I wanna camera here.
I don't read the Washington Times but thank goodness other people do. Apparently there was an article about speed and red light cameras being racist. This idea being based on the idea that the cameras are in black neighborhoods and thus hurt black drivers. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.For one. If you live in a neighborhood with the cameras, you know where they are and adjust accordingly. People do slow down in that stretch near the bridge just before the Fed Ex building, and after they pass it...people speed up. The cameras are there to capture the forgetful (as in you forgot the camera was there), the people who don't live here, and speeders.
Second, attend a neighborhood meeting and you will find black people who want cameras. Okay, not so much speed cameras but cameras to get the drug dealers moving. I'll bet you money if you told the folks at a BACA meeting that BACA (the northern 1/2 of Truxton Circle) was getting one camera and asked where they wanted it, we'd be fighting over which corner. If anyone asks, I vote for a camera NJ and R or the Florida Avenue park. People at R and NJ don't seem to believe that red light means stay stopped. Instead it means if you don't see any traffic, and pedestrians aren't traffic, go anyway.
Third, as someone pointed it out, this city has a 60% black population. But also I have to note that if you are driving in from PG County, another majority Black area, you have to drive through more of the city and thus you're going to hit more traffic cameras than someone driving from majority white Virginia. What of MoCo? Connecticut Ave has more traffic lights and traffic and pedestrians than say the NE stretches of New York Ave. So just by geography alone, you're more apt to get a ticket.
If you take away cameras please replace them with citizen ticketing, where DC residents have the right to fine and ticket traffic violators. There a couple red light runners I have in mind.
posted by Mari @ 9.6.06
2 Comments:
I agree with the previous post. We used to live up on Connecticut Ave and drivers there did not seem nearly as aggressive as in Truxton Circle when it comes to running red lights or speeding. But I don't think it has anything to do with race, but rather with the appearance of the neighborhood. Based purely on anecdotal evidence, my sense is that people (white, black, etc) feel that it is OK to disregard traffic rules in neighborhoods that have boarded up buildings, litter-strewn streets, industrial sites, loitering, etc. The general sense of neglect fosters an "anything goes" atmosphere (in keeping with the "broken window" theory). The answer, in my view: tougher enforcement and constant progress in making the neighborhood more livable and beautiful. And by the way, the cameras are not targeted at any particular race, but only at people who feel that they are too important to live by the same rules as everybody else.
This is right up there with that person that said drug dealers do their thing because its the only way their families can pay the taxes caused by white gentrification.
The reason there are more speed cameras in black neighborhoods (SE & NE) is because these areas are fortunate enough to have the best roadways in/out of the city. SW really only has ramps, while NW is a nightmare. A big place to speed in our hood is 395 S, which starts in NW & has a camera!
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