BC: Photo Radar... Only After The High-Risk Driver, Right? 

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Honourable Jackie Pement, addressing the Legislature of British Columbia, May 17, 1995, Hansard p. 14359
"Our strategy targets high-risk and bad drivers."

Honourable Jackie Pement, addressing the Legislature of British Columbia, June 8, 1995, Hansard p. 15269
"We will be focusing on the worst offenders."
"Our success won't be measured by how many motorists are ticketed for speeding but by how few."

Honourable Jackie Pement, addressing the Legislature of British Columbia, June 13, 1995, Hansard p. 15453
"You're looking at bringing the high-risk driver down to reasonable speeds..."

Province of British Columbia, Motor Vehicle Branch, "Request for Proposal: Speed Management Project", p. B16:
"A number of stakeholders... will be significantly impacted by the additional 1.6 million notices/violation tickets expected in the first year of operation."

This clearly says that they expect 1,600,000 tickets.

Some other facts:

British Columbia has a population of about 2,400,000 drivers, close to that of Victoria, Australia.

In British Columbia, about 400,000 conventional speeding tickets are issued annually by police officers.

In Victoria, Australia, conventional speeding tickets declined by only about 15% after the introduction of photo radar.

Victoria, Australia, recidivism rates (i.e. the distribution of tickets among the population) indicate that 80 to 87% of all photo radar tickets issued go to drivers who receive only one ticket in the year. 11 to 16% get two tickets, 2 to 3% get three tickets, and less than 1% get more than four tickets annually.

Using the above information, SENSE predicts that if only 600,000 photo radar tickets are issued annually, one-in-three drivers in BC will get at least one speeding ticket annually!

Is this really targeting only the high-risk driver, the worst-of-the-worst?

Speed Management Project, Internal Information Package. Summer 1995, p. 1:
"The initial focus will be on the worst offenders."

Initial, eh? Can't wait for later.

Honourable Jackie Pement, addressing the Legislature of British Columbia, July 11, 1995, Hansard p. 16827.
"...we have said right from the start that there would be an increase in fines with photo radar..."

Rev: 1998.09.29