Red-light cameras at every intersection? Mayor Bloomberg, already a fan of the nanny state, wouldn't mind! At yesterday's press conference about all the filming going on in the city Hizzoner was asked about the push to bring more of the cash-cow cameras to town and he took the idea one step further: "I think we should have them on every corner if we could," he said. "Using technology instead of having cops makes a lot of sense, and something, because of the economics, that we really have to do, and it does show that they are very effective." Oh, and also? He'd also like to print the name of speeders in the newspaper.
Right now there about 150 cameras around town that are set to auto-ticket those who run red-lights. Legislation to jump that number up to 225 is currently meandering through Albany (it passed the Senate in June but still needs to get through the Assembly), but Bloomberg wants more, more, more. But he wants it for the kids and the grannies, people, not the millions of dollars in revenue those cameras bring! "I can tell you as I get older, you don’t hear as well, see as well, you don’t react as quickly," Bloomberg explained, "and a disproportionate percentage of people who get hit from people running red lights are...the seniors.”
As for speed cameras? Right now the city is free to put up cameras that can detect speeders but, just like with additional red-light cameras, it would need permission from Albany to start auto-ticketing people. So Bloomberg yesterday mused to reporters that the city could just, y'know, print the names of speeders and red-light skippers in the paper and shame them:
We can put red light cameras on every single intersection—you just can’t use them. Maybe what we should do is do it and start publishing in the paper who does it and then the list of the senators and assemblymen who keep us from having cameras, and every time there’s somebody hit, say ‘okay, assemblyman and senator so-and- so didn’t think that person’s life…these are the lives of our people we’re talking about, this is not something cute, and we’ve got to do something about it.
The people who are worried that red-light cameras are just the first step to a city ruled by RoboCops and predator drones are just going to love this idea. But for now at least, if you want to avoid red-light cameras you probably want to start here.
