JOSEPH GERTH

Louisville police: It's too unsafe to stop drivers who run red lights

Courier Journal

What is it with people who are in such a hurry they can't be bothered to stop at red lights?

I've had it with you.

So has Laurie Wolberton.

She had just picked up her car at Heustis Service Center in Crescent Hill last February, paid $686 to replace a starter or something on her Honda CR-V and was headed home by way of Cannons Lane.

WHAM!

Just as she passed Holy Spirit Catholic Church and headed through the intersection at Lexington Road, "a nice young man" ran a red light and slammed into Wolberton.

"He hit me in the driver's side. I'm lucky it wasn't worse," said Wolberton, whose car was totaled and who is still under a doctor's care for injuries she suffered in the crash. The other driver wasn't cited, she said.

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While Wolberton's injuries weren't life-threatening, over the past decade, 77 people in Louisville have died when drivers ran red lights or disregarded other traffic control devices.

A motorist runs a red light at the intersection of 4th and Market.

Statewide, that number is 324, according to state police data.

Dead. All of them. Thousands more with their lives torn apart. Husbands. Wives. Children. Parents.

Despite that, Kentucky's General Assembly hasn't taken a simple step that has been shown in 22 states to reduce the number of people running red lights.

That simple step? Allow cities to install cameras that snap pictures of cars speeding through red lights so they can be fined.

They are desperately needed in Louisville, where traffic signals are seen as nothing more than a recommendation.

Stand on any street corner downtown and wait for the light to change and you dang-well better count to five — or maybe 10 — before venturing into the street, or else you'll end up as a hood ornament.

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And there's not a lot being done to stop it.

In 2016, 811 people across the nation were killed when people ran traffic signals. Thirty-four of them were in Kentucky. Six of them were in Louisville.

Thirty-four Kentuckians. Dead.

The number of crashes in Jefferson County that occur when someone runs a red light or stop sign goes up just about every year, state police data show. It was 943 crashes in 2008, and last year the number was 1,232.

Louisville Metro Police statistics show there have been 5,809 crashes already this year at intersections that have traffic lights.

Some of those crashes almost certainly were rear-enders or happened as cars made last-second lane changes to turn. But you have to suspect that a large percentage happened when someone ran a red light.

Lt. Micah Scheu, who oversees the LMPD traffic unit, said it's tough to catch folks who run red lights, in part because to chase them down, an officer must often venture through an intersection against the light.

That's dangerous for both the officer and other drivers.

The optics aren't good either if a police officer were to run a red light and cause a serious crash because he was trying to catch a careless driver who ran a red light and didn't cause a crash.

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And operations to crack down on those who run red lights are labor intensive and are often so low-profile that they don't deter bad behavior, Scheu said.

That's why many cities and states have gone to using cameras that monitor intersections, and then mail out tickets to those who speed through after the light has changed.

According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, 419 communities in 22 states are using red-light cameras.

The institute said that a study in Philadelphia a few years back found that lengthening the yellow light by a second reduced the number of people running red lights there by 36 percent. When they installed red-light cameras, it reduced the number by an additional 96 percent.

You won’t find any of those cameras here, though.

State law doesn't allow it and legislators haven't even talked about it for a generation.

Back in 2000, Kentucky Sen. Tom Buford, a Jessamine County Republican, sponsored a bill that would have allowed red-light cameras in Kentucky after a Lexington-Fayette Urban County Council member asked him to do it. Seems the federal government had some money available to pay to start up such programs at that time.

But after the bill cleared a Senate Committee, it failed in spectacular fashion on the Senate floor after another member warned of “big brother” watching you.

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“We had 20 votes lined up and then (former state Sen. David Boswell) called it 'Big Brother,' and they started peeling off,” Buford said.

Since that vote failed in March of 2000, there have been 15,076 bills filed in the Kentucky General Assembly.

Not a single one of them have allowed cities here to use the simple, life-saving cameras.

Though Buford said he thinks the cameras cut down on violations, he said no one has asked him to try to pass the bill again. "I think that (federal) money has gone away," he said.

And in fact, in some states like Tennessee and Ohio, where state laws allow the cameras, state legislators seem intent on making it difficult for communities to use them.

After numerous communities in Ohio began using the cameras, the legislature passed a law stating that a police officer must witness someone running a red light. Some communities then took down the cameras.

After the Ohio Supreme Court struck down that law, the legislature passed a law limiting how communities that use the cameras can spend the money they receive from fines.

In Tennessee, the legislature required a line on all notifications of fines that says people can't be forced to pay the fines, and refusal to pay the fines will not affect their driver's license nor will it be reported to their insurance companies.

Louisville police don't put a lot of priority on red-light violations.

Part of the problem is that statistics are so poor, police here don’t really know how big of a problem running traffic lights is, Scheu said.

(A 2000 study by the New York City comptroller estimated that people ran 1.23 million red lights per day in the Big Apple, which at that point had installed about 50 such cameras. It’s doubtful Louisville is that bad, at least as far as raw numbers go — but percentage-wise ...)

And while the traffic unit in Louisville will sometimes run operations to catch red-light scofflaws after a flurry of crashes or a particularly bad one, Scheu said such details don't provide a lot of bang for the buck.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety recommends lengthening the time lights stay yellow and using roundabouts to cut down on red-light accidents, but red-light cameras are the most effective way to stop it.

And you won't see them here unless the legislators in Frankfort decide that "Big Brother" isn't so bad if he saves a few lives.

Joseph Gerth's opinion column runs on most Sundays and at various times throughout the week. He can be reached at 502-582-4702 or by email at jgerth@courierjournal.com. Support strong local journalism by subscribing today: courier-journal.com/josephg.