Bad driving proven, NLV camera-ready

By Mike Trask (contact)

Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2008 | 2 a.m.

Setting its sights on bad drivers, North Las Vegas has installed sensors to track how many vehicles blow red lights at two of the busiest intersections in the city: Martin Luther King Boulevard and Cheyenne Avenue, and Camino Al Norte and Craig Road.

The city hopes data collected by the sensors will persuade state legislators to allow the use of traffic cameras at intersections to nab motorists who run red lights.

North Las Vegas is far from the first municipality to want to use so-called “red-light” cameras. In California and nearly two dozen other states, the cameras take photographs of vehicles that run red lights, allowing authorities to mail tickets to the vehicles’ owners.

But in Nevada, a 1999 law bans the use of remotely controlled cameras to gather evidence against drivers who run a light or get in an accident.

North Las Vegas has unsuccessfully lobbied in the past two legislative sessions to allow the cameras. For the 2009 Legislature, the city will make its case with hard data. For six months the city monitored how many motorists ran the lights. At Martin Luther King and Cheyenne, about 70 northbound vehicles ran the light each day, and at Camino Al Norte and Craig, about 17 southbound vehicles ran the light daily, North Las Vegas Police Chief Joseph Forti said.

In the next six months, a sign will alert motorists to the sensors.

The signs alone should cause motorists to stop speeding up at yellow lights, city leaders think.

The results of the data shouldn’t be too surprising.

Dozens of studies across the county have shown that the incidence of motorists’ running red lights was reduced after cameras were installed. A pair of studies by the Insurance Institute of Highway Safety shows the number of offenses can decrease by 40 percent with cameras in place.

The National Campaign to Stop Red Light Running, which has worked with North Las Vegas, says cameras can decrease red-light running by 40 percent to 50 percent and reduce the number of injury crashes 25 percent to 30 percent.

Still, not everybody is in favor of cameras.

The American Civil Liberties Union and other civil rights groups say they are an unnecessary invasion of privacy that could lead to abuse. It’s a slippery slope, they say, between cameras watching traffic and cameras watching every move we make.

The supporters preach responsible use and safety.

Metro Police was not involved with the study. But it supports North Las Vegas’ red-light camera campaign and the use of the devices, said Bill Cassell, a spokesman for the department.

North Las Vegas hasn’t been able to keep up with the need for police officers as the city has grown.

“Our accident rate is high,” Forti said. “We had to do something about it. Technology can be part of that.”

Rep. Kelvin Atkinson, a North Las Vegas Democrat who is chairman of the Transportation Committee, says he’ll listen to arguments for the cameras at a hearing next year. But he said he’s undecided about legalizing them.

Instead, he says he’s being fair to the city he represents by granting it a legislative hearing. Atkinson, like many other people in the state, wants to see some hard evidence that traffic cameras would decrease red-light running, specifically in Nevada.

North Las Vegas plans to give it to him.