The mobile speed camera program has resulted in almost $10 million in fines being issued for speeding, mobile phone, and seatbelt offences since it was introduced in 2022.
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Camera deployment has paid for the program in fine revenue, but revenue-raising is not its purpose.
The goal of the program is to reduce the level of speed-related road trauma.
Minister Ferguson recently implied that this goal is being achieved because the average speed across the high-speed network has reduced by 1.2 km/h over the program's 18-month operating period.
But a change in average speed is not a measure of unsafe driving behaviour.
The same mean can result by raising or lowering the curve; by decreasing or increasing both slower and higher speed traffic.
However, there is a more accurate measure of reduction in crash risk and trauma - the level of speed-limit compliance.
One study has estimated that 24 per cent of all casualty crashes investigated would have been avoided if none of the vehicles had been travelling above the speed limit .
Speeding causes about 30 per cent of crash fatalities.
Speed and volume data is being collected through continuous and short-term count stations on the state network which is available through the tasmaniatrafficdata.drakewell.com website, but the speed camera data is not readily available and non-TIN data is discarded after a short period.
So, to measure compliance, I have collated and analysed continuous counter data for the December-to-Februart quarter for the 2019-24 period.
This analysis shows that the mean rate of speed limit compliance is currently 81.9 per cent, a 4.6 per cent increase over 2019-20.
The highest rate of compliance was recorded on the Midland Highway at the Glen Dhu overpass.
The lowest was recorded north of Bradys Lookout Road on the West Tamar Highway, which continues to decline alarmingly.
There are 13 sites with a compliance of 90 per cent or above and 23 sites that need attention, so there is clearly still much more that an expanded or targeted program could achieve.
For example, between September 2022 and March 2024, a mobile speed camera was deployed for 115 hours on the West Tamar Highway at Riverside, resulting in relatively few infringements, not at Rosevears where there is a major problem.
So, has the speed camera program and highway patrol deployment been effective?
It seems that they have improved compliance, although the results are very variable by location and there may be other factors leading to the observed change in driver behaviour.
Police issued 759 speeding TINs in December to February 2023, but only 510 in the same period in 2024, which poses other questions about effectiveness.
Greater and more widespread consistency is possible with more cameras and patrol units, targeted to areas of low compliance together with deployment on local roads.
The data recorded by mobile enforcement cameras needs to be retained and merged with the counter data, made publicly available, and the level of compliance published regularly by RSAC.
The popular perception that speeding TINs are a revenue generating device needs to be dispelled by an RSAC disclosure of what road safety measures the revenue is used for (in addition to evidence-based effectiveness), in order to gain support for any proposal to expand the camera program and policing.
Please drive so others survive.
