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Coming soon: The speed camera you cannot beat
Last updated at 22:52pm on 25.05.07
Speed cameras you can't beat: The battery-powered, wireless devices which don't flash and never run out of film
Millions of motorists face the prospect of being caught by a new generation of speed cameras which do not even flash.
The digital cameras can operate round the clock as they require no film and can photograph the driver's face as well as number plates.
So the first a speeding driver would know about being caught is when a £60 fine popped through their letter box.
Campaigners claim the cameras, which are smaller and less easy to spot than the old-style units, are 'cash cows' that will do little to make roads safer.
Paul Smith, of the Safe Speed road safety campaign, said: "The fact that you do not know you have been flashed adds more uncertainty, which is never a good thing for safety.
"But a cosmetic makeover won't disguise the reality that the Government's speed camera policy is a failure."
A trial on the A4 Great West Road in London has already trapped drivers but they will not be prosecuted as the camera has not been officially approved.
Once they have been sanctioned by the Government, the devices are expected to be installed across the country.
The new device can be used forward or rear-facing so they can also trap speeding motorcycles, which only have number plates on the back.
The cameras, which can operate on battery power in case of a power cut, rely on wireless technology to send digital images to police so that the details can be processed quickly.
They can also be used to catch drivers who jump red lights.
Its makers, Truvelo, were given permission to test the camera at Gillette Corner, Isleworth, by Transport for London and is working with the London Safety Camera Partnership (LSCP).
A TfL spokesman said the trial was "openended" and would continue until the device was approved by the Home Office.
The number of people killed or seriously injured on London's roads has fallen by 41 per cent since the mid-nineties.
TfL says cameras have played an important role in reducing the number of casualties, together with other road safety measures such as 20 mph zones, as well as advertising and educational initiatives.
About half of all motorists flashed by speed cameras in London avoid a fine.
This compares with a 100 per cent “hit rate” in areas including Kent, Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire, and a national rate of around 60 per cent.
All major speed camera firms - including Truvelo, Serco's Gatso, RedSpeed and Robot - have commissioned newlook cameras from Crown UK which designs and manufactures the devices.
Crown UK has sold more than 7,500 housings worldwide - 6,000 of them in the UK. The UK's network of cameras catches an estimated two million speeders each year and the number of drivers with penalty points exceeds six million.
Reader views (16)
Speed cameras? Good at some junctions, pointless waste of money in other places designed to extract cash from the poor tax payer. A 'hidden' speed camera or 'safety' camera is there for money making purposes or it wouldn't be hidden. Defeats the object, just like the sneakily positioned Police car on a straight road. The hide so they 'let you speed' then nick you. If they were so concerned about speed, they would place themselves in such an obvious position that you can see them for hundreds of yards, thus slowing down and reducing even more, the chances of an accident. One shouldn't speed......but we do, especially at night on a clear road.
Safety vans are another waste of time. They pick a fast stretch and place themselves a little further out of the way, just around a bend, then catch you. Result? An unsafety van that likes you to speed so they can get your cash otherwise a real safety van would be obviously placed at the early point of the fast bit, so that YOU wouldn't do the speed. Bin liners are great for Gatso's and it doesn't damage the camera, but don't pop one over one where they are really needed. Common sense will prevail there. Watch out on the Mickleham Bends heading North away from Dorking in Surrey. They put a van around the bend AFTER you speed up from going past a Gatso. The limit is 50mph. It's near Boxhill.
- John, Surrey, UK
Every camera needs a large speed limit posted before the camera.
Roads should have colour stripes that define speeds.
In France, speeding drivers were caught on mass, put in a field for an hour and a half before a cash/credit card fine - very effective.
Average speed cameras over say 5 miles are very effective if well advertised.
Overhead signs that display your speed prospective fine and points - as a warning would be much more effective.
- Mike, Leicester
Speed itself doesn't kill, bad driving does. We have ludicrous speed limits currently. Residential roads should be slower, dual-carriageways and larger should be faster. The current system is terrible. Speed limits are mostly much lower than is safe so everybody brakes sharply when they see a camera, which is more dangerous than everyone travelling at their original speed.
Sometimes it's also difficult to tell what the speed limit is. On one road last week there signs showing different speed limits on different sides of the road - again, causing more danger because in the confusion you're not 100% focussed on the road ahead.
Set proper speed limits, then put cameras in and send offenders on driving courses instead of just fines fines fines.
- Dev C, London
I am waiting for them top invent a camera that takes a photograph of the person tailgating me when I keep to the speed limit! Also the implementation has to be logical. A road near me had the limit reduced and speed cameras installed after a fatal accident. Safety was not improved. The original limit was perfectly safe - the person that died was 30 mph over that and on the wrong side of the road!
- Michael, London
True Warren. By not having a visible deterrent, they have just admitted that it was never about safety and always about money and now about making even more money.
- Jay, London
What is being done to take the thousands of vehicles off the road which are unregistered, uninsured and un taxed. Speed cameras don't do a damn thing except raise revenue, and are usually sited not in places where accidents have happened, but where they can catch the motorist out. Once again, another penalty for those of us who keep our vehicles in order. As speed camera numbers go up, traffic cop numbers go down. More stupidity from "the government that listens".
- Robert, London
I'm sure these cameras are not cheap to buy. If there is surplus money floating around the system why not spend it on unmarked police cars to catch the dangerous drivers overtaking on bends and double white lines. Drive the A26 between Tunbridge Wells and Uckfield to see what I mean! But heck this isn't about road safety is it?
- Andrew Tuck, Crowborough, East Sussex
The camera flash provides a visible disincentive to speeding both for the driver who is caught by the camera and others passing by who see the flash. Eliminating the flash will do nothing to improve road safety, so presumably we can now be spared the hypocritical lies claiming safety is a reason, instead of raising money and also causing more drivers to unwittingly acquire more penalty points and get banned, thereby reducing the numbers on the road.
- Warren, London
If the intention is to modify people's driving habits to make the roads safer, they would be obvious, well sign-posted and in genuine accident blackspots.
Instead we have cameras hidden behind bushes, on straight roads with no hazards and no signs saying where they are or what hazards they are intended to slow you down for. This contempt for drivers shows that these are revenue making machines rather than safety.
Their only reason for being is to try to enforce ever lower speed limits that do not save lives as often there has never even been a minor accident, let alone a serious one, where the limits are reduced. And when you question the councill they juts re-oiterate the old mantra of "speed kills".
- Graham, Reading, England
How many times are we going to get this kind of story and whining from criminals and their supporters who claim it's a money making scam! If you don't want a fine, just simply stop speeding. No crime, no fine, no money for the operators of system.
- Mm, London
Austen, you really need to rethink your arguments. There are times when it is perfectly safe to exceed the speed limit.
The abiding rule of advanced driving/riding is to stop on your own side of the road in the distance you can see to be clear. A camera does not factor this in.
- Simon, London, England
If only the government would spend money to catch the real cheats - tax and insurance dodgers. They are able to drive as they wish without getting caught and we pay the increased tax and insurance premiums. Why not issue electronic devices when tax and insurance is paid and install detectors on our roads instead of high tech speed cameras? I'm totally fed up with the government targeting easy hits and playing the numbers game.
- Peter, London
This is a good idea, as it will make drivers think twice before speeding.
Breaking the speed limit is illegal and is both dangerous and intimidating to law-abiding road users - other drivers, motorcyclists, cyclists and pedestrians. Try driving at or just below the speed limit in London, and see what response you get from the speed addicts behind you. Many people don't ride a bicycle in London because "it's too dangerous" - a problem created by the speed idiots.
The people who complain are those who think it is okay for them to ignore laws they don't like. They deserve to be caught and punished, just like other criminals who think the law should not apply to them - drink-drivers, wife-beaters, litter louts and petty thieves.
- Austen, London
Yet again you get fined for being law abiding...apart from going over the speed limit of course!
We have face cameras in switzerland to prevent people saying they weren't the driver. You have to be careful though, a friend of mine got flashed for speeding in a 30 km/h zone, the front shot also showed him without a seat belt and on his phone! Big fine!
- James, Zurich, Switzerland
Wonderful waste of technology.
- Nobby Clark, London
It still won't be able to catch people in unregistered/untaxed cars, but it will be great at catching those whose paperwork is in order.
- Brian, Telford
