Victoria Dudley, for example, was killed on Aug. 16 when the Dodge Caravan her father was driving collided with a Ford Expedition on I-215 at Losee Road. The Nevada Highway Patrol reported at the time of the accident that investigators suspected that the driver of the SUV failed to stop at a red light.

To try to encourage more people to always stop for red lights, police and others have advocated installing traffic cameras at busy intersections that would issue citations to drivers who run red lights. These unmanned traffic enforcers could free up the police to pursue other crimes while providing consistent citations at busy intersections, officials have said.

Nevada has a law prohibiting such cameras that was passed in 1999, and recent efforts to repeal the law have not been passed in the Legislature.

State Sen. Dean Rhoads, R-Tuscarora, originally supported the bill prohibiting the use of cameras at intersections. He said using the cameras for law enforcement purposes would have amounted to a violation of drivers' rights to privacy.

"I thought it had intervened with privacy, with big brother looking at you," he said. He said he didn't believe law enforcement use of the cameras would deter have people from running red lights, but he also acknowledged that in rural areas such as the ones he represents, running red lights isn't much of an issue.

Two bills during the 2005 legislature sought to address this issue. Assembly Bill 11 sought to repeal the prohibition on using cameras or other equipment to gather evidence for the issuance of citations. Similarly, Senate Bill 473, would have required the state Transportation Department to set a pilot program allowing local governments to set up "automated systems" -- traffic cameras -- to enforce traffic laws.

Neither passed during the last legislative session.

Breen, an advocate of the traffic cameras, said they would rein in people who drive through red lights.

"I always say that getting a ticket is the best education," she said. As she was speaking by cell phone, Breen said she saw someone run a red light.

Metro Police Sgt. Monty Hall of the traffic division said the number of drivers who burn through red lights often outnumbers the police who can be on the scene to issue citations against them. That often leads more and more drivers to run red lights in what they believe is a consequence-free environment.

"It leads to an atmosphere of lawlessness," he said.

The paradox -- that drivers speed up when approaching a red light in order to get through the light -- is also a symptom of other poor driving habits such following too closely, driving too fast for the conditions and vehicles traveling too closely together in packs, he said.

"It's so dangerous, and it doesn't get you there any faster," he said. "(The drivers who run red lights) will just get stuck at the next light."

There are more than 1,250 electronic traffic signals in the Las Vegas Valley, said Tom Kruse, engineering supervisor with the Regional Transportation Commission's traffic engineering division.

While the fatalities are the most serious result of people running red lights, the injuries can be staggering, Blakey said, adding that brain and spinal injuries are common.

"They do it because they can and they do it intentionally," she said of people who run red lights.