A Study of the Feasibility of Using Photo-radar for Traffic Speed Enforcement in Virginia

About the report:

Because of increasing difficulties in enforcing posted speed limits on the Capital Beltway around Washington, D.C., local officials proposed that experiments be conducted with photo-radar to determine if that method of automated speed enforcement (widely used in Europe for about 30 years and very recently employed in the western United States) could help reduce average speed and speed variance. A project task force led by the Virginia Department of State Police, with assistance from the Maryland Department of State Police and the Virginia and Maryland Departments of Transportation, and with technical assistance from the Virginia Transportation Research Council, conducted site visits to cities in Europe and the United States where photo-radar is being used. The task force also invited six manufacturers of photo-radar equipment to staff and demonstrate their equipment. Five of the manufacturers conducted a 2-week series of tests on sections of interstate highways with varying volumes of traffic and different traffic characteristics. The tests, which were conducted from June through September 1990, were designed to provide the evaluators with data on the accuracy, reliability, and efficiency of each unit (in terms of the number of speeding cases that could potentially be generated by the use of photo-radar on the Beltway) and help the study team determine if photo-radar could be successfully deployed on the Capital Beltway as an enforcement tool. In addition, the project included an analysis of legal and constitutional issues associated with photo-radar use as well as an evaluation of public sentiment concerning photo-radar use on the Capital Beltway. The evaluators concluded that photo-radar use was feasible on high-speed, high-volume roads such as the Capital Beltway and, therefore, recommended efforts to pass state enabling statutes and test further the efficacy of photo-radar in actual traffic enforcement conditions.

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