Swindon council to try red lights barrier for speeding offenders

Councils and the Government are always looking for new ways to curb the nations speeding habits as they have an effect on everyone including pedestrians and other drivers. After successful trials in Europe, approval has gone ahead to test a new system in Swindon starting this autumn.

A pilot scheme will be introduced in a few months to help stop speeding by turning the traffic lights red when a car is speeding. Sensors will be installed in the road to monitor vehicle speed; if a motorist decides to drive faster than the speed limit than the next set of lights will turn red leaving everyone fuming.

In 2009 Swindon became the first town in the UK to completely turn off all speeding cameras, the council has vowed to look into new ways to reduce the amount of speeding in the town. The two roads that this new system will trial are Thamesdown Drive and Queens Drive, the speed limit is set at 40mph but this is regularly broken as motorists put their foot down.

How it will work?
When a motorist is speeding down Thamesdown Drive a sensor will be triggered to alert the next set of traffic lights that someone has broken the speed limit. So when the offender is at Queens Drive waiting for the lights to turn green, the people behind that have to stop because of this immature or possibly brainless driver and they will be fuming and glaring back at the offender. The council states that 'a little bit of social pressure from other drivers is not necessarily a bad thing'.

The system will be most effective during off peak hours as there is less traffic and motorists will be most likely to offend. For emergency service vehicles such as ambulances, police cars and fire engines a camera will use licence plate recognition to ensure that the traffic light does not change to red. Swindon council has said that if the trial works then they will then roll it out to the other 200 traffic light controlled junctions throughout the town.

As you can expect not many people are getting their hopes up with internet forums slamming this ridiculous idea. A lot of people remain sceptical and cannot understand how the council approved this trial. Many people who speed do not care about the other drivers and the repercussions that may occur so glaring at an offender will simply encourage road rage. We will have to wait a few more months to see if this trial is successful.