Ever run a red light? Get ready to pay if this proposal passes

Speeding through a red light in Macon may cost you money in the near future, even if a deputy doesn't catch you.

Cameras may be installed on traffic lights and other places where littering and illegal dumping is common. The Macon-Bibb County Commission will get details in the coming weeks on how the camera system would work and which locations would be the best places to put them up.

The commission could then decide if it wants to contract with a company to install and monitor the cameras. Macon-Bibb would recoup some of the revenue from the fines, and it would keep motorists and pedestrians safer, Commissioner Joe Allen said Tuesday.

His resolution also mentions running stop signs as a possible area of enforcement for the cameras.

"There are companies out there that will put the cameras up and catch folks who are speeding and running red lights," Allen said. "You can also do that to deter people from speeding through zones where people are walking across the street."

The possibility comes at the same time commissioners are considering partnering with Georgia Power to install surveillance cameras on street light poles as a crime deterrent. Cameras also have been put on stop arms of Bibb County school buses to try to catch motorists driving around buses while the stop arm is deployed.

This isn't the first time Macon officials have considered red light cameras. Commissioner Elaine Lucas said while serving on the Macon City Council about 10 years ago, a company offered to install them in the city.

But council members balked at that proposal because all of the revenue would have gone to the company, and there were issues with inconsistencies in how the system worked in different cities, Lucas said Tuesday.

There has been some controversy over how red light cameras are enforced in cities across the country. Earlier this month, the mayor of Miami said that city would be removing cameras because the city's "most vulnerable" residents were being forced to pay the costly fines.

This story was originally published March 13, 2018 at 4:54 PM with the headline "Ever run a red light? Get ready to pay if this proposal passes."