Keeping them on our radar

This fall, 36 new photo radar devices will be deployed, adding to the 15 units already installed in 2009. It’s a sensible initiative since photo radar and red-light cameras, combined with other measures, have helped improve road safety in the province. You be the judge: The number of fatalities has dropped from 488 in 2010 to 336 in 2014, and the number of serious injuries in the same period has dropped from 2,293 to 1,573. Let’s fervently hope that these figures continue to decrease. New radar devices should help accomplish this.

Let’s also acknowledge that the Quebec government has managed the initial implementation effectively and transparently. Surveillance devices were set up based on precise site-selection criteria and alerts to their presence are clearly visible – speed traps they are not.

It seems fair to conclude, therefore, that the devices are effective and generally accepted by the driving public. That being said, one important aspect of the surveillance program has slipped beneath the radar – namely, the resultant fines that have been accumulated in the Highway Safety Fund since 2009. By the way, are you even aware of such fund? It was set up to finance and maintain the devices as well as to fund programs for improving road safety and providing help for roadaccident victims. The problem is that the money collected has never been used. Political and bureaucratic red tape has only managed to freeze the millions of dollars accumulated.

So now, six years after the advent of photo radar, and three following the aid program’s development, financial assistance for road-accident victims or road-safety initiatives has still not seen the light of day. Will the wait simply be prolonged as surveillance devices continue to proliferate? With a total of 170 potential surveillance sites available – given the mobility of some devices – you don’t need a crystal ball to predict that the Highway Safety Fund will grow even larger.

Isn’t it now time for the community at large to avail itself of the Fund? The aid program is an integral part of the photo-radar project. The government should implement it soon so that the adoption of surveillance technology makes good sense at every level. Only in such a context will the installations, both current and new, best serve the overall mission. I hope you’ll agree with me when I say that the effectiveness and social acceptance of such crucial issues as road safety and publicfund management must not be neglected.

In a nutshell, let’s keep the use of the Fund on our radar. ■

For more information, visit objectifsecurite.gouv.qc.ca.

Richard Lachance

President and CEO