Red Light Cameras Pros And Cons

Red light cameras are becoming a more common sight in the last decade. The debate on whether these cameras are improving the safety of drivers or just causing another financial burden to the states is still as strong as ever. These red light cameras are saving lives and not imposing unnecessary costs on states, but instead the cameras are saving states millions of dollars each year.
In 2007 it was recorded that each year 751 people die in crashes due to someone running a red light, which comes to 63 people each month. Not only the shockingly high number of deaths due to running a red light, the financial cost of red-light running crashes was $378 million. But due to the increase of red light cameras in 2011, there was 201 fewer red-light running
In 2012 there was a $27 billion reduction in costs because of the 8,445 fewer traffic fatalities. As well as, $559 million saved from the expenses of the 178 lives that were saved from the previous 2011 death count. In 2009, the Federal Highway Administration calculated the cost of a single motor vehicle fatality to be $6 million, and private insurance only pays 50 percent of the cost ("Fact Sheets," 2016). Not only in the United States are red-light fatalities decreasing, so are they in Australia which has reported having reduced casualty crashes by 25 to 30 percent from 2005 to 2009. In Austria, the amount of drivers that crossing through a red light has decreased by 4,500 since the same time in 2012. Canada has had a 15 percent drop in injury and fatality rates and 22 percent drop in severe collisions. England, Israel, and Scotland have also all reported a drop of over 15 percent each in their fatal accidents since installing red-light cameras ("Fact Sheets,"
Although, in a Tennessee city, six red light cameras were placed and collected data for 6 years from 2005 to 2011. During the 6 year period, three extra cameras were also placed and included in the study, Testerman was able to collect the data that showed 587 rear-end crashes and 125 right-angle crashes (2013). After reviewing the data he noticed that after the first 2 year period of increased rear-end collisions, that the rate of rear-end collisions actually decreased. The result shows that the cameras reduced injury crashes by 25 to 30 percent (Testerman, 2013).
Red light cameras will always be a contradictory topic due to the facts it does discourage drivers from speeding through a red light, but also causes more drivers to act quickly and thus increasing the possibility of being rear-ended. As researched and concluded by Alena Erke, “most studies find a decrease in the overall number of crashes. The largest decrease is found for right-angle collisions, which are the target crashes of RLCs” (Erke