Speed cameras will catch 70,000 more speeding offenders this year – NRK Norway – Overview of news from different parts of the country
The police will lead to fewer people being killed and seriously injured.
– The speed cameras are a good supplement to the police’s mobile control activity, says director Runar Karlsen in the Police Directorate.
He is also the former chief of the Emergency Police.
April and May this year have been the deadliest months in traffic in several years. Now the authorities think of more active speed cameras may be able to slow down the number of accidents.
The speed cameras have so far only been in operation parts of the day, and least where the traffic is greatest.
In operation almost around the clock
– Now we turn the boxes on so that they are approx. 90 percent of the day. This applies to all speed cameras in the whole country, says Runar Karlsen.
The Norwegian Police Directorate has in fact adjusted the so-called “target number” for how many are to be taken by speed cameras from 180,000 in previous years to 250,000 this year.
The decision was made to the many fatalities in April and May this year. But both the police and the road administration measure the slowdown in the number of serious accidents.
Will take 70,000 more
– Probably about 70,000 more will be taken in the photo booth this year than in previous years, he says.
– Why are you doing this?
– It is a traffic safety measure to reduce speed, because speed takes life. We know that the speed cameras, both point measurements and distance measurements, affect traffic safety.
– Why not wear the boxes all the time?
– It is about the capacity, both of the Public Roads Administration, which supports equipment and delivers cases to the police, and the police’s capacity to process cases.
There are 413 speed cameras along the roads in Norway, according to the Norwegian Public Roads Administration. 273 of them conduct point measurement. The others are on roads with distance measurement that controls average speed.
Should slow down
Reducing speed is one of the goals in the new action plan for road safety that was presented in March.
The proportion of drivers who keep the speed limit will be increased from 62 per cent to 72 per cent.
The police are now strengthening the staff at the center for automatic traffic control in Molde. Among other things, they weed out emergency vehicles and cases where the images are of poor quality to be used as evidence. And they make sure that speeding offenders are fined or fined.
Ended many fatal accidents
Average measurement on selected sections is politically controversial, but also very effective.
– There were many accidents here, especially many serious ones, says Guro Ranes, department director for traffic safety at the Norwegian Public Roads Administration.
She drives on county road 170 between Bjørkelangen and Fetsund in Akershus. There was an average measurement in 2015 on part of the stretch.
In the ten years before 2015, five people lost their lives here, and many were seriously injured. Afterwards, there have been no serious accidents here. No one was killed and no one seriously injured, says Ranes.
She says that the point measurements also work in a larger area than exactly where the boxes are.
– Measurements have shown that people drive a little more carefully even three kilometers after that they have passed a speed camera. So the hope is that they will take this driving behavior with them on the rest of the road network as well, says Ranes.