Am I the only one who finds the arguments around photo radar, especially online, to be rather amusing? There's no "in-between" on it. Those who comment are either staunchly for it or staunchly opposed. Not that there's anything wrong with either side. Debate is never a bad thing. But I do enjoy poking the bear. So here we go again.
I have no issue with photo radar whatsoever. Fact is, I've received four little envelopes in my life. Three were in Lethbridge and one was in Medicine Hat. I remember exactly where I got the tickets, the circumstances behind getting the tickets and how fast I was actually going. I paid the tickets and went about my jolly little way. I did the crime so I had to pay the dime.
Here's a harsh reality that some people simply don't want to grasp: without that photo radar revenue, everyone's taxes would be going up. You want to complain that it's a cash cow with $XX-million generated? Without that money, the local police service will be asking your town/city council for that money somewhere else. It's almost as if some people believe that police are padding their own wallets with the extra cash they're collecting from your law-breaking ways. Yes. You were caught breaking the law and you don't like it. Call it a "cash cow" or a "stupidity tax" or whatever you'd like. We could argue until the cows come home about other ways of taxation. But as long as you keep speeding, those little cameras will keep snapping photos of your license plate.
It's almost as if some people believe it's their right to speed. They don't want to pony up unless they have an officer pulling them over. To me, this seems ludicrous. Is this not like being upset that you were caught by a security camera stealing a piece of candy and not by a security guard? I completely agree with the notion that if you don't want a photo radar ticket, then don't speed.
Another argument I've already seen on Facebook is that photo radar was supposed to be a deterrant to speeding and it was supposed to help curb the number of crashes happening in high-impact locations. To that I won't disagree. It WAS supposed to do those things. But it doesn't anymore. Why? Multiple reasons, ranging from wilfully ignorant to being too much in a rush to the speed limits being too slow. So drivers continue to speed. And they continue to get into crashes. The old saying kind of goes here: people are dumb.
Now here's where things get fun. Let me play devil's advocate for a second. Should police cease the use of photo radar and other devices simply because people don't seem to want to pay attention to them? The argument seems to go "well if it's not stopping speeding or crashes then it's completely useless". But why would police stop that revenue from coming in (which, remember, is helping to pay for things that would otherwise have to be covered through even more property taxes)? I know you don't like that answer. But it's a reality.
There could be a happy ending in all of this. If you truly want to see the end of photo radar as we know it, then STOP SPEEDING. If the police noticed that they weren't sending out your happy picture in the mail anymore, they wouldn't feel the need to keep the van on the side of the road capturing said picture. Novel idea, don't you think?
