These cameras can be mounted beside or over a road or installed in a vehicle
As I drove upcountry over the festive season, I noticed that taxi drivers are more disciplined on the highway than in the past. They drove slower, hooted less, used less light and hand signals to warn about traffic enforcement points, and appeared more relaxed. I suspect the statics will show fewer taxis were involved in accidents. Buses remain a menace of course. But it got me thinking. Why the change in behavior of taxi drivers? Simple; the speed gun.
The traffic police now have speed guns that indicate the speed at which a vehicle is moving and errant drivers are instantaneously ticketed. There is a spot near Lugazi that is now nicknamed “kitega” or “where they (police) wait” and vehicles typically do 20kph in this 50kph section!
The speed gun is handheld and pointed at the approaching vehicle. Typically, it uses radar technology to measure the speed of moving vehicle by detecting the change in frequency of the returned radar signal due to what is called the doppler effect; the change in frequency of a wave for an observer moving relative to the source of the wave. It is commonly heard when a vehicle sounding a siren or horn approaches, passes, and recedes from an observer. The received frequency is higher (compared to the emitted frequency) during the approach, it is identical at the instant of passing by, and it is lower during the recession.
The effectiveness of the speed gun on speeding taxi drivers got me thinking. I suspect that the police does not have the manpower to deploy officers with handheld speed guns 24/7. So why doesn’t it use installed traffic enforcement cameras instead?
Reading up on the internet about these devices, also called red light camera, road safety camera, road rule camera, photo radar, photo enforcement, speed camera, Gatso, throws up interesting possibilities.
These cameras can be mounted beside or over a road or installed in an enforcement vehicle to detect traffic regulation violations, including speeding or vehicles going through a red traffic light.
The Wikipedia site says: “The concept of the speed camera can be dated back to at least 1905; Popular Mechanics reports on a patent for a “Time Recording Camera for Trapping Motorists” that enabled the operator to take time-stamped images of a vehicle moving across the start and endpoints of a measured section of road. The timestamps enabled the speed to be calculated, and the photo enabled identification of the driver.[56]
The Dutch company Gatsometer BV, which was founded in 1958 by rally driver Maurice Gatsonides, produced the ‘Gatsometer’. Gatsonides wished to better monitor his average speed on a race track and invented the device in order to improve his lap times. The company later started supplying these devices as police speed enforcement tools. The first systems introduced in the late 1960s used film cameras to take their pictures. Gatsometer introduced the first red light camera in 1965, the first radar for use with road traffic in 1971 and the first mobile speed traffic camera in 1982.
From the late 1990s, digital cameras began to be introduced. Digital cameras can be fitted with a network connection to transfer images to a central processing location automatically, so they have advantages over film cameras in speed of issuing fines, maintenance and operational monitoring.”
The only challenge I envisage is the inability of our traffic to retrieve in timely fashion, any vehicle record for violation, following them up and punishing them. Otherwise, the camera will catch them. And if we catch, a few, the discipline on the road will be assured. Think about it Lit. Gen. Kale Kayihura.
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