Attention, Puyallup drivers: Heed two magic words, and you can avoid being $124 poorer.
Wait for it . . . (insert drum roll here) . . . “Photo enforced.”
Those words are on signs at three Puyallup intersections where cameras have been snapping photos of red-light runners’ license plates since March 1. Tickets are then mailed to the vehicles’ registered owners.
But after a two-month trial period during which only warning tickets were sent to violators, drivers still don’t seem to be getting the hang of photo enforcement. In May, 2,165 real tickets were sent out. That’s almost as many warning tickets as were sent back in March when the cameras were a novelty (2,328).
Puyallup clearly has a red-light-running problem if so many people are plowing through busy intersections months after photo enforcement went into effect. (The cameras are at 39th Avenue and Ninth Street Southwest, 31st Avenue Southeast and South Meridian, and River Road and North Meridian.)
Cities like Puyallup, Tacoma, Lakewood and Auburn don’t install red-light cameras to make a pile of money. They install them because so many people run red lights, causing often lethal T-bone collisions. The money collected from tickets pays the cost charged by the company that runs the cameras and sends out the tickets, as well as court costs when people contest their tickets.
Remaining revenues go into cities’ general funds, where they help pay for services that include policing. Those revenues have been declining for most cities due to voter-approved tax limits. Using red-light cameras gives cities a way to police problem intersections and free up officers for other duties.
In theory, the number of tickets declines quite a bit after drivers get used to having cameras at the intersections. A drop in the number of tickets is a sign of success, a sign that fewer people are putting their fellow drivers in danger.
That hasn’t happened yet in Puyallup. The red-light camera program there can’t be considered a success until it starts convincing drivers to heed those “Photo enforced” signs.
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