Hook it to the Internet and it will email a speeding ticket to you. Also could make it easy to spot stolen cars.
The number’s up for speeding drivers with this new personalised flashing sign being used in roadworks.
Trials have shown that drivers get the ‘back-off’ message quicker when they see their own registration shown below the speed limit.
Highways consultant firm Atkins came up with the idea in a bid to boost safety for road workers. A radar detects the speed of oncoming cars and flashes the words ‘slow down’ and the reg plate of vehicles exceeding 55mph. In a trial on the M42 in the Midlands, almost half of drivers breaking the limit slowed.
Very clever. Would that use OCR or RFID? Connect it to the police database and flash up the driver’s record – that’ll slow them down.
>>Connect it to the police database and flash up the driver’s record
You mean “flash up the record of the person to whom the car is registered, who may or may not be driving”. This doesn’t seem to have any advantages over the old-fashioned traffic cams where they just mail you a ticket. Nobody knows who is actually driving the car.
This contraption is fine as long as it doesn’t send speeding tickets. Any piece of equipment that sends me a summons is going to be destroyed. If you want to ticket me do it in person.
#3 Thats 50 points if you hit it in the bullseye. and 5-15 if you get caught.
“Nobody knows who is actually driving the car.”
Considering the state of facial recognition, the new revision of the sign that IDs you will be out next week.
I am proud when those signs blink because I’m driving too fast.
Oh, but this is just the begining.
There are initiatives to read license plates everywhere.
They will know where you’ve driven and when.
If you really want to get your parnoid juices flowing, consider that the patriot act was conveniently created before this technology became news. Do you think that we’d have put up with such laws if we’d know just how soon this sort of thing would be upon us?
I have no sympathy for those who decry the Patriot Act yet silently approve of confiscating one-half of one’s estate upon death.
I will gladly let you do your crap in secret if I can give my estate to my family.
#8
Wow. Good job connecting two unrelated points.
This technology is already in place in southern California, where it has been in use for several years. However it is used to catch stolen cars heading for the Mexican border, not speeders.
Two comments:
1. Privacy laws have always maintained that people have no right to privacy in public areas, but these laws never foresaw the development of technology that could be used to spy on people constantly. We need a law ensuring some degree of privacy in public.
2. Speeding laws are a joke. The vast majority of drivers speed and most cops won’t ticket you if you only speed a little. People recognize that the speed limits have nothing to do with safety. They speed constantly and nothing bad happens. So why all this effort to automate enforcement? Follow the money and you will see. I think that traffic enforcement should not be a source of income to government. Doesn’t enriching government through traffic tickets encourage abuses? We all know it does.
#11, I have little issue with your first point. Your second point is totally over the top.
The vast majority of drivers speed and most cops won’t ticket you if you only speed a little.
And if they all drive their cars off a bridge are you going to follow them?
People recognize that the speed limits have nothing to do with safety. They speed constantly and nothing bad happens.
Oopps, looks like someone really wants to drive over that bridge. I guess that speed limit near the school isn’t to help safeguard the young children, the sign must be just for show.
So why all this effort to automate enforcement?
Traffic tickets wake people up to the fact that what they are doing is illegal. If you break the law, don’t expect to get away with it every time.
Follow the money and you will see. I think that traffic enforcement should not be a source of income to government.
If you don’t break the law, then you won’t be asked to pay a fine. Really, I can’t think of any other idea of what the government might do with money collected from traffic fines. Giving it back isn’t an option.
Doesn’t enriching government through traffic tickets encourage abuses? We all know it does.
The kicker line. Ask a question then answer it as a given. I am unaware of traffic enforcement encouraging any abuses. Now, there may be some small town in Tennessee where the Mayor is insisting upon a quota of out of town drivers. But generally this is not the case.
Traffic enforcement is almost always a civil penalty. Remember, driving is a privilege, NOT a right. If you don’t like to drive within the rules, then either move to a jurisdiction that will allow you to drive that way or petition the government to change the traffic laws.
The government is not an US and THEM thing. The government is an extension of us and answer to us. If your government representatives don’t do what you wish, then vote for someone else. Oh, what was that? You don’t vote? Then shut the heck up.
With enough technology, no one will be above the law.
Speed limits are a very complex situation. Todays cars can do 30% over speed limits (here is 120Kmh on highways) in full safety. The problem is speedways with only two lanes. If you get a heavy truck at 70 Kmh on the right, and you drive at 90Kmh on your economic compact, you are entitled to pass. But if speed limits are high, then it can be zooming on you from the back someone driving at 150Kmh. He is 60Kmh faster than you and you and the truck side by side become a unsurpassable obstacle. As limits get higher, this speed difference is a increasing risk factor. Speedways work well safetywise if everybody travels at around the same speed.
Also, speed limits keep cars running in the economy sweetspot. Macroeconomically it brings down a country’s dependence on foreign oil…
Other than that speed limits sucks…
In Germany they don’t have them on freeways. But in a gentlemans agreement among car manufacturers they put a 240Kmh electronic speed limit on the faster models. That’s why car transformers and tunning shops abound.
#12–Stereotypical cheap shot aside. You are “unaware…of abuses”? I can think of half a dozen towns, off the top of my head, in my state that do it. Perhaps if you were on the receiving end of some of this “enforcement” you might feel a little more us and them about the situation.
As for voting I’m in line early, though I”m unaware of a voting record being needed for free speech.
H. Fusion…
Wow. I mean, wow!
I don’t have time or interest to respond other than to say I vote in every election, local and national.
8 I will gladly let you do your crap in secret if I can give my estate to my family.
Simple!
If your estate is worth more than $2-million, you just have to kick the bucket in 2010…
http://www.deathtax.com/deathtax/comefrom.htm
Uncle Dave: Also could make it easy to spot stolen cars.
10 However it is used to catch stolen cars heading for the Mexican border, not speeders.
Hmmm. I wonder if they could set these up during “Amber Alerts”, if the license plate of the vehicle is known?
re:#2 Mr. Mustard the owner knows who is driving the car. If they do not then the speeding ticket is the least of their concerns.
re:#3 Improbus I do understand what you mean. I have to say that when I was caught by a “photo radar” at night I knew right away I was going to get a ticket. The flash of light gave it away. They used a police van to house the equipment and it requires an officer to be in it minding the radar. Still waiting for the ticket sucked. Still only a fine was involved. No demerit points. They had a similar sign in my neighborhood sans the ability to read plates. It was to make you aware of school being back in and the school zone limit being in place.
Re:#Mr. Hill I know what you mean. I was nailed with a speeding ticket for going 100 mph. I was pleased to find out my car went that fast. 😉
Re:#13 Matthew that is an excellent point. When people stop saying your only guilty if your caught. Will people still complain? Sure although sadly on the one ticket I received I was bragging. I could not believe my old beater went that fast. lol
Re:#15 Joe I have heard that police in the U.S. southeast states of Mississippi and Louisiana have taken cars from people after they planted drugs in them. If this is where you live or the type of police you are talking about I agree that you have a reasonable concern. I was ticketed by a police officer who was stopped in a dangerous location at the bottom of a hill. I was not impressed, but I was speeding. When Police are corrupt that is the problem not speeding tickets. If you where wrongly given a ticket for a crime you did not do that is a big problem.
This all being said what Mr. Fusion said was very valid in his comments regarding Raddad’s post. I agree that you and all citizens of the U.S. have the right to free speech. I think Mr. Fusion’s comment had to do with those who complain, yet are unwilling to act on that complaint. You are a voter so the remark was not directed at you or others like yourself. If people like yourself continue to act on your beliefs by voting or challenging corrupt Police; citizens will live in a better United States of America. Having interacted with Mr. Fusion I believe that while he may disagree with you on certain things he will be pleased you spoke your mind.
John
As has been noted, there is no way to determine who is actually driving the vehicle based only on the license plate number. So until it is possible to do so, these no-stop tickets should be thrown out as invalid.
And to Fusion: in the state of Georgia, where I grew up, unless you were pulled over by a state trooper, no municipal or county police officer would issue a ticket for speeding until you were 10 miles over the limit. In fact, the county court fines didn’t start until 10 miles over. The result of this was that the effective speed limit was actually 10 mph higher than the actual posted limit. Now, I am a firm believer that if a law is not going to be enforced, then it should not be a law at all. And it seems that was part of the point raddad was making.
I can only guess this would only work on current cars with license plates on the front. Score one for the states in the USA that only have license plates on the back!.
>>I have no sympathy for those who decry the Patriot Act yet silently
>>approve of confiscating one-half of one’s estate upon death.
Unlikely they’re going to be “confiscating” ANY of your estate. The first two million bucks (three million, in some cases) is exempt. And considering that most of this “hard-earned money” in excess of $3,000,000.00 that gets taxed is capital gains on stock that’s been sitting in an account somewhere (and never was taxed in the first place, because the cost basis of stock is the death date of the person bequeathing the estate), all I can say to the whiners is TFB. You want money, earn it yourself. And if you don’t want to pay taxes on your money, become a Columbian drug lord.
#21: Why would that matter? If a camera can read a plate coming toward it, it can read a plate going away. Just face it the other way. Or, use two cameras to get both ends.
These things break all the damn time. I pass two on the way to work and if Im doing 30 on the dot they still flash. I have to be doing 25 for them not to!? The ones on the outskirts of oxford are 50 signs and they flash at everyone, even if you’re doing 40 or are stationary in traffic.
There’s no way they would put on auto-fines on to them because they seem to break so easily.
Just as bad are the average speed check ones on the M25 and M1. Those ones are real fkrs.
Me go fast! For crying out loud, people—stop treating cars as extensions of your egos. A car is a box on wheels you use to get from one place to another. Speeding is dangerous (ask an actuary) Speeding causes a large quantity of fatal automobile accidents. Speeding is against the law.
Loss of privacy? That’s another matter—pay CLOSE attention to what is going on in our society–it is being rewritten and FAST. Technology makes things possible that you never dreamed about. Government is willing to break every social contract (like that one we call the bill of rights) for immediate political gain. And this is not a ‘drop by drop’ kind of change–it is an avalanche. To your children, America will be a whole different trip. Maybe those Italian women have a point…
It doesn’t matter who’s driving the car. If it’s registered in your name, you should be responsible for the behavior of the people you loan your vehicle out to. If you don’t think they’ll be responsible, don’t loan it out to them in the first place. If they earn you a speeding ticket, the registered owner should be responsible for collecting it from the guilty driver. If they were driving your car, you should know whom to collect the fine from.
Lets All slow down!
Most of the comments posted pertain to the USA.
Please look at the picture and caption. This is in England, the picture is not mirror imaged. M42 is the British equivalent of the US Interstate. The M is shot for Motorway.
LOL
8. Argued like a true Republican Congressman.
#28, I took it to sound more like a neo-con troll.