Police to take photo radar dispute to the streets — literally

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This article was published 14/12/2011 (5021 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A flood of complaints about tickets issued from a photo radar unit parked near Grant Avenue and Nathaniel Street has forced the Winnipeg Police Service to demonstrate how the speed cameras work.

On Tuesday, Sgt. Doug Safioles said police want to show what they see every day — drivers pulling off a side street or proceeding when the light turns green and accelerating above the speed limit in a matter of seconds.

“We want to easily show anybody that all these cars can do it,” he said. “We can sit here and try to prove everything for the rest of our lives, but really, why would we lie?”

Hundreds of drivers claim a mobile photo radar unit stationed on a service road just west of Grant and Nathaniel has wrongly ticketed them because the unit is positioned too far from Grant. The drivers — and groups critical of photo radar — say the camera ticketed them seconds after they had turned onto Grant from Nathaniel and that they could not have been driving above the speed limit. Many say they’ll plead not guilty and argue their case in court.

Driver Eric Zipman did just that on Tuesday and got his day in court March 6 to fight a $329 ticket.

“I hope enough folks follow the same path and plead not guilty and we can have these tickets exonerated,” he said, in an email.

Safioles said police want to show how quickly someone can be speeding after turning onto Grant. “Nobody turns a corner and stares at their speedometer until they get up to speed. People don’t drive like that. They’re all up in arms saying their car can’t do that. I’m telling you that I’ve had a guy out there for two days giving laser tickets in the same location the photo radar van was parked. You can watch the cars turn the corner and get beyond the speed limit.”

Safioles said police also want to address confusion about when the camera takes a picture of a vehicle.

But police will not discuss the tickets issued by the photo radar unit as those are before the courts, he said.

The demonstration will happen today or Thursday.

The most recent flap over photo radar — the last one was more than two years ago and involved speed cameras in construction zones — comes two years before the city is to renegotiate its contract with ACS Public Sector Solutions, the company that provides the cameras.

Coun. Scott Fielding, city council’s finance chairman, has said Winnipeg should get rid of the cameras when the existing contract expires — pending the results of a full cost-benefit analysis of the photo-enforcement program — and use police officers to do enforcement.

The camera program will have been on city streets 10 years by 2013.

Fielding said it makes sense for police to demonstrate how the camera works to ease public concerns.

But driver Helen Deegan said there’s little police can do to quell public anger.

Deegan, 80, said she got a $218 ticket for going 63 km/h in a 50 km/h zone after the camera tagged her near Grant Park High School.

“I’m not a drag racer,” she said. “If they want drag racers they should go to the streets of Lindenwoods. I just feel I’m being picked on. They’ve got a little spot there and they’re picking on people.”

bruce.owen@freepress.mb.ca