this post was submitted on 05 Jul 2025
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i will never understand why us traffic lights go immediately from red to green. you have a whole-ass third light to use for signaling that the light is about to change, so people don't have to floor it due to an unexpected change.
Drivers in the US would start treating that middle light as go and we'd be right back to square one
You don't need to do a lot of enforcement to change that behaviour. And you can do the enforcement with red light cameras
Fuck red light cameras and fuck you for suggesting them.
In many localities voters have used initiative powers to ban red light cameras and in some jurisdictions red-light camera fines are deemed constitutional violations because the US Constitution requires those accused of crimes to be able to "confront their accuser" in court which is not possible if the accuser is a machine.
Red light and/or speed cameras are banned in many parts of the US, because courts have repeatedly ruled that they’re unconstitutional. The constitution’s sixth amendment guarantees the right to argue against your accuser in court. This was originally intended to prevent secret surprise court rulings, which the British used against Americans leading up to and during the revolution; The crown would accuse people of crimes and try them without any notice. When they obviously failed to show up to court, they were found guilty in absentia and arrested.
Regional courts have repeatedly banned the cameras, by ruling that because people can’t argue against an inanimate object, the object can’t accuse people of crimes. Basically, the constitution says you have the right to get your day in court, and some courts have interpreted that to mean the automated cameras violate that right.
That's weird. Isn't the accuser in that case the police or whoever is in charge of those cameras? The camera just provides evidence, doesn't it?
If it were a cop pulling you over and writing a ticket, sure. It would be that cop. They can show up in court and stand as a witness for you to cross-examine. But if the entire system is automated, which specific cop is the accuser?
Is the system completely automated in the US? We still have people from that department going through each picture, checking if there is indeed a violation. That person will then type out your license plate and a letter is sent to you.
If you pay, it's done. If you don't pay you will have to show up to court and make your case, while they will show up with that picture and date/time as proof.
The accuser in that case is the person that read the license plate from the picture.
That's not how it works. I had to fight a ticket from one of these once.
An invalid ticket, for the record. I was innocent and I could prove it with dash cam footage. I did not run the red light, but as usual everybody acts like accusation is the same as guilt and you know how that song and dance goes.
First, those cameras are almost never operated by the state or the police. They're run by a private company which is under some kind of contract with your state or municipality. You'll find this is why racking up tickets from red light cameras usually can't put points on your license.
Anyway, you will face your accuser in court if you challenge the ticket. That person will be some lackey from the company that owns the cameras, whose job it is to show up to court. Theoretically this person was also supposed to have reviewed the evidence related to the incident in question, and this is what lets them get around that pesky constitutional requirement you mentioned. In my state the requirement is that two pictures must be shown, a before and after, positively depicting the vehicle in question crossing into the intersection. In my case the second picture was mysteriously absent from the ticket, which of course the state still treated as "valid" until I challenged it. This despite the conspicuous empty square on the printout they mailed me where that photo was supposed to be. The twerp from the camera company tried several tactics (unsuccessfully) to weasel out of producing the second picture until the judge forced him to. To no one's surprise whatsoever, it showed my car exactly in the same spot as the first picture and my ticket was dismissed.
I still had to take a day off of work to contest it, though, and the private entity knowingly lied and attempted to slap me with a fraudulent ticket knowing full well they would never actually be punished for doing so. And they weren't.
The guy whose case was right after mine on the docket was disputing a similarly bogus ticket, which he showed me. He was a big black dude with a Harley I saw parked outside. The "damning" photo evidence printed on his ticket showed a skinny white guy in a wife beater on a crotch rocket. I have to imagine he won his case as well, but I did not stick around to find out.
So the system is indeed still bullshit, but not in the way people expect.
FTFY. The rest of your comment needs to have that context in mind, because the cameras’ legality entirely depends on where the camera in question is located.
Only nine states have outlawed red light cameras. Your "many" statement you made earlier is, in fact, just "some."
The sixth amendment challenge has been proposed several times, but very few of the actual rulings I can find contained anyone successfully using this as an argument. One for instance is The People v. Khaled in California where the camera operators were not available for cross-examination. All the state has to do is provide their witnesses and the sixth challenge goes out the window.
Insofar as red light camera schemes have been declared unconstitutional in state courts, this is most often because the scheme in question exceeded the authority granted to cities and municipalities, which tried to go over the heads of their superseding states. You can call this a win since they were indeed declared "unconstitutional," but not for the reason you specified. The US Supreme Court has also been silent on the sixth amendment argument.
So, fixed that for you.
If you have to stoop to attacking someone’s grammar in an argument, you’ve already lost. I likely won’t be replying to this comment chain again.
Edit: Lol they edited their comment. The original was only as follows:
seems like a pretty good reason for revoking a licence to me
That's because practically nobody here drives a car with a manual transmission, and the reason for those in Europe is (or originally was) to give drivers notice when they need to get back into gear.
A knock-on consequence of this is that nobody in the US knows how to drive, they just point the wheel vaguely in some direction and mash the skinny pedal. If they don't get the result they wanted, they stomp on the pedal harder. You ought to watch chucklefucks try to drive in the snow, especially those with SUVs and muscle cars with rear wheel drive. People treat the throttle as if it's the "make the car go in the direction I'm looking button" and the rest of us know that's not how it works.
surely traffic lights pre-date automatics?
It's not hard if you can see the other lights in the intersection.
but why depend on that?
No idea.
they used to have this. it did not go well.
wait, what? why not? it works for the rest of the world...