New speed cameras won’t stop ‘the idiots’
A road safety expert says the Government’s proposed new point-topoint cameras won’t stop crashes – they’ll alienate motorists.
Associate Transport Minister Julie Anne Genter and the minister in charge of road safety, Julie Anne Genter said New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) was trialling the new cameras in two high-risk locations within the next six months.
But safety campaigner Clive Matthew-Wilson said speed cameras did not stop those who were causing crashes, and these specific cameras breached motorists’ privacy.
The point-to-point cameras take the average speed a car is travelling along a stretch of road by snapping the registration at two separate points. It then calculates the average speed using the time it took to cover the distance between.
Genter said she was committed to looking at all effective steps when it came to addressing ‘‘the horrific number of people being killed and seriously injured’’ on New Zealand roads.
‘‘Point-to-point cameras are particularly effective at targeting dangerous stretches of road where high-speed driving puts others at risk,’’ Genter said.
She added that the cameras had a track record of saving lives in Australia, the United Kingdom and Europe.
However, the National Party had chosen not to go ahead with the cameras, after considering them as part of its Safer Journeys 2010-2020 road safety strategy. Cabinet considered it in 2016, but did not implement the cameras.
Matthew-Wilson said speed cameras, even the new point-topoint cameras, would not lower the road toll. He said speed alone was a factor in just 15 per cent of fatal crashes, adding there is a minority of people who would speed no matter what, and they were the ones who were involved in speed-related crashes.
‘‘Speed cameras seem like a magic solution, but they’re not: they alienate ordinary motorists without affecting the behaviour of the tiny minority who cause most fatal crashes,’’ he said.
‘‘The sad fact is: the idiots who cause most fatal accidents tend to ignore speed limits anyway.’’
A 2009 AA analysis of fatal accidents found these crashes were caused by ‘‘people who don’t care about any kind of rules. These are men who speed, drink, don’t wear safety belts, have no valid licence or WoF – who are basically renegades. They usually end up wrapped around a tree, but they can also overtake across a yellow line and take out other motorists as well’’.
And Ministry of Transport research from 2017 found 85 per cent of the road toll occurred below the speed limit.
Getting trucks off the roads, and adding median barriers and roadside fencing helped, he said.
A study by Monash University on the effectiveness of roadside fencing and median barriers concluded that: ‘‘reductions of up to 90 per cent in death and serious injury can be achieved, with no evidence of increased road trauma for motorcyclists’’.
There have also been issues raised about potential privacy issues relating to the cameras.