Red light hookers
Martin Doyle
WATCHING how Aucklanders organise themselves is like a vision of Hell.
Only they could invite 200,000 people to Party Central and then provide room for only 12,000. Their ferries couldn’t dock, buses were invisible, and sauna-like trains were running hours late. And to add to the chaos, JAFAs kept pulling the Emergency cords.
Still, quite a lot of people did get to Eden Park and many even saw the game, so that was at least something worth celebrating for Auckland. It has to be said that, even normally, the whole Auckland traffic system is like a vat of killer worms in a P Lab. The road-raging motorists there drive like escaped lunatics pursued by posses of money-grubbing Council traffic enforcers. Personally, I have no problem with it because (let’s face it) it’s a free world and, praise be, we in Wellington are protected from all that by 639 valuable kilometres of State Highway One.
So little lights started flashing when it was announced recently that Wellington was planning to adopt a traffic-control tactic that has been guinea-pigged in Auckland... Up there, when they’re not boy-racing or giving each other one-fingered salutes [or is that just the MPs?], we’re told they’ve had a big problem with people screaming through intersections when the lights are red and crashing into other vehicles. Consequently, they brought in red light cameras at crossroads all round inner Auckland. If you run a red light, you get photographed and fined heavily. These cams have helped lower the incidence of ‘running the lights’ and [cue sound effect of massive avalanche of coins from a gambling machine] the local Council endlessly scores one helluva lot of money from the fines issued.
From my observation, Wellington has an almost non-existent problem with ‘running the lights’. Our main problems are people getting run over by buses downtown and roving packs of Parking Wardens ticketing shoppers. But a crisis of running red lights? Hardly. Our traffic moves at the speed of a funeral cortege at the best of times. No, these red light cams are for money. They’re cash registers on poles. Bringing in red light cameras effectively will turn Wellington into a giant red-light district: the scantily-clad road-safety goal is just being used, like a young streetwalker, as a means to hook in extra dough for her pimp, the Council.
Many US States of similar size to New Zealand (eg Arkansas, Mississippi, Utah), and another twice our size (New Jersey) have wisely banned their use. Some operators round the world have found a good lark is to shorten, or even just vary, the duration of the ‘orange’ light and you’ll nab no end of poor, unsuspecting suckers (and their money).
And rather than bringing calm and predictability to intersections, the constant fear of getting $150 fines will foster paranoia behind the wheel and knee-jerk slamming-on of brakes whenever you see an orange light.
Grrrr...!!! May this blinking stupid idea never see the light of day.
Only they could invite 200,000 people to Party Central and then provide room for only 12,000. Their ferries couldn’t dock, buses were invisible, and sauna-like trains were running hours late. And to add to the chaos, JAFAs kept pulling the Emergency cords.
Still, quite a lot of people did get to Eden Park and many even saw the game, so that was at least something worth celebrating for Auckland. It has to be said that, even normally, the whole Auckland traffic system is like a vat of killer worms in a P Lab. The road-raging motorists there drive like escaped lunatics pursued by posses of money-grubbing Council traffic enforcers. Personally, I have no problem with it because (let’s face it) it’s a free world and, praise be, we in Wellington are protected from all that by 639 valuable kilometres of State Highway One.
So little lights started flashing when it was announced recently that Wellington was planning to adopt a traffic-control tactic that has been guinea-pigged in Auckland... Up there, when they’re not boy-racing or giving each other one-fingered salutes [or is that just the MPs?], we’re told they’ve had a big problem with people screaming through intersections when the lights are red and crashing into other vehicles. Consequently, they brought in red light cameras at crossroads all round inner Auckland. If you run a red light, you get photographed and fined heavily. These cams have helped lower the incidence of ‘running the lights’ and [cue sound effect of massive avalanche of coins from a gambling machine] the local Council endlessly scores one helluva lot of money from the fines issued.
From my observation, Wellington has an almost non-existent problem with ‘running the lights’. Our main problems are people getting run over by buses downtown and roving packs of Parking Wardens ticketing shoppers. But a crisis of running red lights? Hardly. Our traffic moves at the speed of a funeral cortege at the best of times. No, these red light cams are for money. They’re cash registers on poles. Bringing in red light cameras effectively will turn Wellington into a giant red-light district: the scantily-clad road-safety goal is just being used, like a young streetwalker, as a means to hook in extra dough for her pimp, the Council.
Many US States of similar size to New Zealand (eg Arkansas, Mississippi, Utah), and another twice our size (New Jersey) have wisely banned their use. Some operators round the world have found a good lark is to shorten, or even just vary, the duration of the ‘orange’ light and you’ll nab no end of poor, unsuspecting suckers (and their money).
And rather than bringing calm and predictability to intersections, the constant fear of getting $150 fines will foster paranoia behind the wheel and knee-jerk slamming-on of brakes whenever you see an orange light.
Grrrr...!!! May this blinking stupid idea never see the light of day.
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