Traffic calming designs and devices should be preferred over speed cameras.

Narrow streets, chicanes, pedestrian zone height transitions, narrowing the street at pedestrian crossings, etc.

This is more “fix the symptom instead of the problem” though I do agree that we need better pedestrian infrastructure.

I know what they are, that doesn’t change my point.

You know that you can drive a car you don’t own right? And not every person who is ticketed is driving like an asshole. I got a 100 dollar ticket for driving 57 in what was normally a 50 km zone, but there was brand new signage up that I had literally 4 seconds to read (I went back and timed it) that gave: months of the year, days of the week, and hours of the day that the new 40 km/h speed limit was enforced. But because I can’t read at the speed of light while driving down the road, bam, ticket.

How about instead of speed cameras you change your road designs? People won’t speed if they cannot speed safely.

Make your roads less wide. Add some curves, depending on required max speed, you make the curves larger or smaller. On lower speed roads, add obstacles to drive around.

There are many forms of traffic management that don’t require speeding cameras but then again, speeding cameras are for making the government money, not for traffic safety

Then you tick the court date box and mail it back to them. Then two or three years later, you get a court date, so you dust off your form letter charter 11b challenge, send it off to all relevant parties, head down to the Winchester and wait for all of this to blow over.

My point is that does nothing to serve the stated goal of increasing safe driving.

Depends on how often the camera needs to be repaired/replaced and where the money goes for the tickets it writes.

Cops need to start ticketing:

• people changing lanes without indication
• people turning without indication
• people driving in the inside lane when they’re not passing
• people who take more than 2 seconds to react to a light change
• People following bumper-to-bumper forming left-turn trains through yellow/red lights
• People who take more than a few seconds to get back up to speed

And also:

• Pedestrians who stand on the edge of the curb at the corner waiting for the light to change so they can cross
• Pedestrians standing literally on the edge of the road at the corner waiting for the light to change so they can cross

You want to ticket pedestrians for standing on the edge of the curb, waiting for the light? Like, on the sidewalk, just really close to the road?

Speeding is an inherently human problem, you cannot solve the human, you can only trick the human into solving the problem for you, i.e. scaring them and making speeding actively risky for their own car.

Ultimately, on top of traffic calming, we need way better public transit and making driver’s licences harder to acquire with longer, more rigorous training. That way, driving is not an obligation and those who don’t want to drive or should not be driving do not have to drive. Not everyone was meant to drive.

Nobody drives 90 in Ottawa. Especially not on the 417.

Oh they have speed cameras on the 417?

No, and they really don’t need them. Ottawans merge somewhere between 60 and 80, and drive more slowly in general. In most Ontario cities, driving at 100 in the left lane will get you run over. In Ottawa, you will be passing everyone.

We’re talking about speed cameras, that’s my point, why the hell would you assume I was talking about the 417.

Ever driven on walkley road?

Maybe take it down about 20 percent there, friend. You commented that Ottawa drivers speed up to 90 between speed cameras. I replied, a bit tongue in cheek, that Ottawa drivers don’t drive 90, not even on the 417, where they’re supposed to. Ottawa is the only city I have driven in where significant numbers of people drive at or below the speed limit, even when traffic would permit them to go faster, and that was the case even before the speed cameras. That generally forces everyone else to be honest enough, but I concur, Ottawans definitely hammer the brakes down even harder right before a speed camera. Or while merging on the 417.

Maybe take it down about 20 percent there, friend. You commented that Ottawa drivers speed up to 90 between speed cameras. I replied, a bit tongue in cheek, that Ottawa drivers don’t drive 90, not even on the 417, where they’re supposed to. Ottawa is the only city I have driven in where significant numbers of people drive at or below the speed limit, even when traffic would permit them to go faster, and that was the case even before the speed cameras. That generally forces everyone else to be honest enough, but I concur, Ottawans definitely hammer the brakes down even harder right before a speed camera. Or while merging on the 417.