Traffic cameras designed to catch drivers breaking red lights will be introduced in Dublin city early next year, Dublin City Council has said.
The automatic enforcement cameras take pictures of registrations of drivers who fail to stop at a red light, an increasingly prevalent traffic violation which has become a “scourge” in the city, according to the council’s head of traffic, Brendan O’Brien.
The cameras were introduced for a six-month trial in 2015 on traffic lights at the junction of Blackhall Place and the Luas Red line in Dublin’s north inner city, following a number of crashes where vehicles failing to stop at the red light was the main contributory factor.
[ Traffic light cameras will be installed nationwide by next year, Eamon Ryan saysOpens in new window ]
The trial was hugely successful with the number of drivers breaking the light falling by half in the second three months of the trial, and no successful court appeals against fines. However, the trial was discontinued and never repeated.
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Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) was earlier this year tasked with developing a strategy for the introduction of both red light and bus lane cameras. The strategy had been due for completion in 2024, but a spokesman for the State agency said it had been slightly delayed and would be submitted to the department in the first three months of 2025.
Mr O’Brien said the council, with the support of the National Transport Authority and the Garda, intended to erect some traffic light cameras in advance of the introduction of a national strategy. “We are keen to get going on this because red light running is becoming quite a scourge around the city and it really needs to be tackled. At the moment people feel there is no consequence for that behaviour.”
The council’s traffic-monitoring staff observed increasing numbers of drivers running red lights and as a result, had to introduce greater delays between lights turning red for vehicles and the “green man” lighting up for pedestrians, he said.
“Because people speeding through red lights is just so widespread, we have to delay more and more the pedestrian signal to make it safe for pedestrians to step off,” said Mr O’Brien. “That means we have to give more red time to cars, so running the light has actually become counterproductive for cars. It’s a vicious cycle.”
Mr O’Brien was not involved in the 2015 camera trial, but he understands resource issues were largely what stymied its continuation. “Technology has moved on since. We’ve got better cameras and better systems, it is more automated. What TII is considering is how to scale it up.”
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