The ongoing pissing match between pro- and anti-red-light camera factions has a battleground in cyberspace. Wrongonred.com, a site set up by anti-camera advocate Matt Hay, advocates against the cameras, which is now getting some online competition from an anonymous group that has established Wrongonred.org, which, as you might guess, supports red-light-camera use.
Who is responsible for the copycat site is unclear. Our sister blog at the Riverfront Times reports that the site is registered anonymously. But the original Wrong On Red crew took a screen shot (pasted after the jump) apparently showing that American Traffic Solutions, a large producer of red-light cameras, linked to the new site on its Facebook page with a shot -- "Matt Hay and his
band of merrymen who believe lawbreakers are the victims would love
for you to go there!!!" -- at Hay and his supporters. This debate is quickly going from ugly to nasty.
The .org site isn't much, just three videos of people running
red lights, including a video of an Excelsior Springs crash that Plog
posted last month. It also has a banner rotating mostly unsourced stats and figures
about red-light running and fatalities.
Hay told RFT that if a snarky Facebook post wasn't enough, further evidence suggesting ATS is behind the mock site is that the videos are all from
cities that have deals with ATS to operate cameras.
Of course, using videos of cars running red lights and
crashing seems like a very odd strategy for promoting their use. It's
almost anti-propaganda. Don't these videos simply show that even at
intersections with the cameras, drivers will still run red lights? If
the pro-camera stance is that red-light cameras prevent crashes,
wouldn't it be more effective to show drivers stopping at
camera-enforced red lights? Just saying.
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"red light camera paintball" is a fun. why dont they use that red light cam tech to turn the light green when the motorist is alone at an empty intersection
"red light camera paintball" why cant it just turn the light green? why must i sit there with no one around ? "red light camera paintbal is fun"
"red light camera paintball" try it today
"red light camera paintball" is fun !!!! make the camera see a motorist alone at an intersection and turn the light green instead of a ticket. "red light camera paintball"
See the RFT updated story. ATS now admits it is their page and has a link from their Facebook page to the RFT article stating that they have "nothing to hide": http://www.facebook.com/ATSolu... Perhaps they could explain if that is the case, why the anonymous registration and nary a mention anywhere on the site?
Ben, THANK YOU for this article, but for that last paragraph especially.
if Red Light Cameras worked as advertised and actually caused people to stop running red lights, the companies would go out of business. instead they're able to spend huge amounts of money trying to scare people into paying them to videotape car crashes...
Charles Territo, Communications VP at American Traffic Solutions took credit for the faux site. They finally got back to the RFT, though they had no explanation why they paid extra for anonymous hosting. Probably the same reason that they removed the screen shot you have above from their Facebook site. There was an update to the RFT story with ATS's response. Something Jack Nicholson-esque "You're God Damn Right I ordered a Code Red!" (on WrongOnRed.com)
Hard to take serious a former elected official, matt hay, who was fired by the voters of arnold for his extreme views!
For more information, please visit www.wrongonred.org
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