One main reason for automatic enforcement, except of the safety situation, is that the police will not be able to take direct action to each detected violator at normal police enforcement activities in some environments. By using detectors and camera technology the violators can be identified and sanctioned. Though it's almost three decades of use, automated traffic enforcement has mainly been applied to speed and red light violations. In the recent years, however, there has been an extension to other violations, e.g., following distance, lane keeping, and toll payment violations. The increased use of digital video and image processing technology, as well as the electronic identification of vehicles, has paved the way for extending the applications to a still wider spectrum of violations, as well as making the enforcement considerably more efficient in the future. Automatic enforcement always consist of at least three different procedures: Detection of the violation; Identification of the vehicle involved; Identification of and contact with the owner of the vehicle. In order to combine these procedures into one system the aim is of course to have to create a fully automatic system. Today the detection of the violation is automatic but the identification processes are more or less manual. The strategy for automatic enforcement varies a lot between countries depending on detection technology used, police force organisation, traffic legislation and sanction system. It is impossible to recommend a European harmonised solution. An important prerequisite for an efficient automated enforcement system is the availability of a centralised register of vehicles and their owners at a national level. If the register were not centralised, the process of identifying vehicles and drivers from outside the jurisdiction where the violation takes place would be extremely laborious. That is also a reason why few countries routinely follow up violators from foreign countries. An example of sanctioning across borders is found in Scandinavia, where there are mutual agreements between Norway, Sweden and Denmark regarding the process of fining violators from the neighbouring countries. Some automated enforcement applications are manned; for example in those instances where the automatic system is operated from a police car. As long as the detection of violations is automatic, and the purpose of the manning is only to supervise the equipment, these applications are considered within our definition of automated enforcement (whereas applications depending on a police officer to initiate the recording when observing a suspect vehicle, is not automated.). An advantage of manned controls seems to be increased flexibility concerning the choice of sites. Extensive unmanned operation on the other hand requires a certain number of fixed facilities between which the equipment can be rotated. In the long run, however, the costs of such facilities are probably lower than the costs of manned operation for a similar level of enforcement. (Author/publisher) For an overview off all working papers and deliverables of the ESCAPE project, see http://virtual.vtt.fi/virtual/proj6/escape/deliver.htm
Abstract