My experience shows A9 average speed cameras are a waste of public money

I HAVE driven the A9 (old and new) for more than 40 years and found myself puzzled by the Scottish Government’s proposed scheme for average speed cameras (ASCs) along the route.

On the morning of June 11, while they were being installed and tested in Perthshire, my car’s computer recorded a stately 40mph average speed between the cameras from just south of the Dunkeld junction to north of the bridge over the Tay. From there to the cameras near the Kindallachan it recorded an even more stately average of 38mph.

I repeated the exercise the other day and recorded speeds of 51 and 53mph respectively on these sections. From the Kindallachan to the Raigmore junction at Inverness my average speed was also 53mph, this on various sections with single or dual carriageways.

In both journeys I did not exceed the appropriate national speed limit of 60mph on single carriageways and 70mph on dual carriageways. I also observed various temporary and permanent reductions on the normal national limits.

If it is an offence to exceed the various national and temporary speed limits on the road and this can be detected by fixed or mobile cameras, what is the justification for a massively-expensive system of ASCs when it is clearly not possible to approach the permitted national limits without significantly exceeding these limits on a section of road between the cameras?

Secondly, on the sections with both single and dual carriageways, what is the permitted average speed between the cameras and how is the motorist to be made aware of this?

The justification for this seemingly useless but massivelyexpensive exercise is that it “worked” to reduce accidents on the A77 road in Ayrshire.

I would suggest there are few similarities between a road such as the A77 and the A9. First,the distances involved in the total camera sections are very different (about 35 miles as opposed to 105) and secondly, the incidence of major centres of population which produce an entirely different travel pattern of largely local traffic on the A77 as opposed to the largely long-distance function of the A9.

While there are doubtless incidences of frustration on the A77, these would be relatively short-lived by comparison with that experienced by the long-distance traveller on the A9.

From the southernmost cameras on the A77 to the end of the road at Stranraer is 23 miles, whereas Inverness to Thurso is 105 miles.

The new A9 is a well-designed road but must be rapidly approaching capacity, particularly through Perthshire.

Would public money not be more usefully spent on upgrading these sections than on an apparently futile and unnecessary surveillance system? Ian Munro, 48 Dockers Gardens, Ardrossan. Pictures published in The Herald are for sale www.thepicturedesk.co.uk