Chicago Photo Enforced Intersections – Sense or Cents?
It’s nearly ubiquitous in Chicago, sprouting up like an untended weed on the city’s streetscape. Typically placed just shy of an intersection, it whispers to drivers that some mighty bit of technology is positioned here ostensibly to protect the real Chicago denizen, to snap multiple photographs should they delve into or through marked intersections after the light has shifted from green.
But amid balky drivers becoming ever more reticent to conduct their vehicles seamlessly, wondering if this stale green light is going to turn just as they come to the intersection or if this intersection even proffers this mad bit of technology at all, I wonder if photo enforced intersections promote safety or just the opposite.
Don’t mistake me, mind you. I am just as disturbed as the next law abiding citizen with an insured vehicle when I spot a poorly driven car that disregards a stop sign or a red light or careens down Lake Shore Drive like he’s participating in a toxic video game where poor driving has no consequence other than lost points or tinny computer-generated sounds.
But tell me how a left hand turn at Nagle and Devon just as the light turns yellow merits a ticket from a cousin of R2D2.
I was and still am of a mind that a yellow light is the harbinger of the upcoming red and that the yellow is a warning without being a ticketable offense. The photo enforced lights seem to disagree, dealing from the bottom of the deck and categorizing a yellow the same as a red.
So as I drove to my current location, my open house touting a Logan Square condo for sale with The Real Estate Lounge Chicago, I came to the photo enforced intersection in Edgewater at Ridge and Clark. I pass this intersection multiple times per week as I go to and from my showings of Chicago real estate listings and know that it has a box pointed to snare drivers.
So I became what I am not – fickle. I started tickling the brake and tensing my shoulders as I came closer and closer, not knowing if it would be essential to slam on my brakes (something I have done) or ease into the intersection as the green gently but entirely shifts to yellow (as I have done). In this instance the light lingered green, making me safe (unless, imagine, that the technology is flawed).
Bottom line is this, my driving slate is clean and I have never cruised through a red light, not in Chicago nor in my varied and wide travels.
And yet I have been the recipient in the mail from the Chicago Department of Revenue of a ticket showing me in an intersection beneath a yellow light. And as a result my flowing and safe driving method becomes a bit tense and mechanical due to the photo enforced system.
Now if the true goal of tinkering with the lights was to make the streets safe for my Chicago neighbors what we might want to do is implement a system like exists in downstate Galesburg. There the lights are on a staggered delay where each of the four streets at a light have a red light for 4 seconds at every transition. What it does is clear the intersection and significantly reduces the chance of a straggler creating a crash.
Without being too cynical I think the point of Chicago’s photo enforced intersections has more to do with revenue than anything else. So I won’t hold my breath for the 4-second delay system and will keep riding the brake even though I am coming up to a green light.
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