UF-Designed System To Help Cities Gauge Red-light Running Problem

January 18, 2001

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — University of Florida engineering researchers have developed an inexpensive system to count red-light runners at intersections, a step that comes as advocates of red-light camera ticketing systems pursue laws making them legal in Florida.

The system developed by civil engineering Professors Ken Courage and Scott Washburn, with engineering graduate student Shaun MacKenzie, uses a video camera and computer software to automatically count red-light runners at intersections. The goal is to give cities an inexpensive way to identify intersections with lots of violators. That data would help them place expensive cameras and electronics that automatically photograph red-light runners for tickets — investments of at least $50,000 each.

“The issue for cities is that the automated enforcement equipment is very expensive, so they don’t want to invest in it at intersections where there is not a significant problem,” Washburn said. “The premise behind this project is to find a reasonably low-cost way to identify the worst intersections.”

Florida law does not yet permit red-light cameras, but that could change in the legislative session beginning in March. H.B. 0071, sponsored by Irving Slosberg, D-Boca Raton, seeks to allow the cameras in Palm Beach and Broward counties as part of a test project.

“A lot of communities don’t have the resources to have the police sit at a red light and wait to ticket violators,” said Slosberg, whose daughter, Dori Slosberg, was killed by a reckless driver in 1996 at age 14. “I think we should just take some small steps to see if these automatic cameras could improve the situation.”

Red-light running is a serious and often deadly moving violation. Nationally, red-light runners are responsible for an estimated 260,000 crashes and about 850 deaths each year, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Statewide, there were 9,348 crashes involving red-light running in Florida and 127 fatalities in 1999, according to the Community Traffic Safety Team Florida Coalition, a statewide traffic safety group.

Several states already use camera systems, including California, Colorado and Maryland. But Florida does not currently have a law allowing traffic citations to be issued based on photos, said Elizabeth Sheetz, regional coordinator for the Community Traffic Safety Team Florida Coalition’s Bartow office. Slosberg’s bill would change that, at least for two counties, she said.

Current methods for counting red-light runners at intersections are tedious, labor intensive and costly, Washburn said. One common technique is to post someone at an intersection to watch for red-light runners, but this can often lead to mistakes, he said. Another method is to videotape an intersection and then pick out red-light runners by watching the videotape. “To process one hour of tape could take five or six hours, so the personnel costs get expensive,” he said.

The UF system, being field tested at a busy Gainesville intersection, automates the process. A video camera on a light pole films an image of the entire intersection at University Avenue and 34th Street. An electronic device connected to the signal controller cabinet, meanwhile, monitors the status of the lights and encodes different audio tones on the videotape for traffic movements. Both the image and the tones are converted into digital codes and processed by the computer software. The result is an automated and running count of red-light runners in different directions of traffic.

Although the system still is being tested, one surprising result so far is the number of red-light runners captured by the system, Washburn said. In one two-hour period after the lunch rush hour, for example, the system recorded 24 violators in just two of the four approaches to the intersection.

“Red-light running is a bigger problem than most people realize,” Washburn said.

The UF research is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Transportation through the Southeastern Transportation Center.