The trial of this new camera technology would’ve resulted in around 2,000 driver licenses being lost
The Western Australian government has announced that six cutting edge, mobile point to point safety cameras will be deployed across WA as part of the state government’s ongoing efforts to reduce the number of deaths and serious injuries on our roads.
WA police minister Paul Papalia says the cameras would be set-up in pairs across a range of locations to calculate if the average speed of a driver between two points exceeds the limit.
The WA government says the results from a six-month trial of six safety cameras are compelling. The cameras were paired at three locations and monitored a total of eight million vehicles in 94 locations across WA. There were around 42,000 drivers that were detected committing an average speeding offence.
The cameras can also detect mobile phone use and seatbelt offences. The trial resulted in 66,000 drivers being detected on their phones by the devices during the six-month trial, compared with 4,909 drivers across the entire state in 2021.
Almost 10,000 of those drivers caught using a mobile phone were repeat offenders.
No actual infringement notices were issued during the trial. If they had been, then a total of 120,000 demerit points would have been issued to errant drivers.
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In WA, the government says 100 per cent of the money generated by automated traffic enforcement fines is placed into the Road Trauma Trust Account, which is then spent on initiatives and resources to increase road safety, like the six new cameras.
“The results from the safety camera trials speak for themselves and are very concerning,” WA police minister Paul Papalia says.
“What they show us is that we need these high-tech eyes on our roads to discourage the tens of thousands of repeat offenders who are putting themselves and others at risk of serious injury or death.
“The worst recidivist driver during the trial was caught so many times they would have been issued 80 demerit points. Around 2,000 driver licences would have been lost in total.
“Our Western Australian Police Force does a fantastic job keeping the community safe. This is just another tool which the state government hopes will continue to save lives and change driver attitudes.”