Albuquerque Red Light Cameras back on

From KOB-TV.com - By: Jeff Maher, KOB Eyewitness News 4; Taryn Bianchin, KOB.com - Eight out of nine city councilors voted to extend Albuquerque's expired camera contract at Monday night's council meeting. All of the cameras had been turned off for the past week because the city’s contract with Redflex, the Arizona-based company which owns the cameras, had expired. Now when the remaining 14 cameras return they won't ticket speeders, just those running red lights. Earlier this year, the state demanded the cameras at Coors and Paseo, Coors and Quail, and Paseo and Jefferson to be turned off because they were on state highways. Now the city will also terminate three more cameras at Academy and Wyoming, Eubank and Central, and Menaul and Carlisle. The reason? Safety. A study presented to councilors on Monday showed that those particular intersections have seen a drop in injury-causing accidents but an increase in rear-end crashes. City Councilor Dan Lewis opposed the contract's extension. After conducting personal research he found that for every dollar the program generated for the city cost taxpayers $11, mainly because of how much the city was paying out to Redflex. "This program over a four year period took over 26 million dollars out of our local economy and sent much of it to an out of state contractor," said Lewis. Read more

Albuquerque Red Light Cameras back on