The SA Metro Police have retracted their support for navigation systems that help motorists avoid getting nabbed by speeding traps, citing technology disruption issues.
Last week, when speaking about the Road Angel Navigator 2000 to The Star, in an article entitled “Police green-light GPS speed warnings”, Metro Police spokesman superintendent Wayne Minnaar was in favour of “anything that could help the police”.
However, in an apparent about-turn, when speaking to ITWeb, he now says these devices interfere with speed camera readings and he has pulled his support for the Road Angel. This doesn't mean that the navigators are now illegal, but just that the police are no longer in favour of them.
Devices with the speed trapping notification function are still legal and usable in SA.
Road Angel was developed by Road Vigil. The device logs where speed traps are, allowing local drivers to slow down when traps are in range.
Road Vigil GM Angus MacArthur says the company has two databases for the device. One is for speed cameras, hijack hotspots and high accident zones, and the second is for mobile location or temporary set-ups by police. The second database is monitored almost daily, adds MacArthur.
Minnaar says the police have picked up that some navigators affect the speed camera readings. “Despite their ability to detect cameras and then make people slow down, the devices are very disruptive. It disrupts the laser beam and then the camera doesn't capture the correct readings. It's not just jammers but navigators as well,” he explains.
He says the metro police have decided to “keep their distance from” navigators because they have discovered the devices cause the cameras to give incorrect readings and promote irresponsible driving where people will only slow down when they get camera or speed trap alerts.
“It would be a good thing if the navigator just detects the speed zone because what happens is that drivers just slow down there [where the cameras are detected] and then speed up again once they've passed,” he says.
There are devices from TomTom, Garmin and Navigon that also have speed trap alert features, and Minnaar says he is not sure which ones specifically interfere with the lasers.
Reassurances from MacArthur that the features cannot interfere with speed trap equipment have not convinced Metro.
The other side
“I am very surprised by his response. He was so positive last week,” says MacArthur.
MacArthur says the navigators are being confused with jammers and explains why the navigators can't affect the readings: “These [Road Angel navigators] are purely database-driven. They cannot interfere with law enforcement equipment. Jammers are the devices that detect lasers and then send their own response and jam the equipment so readings can't happen.”
Addressing Minnaar's second concern that people will only slow down for the cameras and then speed up again, MacArthur points to studies that he says prove otherwise. “On the whole, people tend to be more wary about their driving. Tests done in the UK with a test group using the devices and a control group not using them show a reduction of 50% in the number of accidents with the test group, as well as an 80-100% reduction in the number of fines.”
TomTom agrees and says camera alert features, which its devices also have, do help people to slow down because the warnings are not so exact and so people have to slow down generally.
“If something makes someone drive more carefully, then that's what matters,” says Richard Fearon, group CEO of Garmin Distribution Africa (previously Avnic Trading), whose Garmin navigators also have camera alert features.
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