Posted 8/29/2006 05:36:00 PM by Douglas

Big Brother, welcome to Houston.

Cameras will begin snapping photos of red-light violations at 10 city intersections Friday, and violators can expect $75 fines.

The city plans to install cameras at 40 more of Houston's most dangerous intersections, 10 at a time. The owners of cars caught running red lights will be mailed civil citations with the $75 penalty.

Police officers still can write red-light tickets, too. Those are misdemeanor criminal violations carrying a maximum fine of $200.

So what's the difference? The cameras aren't "criminal" so the civil penalty is only $75. So why the distinction? Could it be that the cameras are just the wee-bit illegal? Well, it is if the Texas Legislature has their say:

A bill that would prohibit Houston and other cities from using cameras to nab red-light runners was approved by a House committee Tuesday — the second of Mayor Bill White's traffic initiatives to get jammed up in Austin.

A Senate committee voted last week to ban the city's Safe Clear mandatory towing ordinance, and a full Senate vote is scheduled for later this week.

The House committee voted 4-2 Tuesday to send the red-light camera bill to the full House, where it is likely to pass.

I drive through one of these 10 intersections every day, and I saw the cameras going up today. They're eerie, and I'm going to try to get some pictures of it, when I get time, but the short answer to this long story is that Chief Hurtt is full of shit. It's not about safety, it's about revenue.

Many communities around the country are using cameras to try to stop drivers from running red lights. It's a safety issue, yes, but drivers like Irving are say it's really about making money for local governments.

Why this light in Bethesda was three seconds might have a million dollar answer. Literally. This one traffic camera earned the county $1 million in fines over 14 months.

"It shocked me," he says. "And the only explanation for it is that light is a trick. And law enforcement shouldn't be a trick."

Lon Anderson of the Triple A's mid Atlantic office complains too many traffic cams today are money scams for the cities that put them up.

Washington D.C. collected big on an odd double yellow light that turns red when it's not even at an intersection. In Baltimore, Anderson says, you can get a red light ticket by missing the light by one tenth of a second.

These systems can work, but why can't they work without tricking them? Why can't they work without gimmicks?

Because it's all about the money. My secret wish: The City of Houston spends millions of dollars installing all 50 of these cash-cow cameras and then the Texas Legislature tells them they're illegal, thus making the Houston tax-payer eat the cost. Since I don't pay taxes in Houston, I think it's the one and only perfect solution to this encroachment of totalitarianism on Space City.