There’s plenty of dinner-table debate about the merits of speed cameras and whether or not they influence people’s driving or just rake in revenue for State governments. But Queensland’s decision to use these unmarked utes to photograph speeding drivers is likely to persuade many taxpayers that it’s more about the ching-ching than the saving of lives.
Kieran Campbell at the Sunshine Coast Daily reported at the end of October, three new undercover vehicles loaded with discreet speed cameras hit Queensland roads, and today tipster Dave send through pics of two utes loaded with the cameras. We don’t know if these are the same vehicles or not, but it seems like a fairly backwards way to try and convince people to slow down.
That said – don’t speed and you’ve got nothing to worry about…
[Sunshine Coast Daily – Thanks Dave!]
simon
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 4:55 PMsure… you could argue speed cameras are revenue raising… but its the law
by someones justification, i should be allowed to spray paint a large wang on public property and not get fined… if they fine me its clearly revenue raising… i mean really, the wang isnt causing any harm is it now
LeisuresuitLarryFan
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 5:03 PMIt’s actually quite paradoxical when you think of it, the Government harps on about people not speeding, but if everybody just stopped speeding, then all the state budgets would be blown out of the water..
Richard Djordjevic
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 5:07 PMI’m undecided….sure it comes off as a money making scheme but it does have somemerit as it makes it very difficult to know where the cameras are. The problem with fixed or even very obvious road side ones is everyone knows where they are (via radio, signs or other cars signaling) which promotes slowing down for isolated distances before picking up speed again.
It’s a bit cliche…but if people weren’t speeding then these cars wouldn’t make the government anyway so I’m not sure if I have a big problem with it.
Fizz
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 12:11 PMThe benefit with fixed or even very obvious road side ones is everyone knows where they are (via radio, signs or other cars signaling) which promotes slowing down for isolated distances before picking up speed again.
A fine in the mail 6 weeks later is not a deterant, the instant shock of seeing a partol car slow people for longer, and being pulled over and handed a fine on the spot is better still.
Jay
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 5:15 PMI cannot install a camera on my premises for security as it violates the privacy of passerby’s but the Govt. can install unmarked cameras that *CAN* violate my privacy.
Who Polices the Police??
Matthew
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 8:09 PMIs speed ‘camera’ not a bit of a misnomer? Bounce a couple of test pulses off you and, if you’re going too fast, it snaps a picture. Seems a bit excessive for them to be constantly recording.
Damo
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 8:14 PMQld’s annual budget is in the tens of billions. Speed cameras are a drop in the bucket. I’ve been caught on the odd occasion but I’m yet to whinge about being penalised for doing the wrong thing.
Homer J
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 11:12 PMI dunno… coastguard?
Francis Mullane
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 5:36 PMSO the thing is a covert speed camera is supposed to be there to “save lives” using the logic that speeding “contributes in 25% of vehicle related fatalities in Queensland”
My main problem with covert cameras is they only take a phot they don;t stop the person who was speeding at the time they were speeding – which means in the 2 weeks it takes to recieve the fine they could have killed someone.
Here’s a question – given the large sums of money raised by these things – if a speed camera snaps a picture of a speeding motorist who then goes on to kill someone, are the police liable for contributing to the death given they made the decision to use a camera instead of an officer. If it’s a cop with a radar gun then the offender is pulled over and stops speeding immediatly …
Steph
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 8:12 PMDon’t be absurd — it’s not the speed camera itself that saves lives. The knowledge that they’re likely to be caught is supposed to dissuade motorists from speeding.
Melektaus
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 7:22 AMThats just it though, that is clearly not working. Speeding fines are up. the road toll is down this year (over last year) but that just an anomaly, IMHO. I bet the road toll is up again next year.
So if it’s supposed to ‘encourage’ people to slow down, but they aren’t, what is the point?
Dan
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 5:55 PMVictoria has had unmarked cars with speed cameras in them for years.
Tomas Medina
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 6:46 PMJeremey Clarkson said it best – drivers are now focussing too much about keeping their eyes on their speedo and what that ute in the bushes is doing, and not paying full attention to the road.
Mr Mack
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 1:08 AMExactly! In WA they have installed red light cameras which capture speeding cars too. So now I am looking at my speedo when going through large intersections instead of looking out for someone about to run a red light. I’m pretty sure a truck running through an intersection just below the speed limit, crashing into a car below the speed limit, is pretty fatal…
The point I’m making is the system doesn’t reward the alert and courteous drivers, instead over-relying on the results of a millisecond snapshot of what a driver is doing out of the thousands of hours they spend on the road, in order to pass judgement about said driver.
Speed cameras in a van, thats not as bad as one roadside camera I encountered where it was placed at a sudden brief downhill section where drivers were looking directly into the sun.
Jesse Matheson
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 8:47 PMYou are meant to conceal cameras, and police vehicles which monitor speed aren’t meant to be concealed from public view.
Steve
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 9:00 PMSpeeding isn’t killing people. It’s the drunken yobbos and bogans who proliferate Surfers and cruise back to their dens to nurse a hangover every night who kill people.
“Noice”
RB
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 10:27 PMtoo much focus on speeding being the cause of accidents IMHO…
they should be focusing more on the idiots who have no clue how to drive properly that keep mindlessly pulling out in front of me as I’m speeding to work…
THEY are the REAL threats to the safety of the TRUE MOTORIST!
/rant
matt
Monday, November 15, 2010 at 10:42 PMwhere are the numbers saying speeding kills?
and the “its the law” argument is sickening…
whose law? some all knowing, perfect being?
we have a right to question laws.
speeding “contributes in 25% of vehicle related fatalities in Queensland” really? I’m sure driving poorly, or being distracted contributed too.
where is the camera for that?
speed limits don’t change when the road gets wet, or visibility is reduced to 5m… so how are these golden numbers so perfect?
Dean
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 7:43 AMFinally! Someone who has an actual brain!
Charles
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 11:09 AMSure, but the transport departments can’t exactly hand out special ‘Good At Driving Most Of The Time’ licences or something! The transport departments or whoever makes up those laws have to make some general statements which are going to annoy some who consider themselves better drivers. It’s those unstoppable moment which kill, not the ones which can be avoided through GREAT DRIVING or something. Where is great driving going to get you when a kid runs out in front of your car trying to get a ball off the street or something? That’s happened to me before and if I was driving much faster than I was…
Peter Simpson
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 12:42 AMGood. It takes me roughly 10 minutes to walk to work from home, in a middle class suburb. In that time, I cross the road through one black spot (hilltop on one side, hard bend on the other) and one pedestrian crossing at a roundabout. In that, I usually have at least 3 cars speeding and acting like general dicks on the road. I can’t say how many times I’ve had to stop in the middle of the street because some dick wants to get into the freeway fracas 3 minutes earlier.
matt
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 10:07 AMI wish I lived walking distance from work…
Peter Simpson
Wednesday, November 17, 2010 at 4:23 AMI nearly got wiped out yesterday morning by a jerk. He had the nerve to beep back my way after probably the most obvious death stare I could muster after having to dash across the road or become roadkill. That 10 minute walk ain’t so cosy from where I’m standing, I just can’t justify the drive.
Angus
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 1:19 AMMoves were afoot recently to enforce infringements for as little as 4km over the limit. On some cars that’s about the width of the speedometer needle. Or casual walking pace. You don’t have to look too far around Sydney to find speed zones of 10, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100, 110… I’m sure there’s a 20 out there somewhere. Add to that certain zoning that is also time sensitive. Not only are we now required to star at the speedo constantly, but you better make sure you check your watch as well. Nevermind the poor bastards in an old car with mph on the speedo, for them you can add metric conversion on top of all that.
Wayne
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 7:14 AMSpeed kills is the message, but the govenment just put more speed cameras on the road. Its in the budget? Why? Unless its a revenue of course. Why not use the money to put speed limiters in cars and transmitters on the roads to then adjust the speed of the cars? Oh yea that doesn’t make money silly me…
Noother
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 9:48 AMSpeed limits are there for a reason. I just wish they’d either start bringing out the chips for cars to enforce speed limits in newer cars (which could likely be hacked/bypassed) but even then older cars would get around it. We still need Cameras around to stop idiots wanting to get to their destination 30 seconds sooner while increasing the chance of having an accident. I say more hidden cameras, more safety cameras and screw all those who have grown up with the mentality that speeding isn’t wrong or doesn’t harm anyone or they’ve never had a problem doing it.
Alvaro Ojeda
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 9:52 AMGod knows how the world went round before speed cameras were invented. Everyone must’ve been driving at top speed and killing every animal, child and pedestrian on the street and just ramming other cars for the mere fun of it. How the hell did humanity survive?
The thing is that if you impose more laws and ways to catch people in illicit acts, then more laws will be broken and illicit acts committed. Simple logic. When the law has a demand it also has a way to create its supply and regardless of everything else, lives notwithstanding, one would find that it still comes down to the C.R.E.A.M. principle… Cash Rules Everything Around Me.
Money Maker
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 12:18 PMGreat comment.
JoJo
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 11:21 AMI don’t think people who have never, ever sped have thought about things for very long. A speed limit is a number. It may be the law, but its still just a number. It was not handed down by God, it is a number determined by a bunch of people in an office somewhere, based on a bunch of stats, averaged, and rounded down to the nearest 10.
The real maximum speed someone should be driving depends on the car, the conditions, the driver, and changes from second to second. Therefore exceeding the speed limit is illegal but it is not necessarily always dangerous. If it were up to some people, we’d all be going to work on skateboards, just to ensure that no one got killed.
Someone can be 5 km/hr or 10 km/hr over the speed limit and not a serial killer or the devil. Yet there are a lot of idiots not indicating, not paying attention, not giving way, reading while driving, etc. There definitely needs to be more emphasis on what people are actually doing when they are driving.
Puddiepants
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 12:23 PMI agree completely, it’s all about driving to the conditions (both road and your car’s conditions)
Unfortunately, that’s a difficult one to enforce and as such it is just set for the lowest common denominator…
Never under estimate the power of stupidity
Money Maker
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 12:17 PMExcellent point. It is all a thing about relativity. There are many drivers who have the attention span of a bird. They drive under limit but are as safe on the road as a blind person.
jgillard
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 1:06 PMget fined? make that money useful, huck a brick through the back window while passing the next one you see! hell you might even take out the shitkunt who’s job it is to drive it and narc out fellow australians of their hard earned wage for all of what? the vehicle moving to fast? grow up, stop being pussies, set one on fire!
red t-rex
Tuesday, November 16, 2010 at 7:47 PMSome of the arguments against these cameras are truly ridiculous. The speed limit is exactly that, the maximum speed. You are not obligated to try to run exactly on the limit and you are expected to not exceed it. Try running a little under it and you have no fear of being caught.
And for those who find it dangerous as they are always having to keep an eye out for all the cameras shows that you take the completely wrong attitude to driving and without these cameras would most likely speed far more. It is exactly for people like you with your current mindset that make the cameras a necessity.
If you speed and get caught you have no-one else to blame except yourself. You are the one behind the wheel in control of the vehicle. So pay the fine and stop whining like a little baby and change your attitude and it won’t happen again.
If you are truly against the supposed revenue raising then why don’t you stick it to the government by preventing them from getting the revenue by not speeding. It’s one of the few goverment charges that is totally within your control to avoid.
I have lost too many family members to road trauma caused by idiots who think they are special cases and the law doesn’t apply to them. In my opinion, they only have to save 1 life to justify their existence because that 1 life will be someones father, mother, brother, sister, son, or daughter. Next time you go home, have a look at the members of your family and consider which one(s) you could do without as it could be their number up next caused by people like you who choose to ignore road rules.
Laura
Tuesday, December 7, 2010 at 10:07 PMBeing a P plater, you do get given very many points on your license. Even if who are a sensible driver, if you have a slip up that could mean your license, so already dealing with red light cameras, radar guns and patrol cars, by having unmarked cars with cameras thrown into the mix has made a young driver like myself paranoid! I am now too busy worried about the black ute parked on the side of the road, wondering if it is a camera, that i am not watching the road and not watching the speedo. Not to mention the fact that because I am so worried about speeding, i am constantly watching the speedo and not the road. Now i am sure you’d agree that keeping my eyes on the road is far more important than checking that I am not a km over the speed limit every 2 seconds . Now i am not using this all as an excuse to say that driving 5-10 kms over the speed limit is okay, however if you are travelling at approximately 95-98kms in a 100 zone and you travel down a slight decline in the road and take your eyes off the speedo for lets say 30 secs its quite easy to end up at around 105-110kms and if you happen to be going past a camera at that moment and your a p plater, well regardless of the fact that you had been travelling at 95kms the whole time beforehand, say goodbye to your license!!
Money Maker
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 12:11 PMIts not to reduce speeding. A government that cared about the populous would have a trickle down effect into the servants such as police. If “care of safety” was the important thing than police would also convey this care in their tone of voice and have a good conversation about their concern for yours and others safety.
“Hey mate, you’re speeding… you know many people die on these roads?? It only takes a second to look away and you’re in trouble at these speeds.”
But that is a wonderland of the old world which no longer exists.
I left a pub a few years ago in Brisbane and there was only one exit out of the place. Around a blind corner was the RBT.
The simple truth is this – if they wanted less people to drive drunk, they would be at the doors of the club asking people if they wanted to check their alcohol levels before getting into the car. You can’t deny however that making money comes before the safety aspect with these preventative laws designed to reduce crashes and save lives.
Ironically, people often speed because they are running late. Speed cameras are often also placed strategically not far from unefficient lights with really badly timed setups. Police know that if they position near these lights after you have been waiting for no reason that many drivers will likely speed off to catch up on time wasted that shouldn’t have been.
Rather than invest more money on speed cameras, how about work on the tasks such as making roads more efficient with lights that could be better programmed by 6 year olds? Sometimes driving through these cities is like playing checkers and there is no efficiency to it, then for those who are trying to make up on wasted lost time are hit with a heavy fine, all of which adds to people feeling more behind and are therefor given more reason to want to speed up.
Personally I don’t speed. But the contradictions of this system are clearly obvious and I think its time we start expecting our police and govern to shift a bit more attention on the real criminals of the world and serving the people instead of the budgets and quotas.
Money Maker
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 12:31 PMLong story short – the penalty is the very thing which encourages the crime. You can sugar this up however you like it as being for a greater good and care for road safety, but it is really punishing a child who eats some sugar by drilling a hole in their teeth.
If you want to stop people speeding, limit cars actual speed. Simple. Government has no problem in controlling the limit of everything else and yet somehow allow cars to be put on the roads that can do 2-3 times the speed of any limit on any highway.
If safety was the greatest concern, cars would be given limits of acceleration and top speed. But then, how could you make money off that? Government wants you to buy faster cars because they want you to want to go faster. It fuels the economy. Faster driving means more petrol being consumed. All of which Government makes more cash on.
But go on, believe its about your safety. Drink some more kool-aid while you’re at it and resume the zombie like naivety of the Government that is just trying to make the world a better place.
Sally
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 6:47 PMIt really comes down to this.
Can you create a camera for dangerous driving…. NO.*
Can you create a camera for driving on a hand held mobile…. NO.*
Can you create a camera for driving in the right hand lane and not moving over… NO.*
Can you create a camera for tailgating… NO.*
But you can create a camera for speeding, which will catch anyone going over X km/h, or for someone going over a line on the road when the light is red.
Hence the government fines speeding, and makes such a big deal about it, because they can put these devices in a spot, and then ching ching, the dollars come rolling in.
You can also make a camera for bus lanes (you see them around Sydney) for the same reason, ching ching. $$$$
If the government could make a camera to make money out of something, the law would change to accommodate it, and the cameras would be installed.
* Well then have not made cameras to catch people doing these yet that I know of. :)
Ben
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 9:08 PMConsider the following: an ambulance driver is driving 3 tonne vehicle at 130km/h with medium traffic. He finishes his shift late at night, when the roads are empty. He gets into his new BMW with ABS brakes, and suddenly he is a “killer” because he wants to drive 115km/h?
If it was not revenue gathering, then the government would dictate that every vehicle be fitted with a speed limiter set to 110km/h. The fact that they don’t shows they want the revenue. A device such as this would cost $10 per vehicle, but stop anyone from doing the really excessive speeds some people travel.
The bottom line is revenue gathering.