The return of speed vans?

Before the City Council decides to bring back speed vans in an attempt to slow traffic, officials should consider the consequences. All of them. Still, at the City Council meeting on Wednesday, councilors are scheduled to vote on bringing back unmanned speed-enforcement equipment. That would mean speed vans parked along the sides of the road for the first time since the program lapsed in 2013.

Yes, drivers need to slow down. Vehicles that photograph speeding cars and trucks are a way to decelerate traffic without stretching police personnel too thin. However, speed vans are about more than taking photos and then issuing tickets. The council has to look at what happens after the tickets get handed out.

How easy will it be for accused speeders to answer charges? How do drivers know the cameras capturing drivers’ speed are accurate? What defenses will be accepted? How will the tickets be collected, and what happens to people who ignore them or who don’t receive them? In a town where mail service has been notoriously spotty, that’s an important consideration. Speeding tickets — even ones paid late or not paid at all — should not bring down debt collectors on otherwise upright citizens. (If this happened to you, by the way, the council meeting Wednesday might be a good time to speak out; or, send a message to your city councilor and the mayor. This will be a close vote.)

Even as the council nears a decision about bringing back speed vans — first the vote and then, if approved, issuing a request for a proposal for a company to run the program — some Santa Fe residents are reporting being contacted for past-due tickets from years ago, the last time the city ran such a program. Some recipients of the dunning letters say they never got the ticket in the first place. They can’t even say for certain their car was where the ticket claims — and after these many months, they have little way of mounting a defense. Any automatic ticketing program must contain plenty of room for due process.

James C. Walker, from the National Motorists Association, commented at www.santafenewmexican.com that speed cameras are expensive to operate, so they often are placed where posted speeds are too low for conditions. He gave this example: “If 85 percent of the cars on a main collector or arterial street are at or below 38 to 42 mph, then almost always, the safest limit to post to produce the smoothest and safest traffic flow with the fewest crashes, is 40 miles per hour, not 35 or 30 or lower.”

However, all drivers in Santa Fe can think of at least a few streets where cars tend to move faster than the posted limit — Siringo Road, anyone? The problem isn’t always speeding, it’s that the speed limit does not reflect conditions. Rather than seek easy solutions — outsourcing traffic patrols — the City Council should look for other ways to improve driving. Start with setting speed limits that work with traffic. Do public relations campaigns about speeding and paying attention. Place more signs asking people to slow down. Most of all, commit to traffic patrols — it will take longer, but the results will last.

Bringing in hired guns — and that’s what speed vans essentially are, run by out-of-state companies — is not the best way to make streets safer.