The City of Oakland will install speed safety cameras at 18 locations across the city as part of a new program, the city’s Department of Transportation announced Monday.
The cameras will be installed by mid-January next year.
These cameras will detect when a vehicle exceeds the speed limit by more than 11 mph and will automatically capture images of its license plate number. City staff will then review the images before issuing fines of between $50 and $500, depending on the speed of the vehicle.
The locations for the cameras were chosen after reviewing the crash data from the city’s “High Injury Network”. This network of streets comprises 8% of city streets that account for 60% of the severe and fatal collisions that occur in the city.
City officials said that after the last camera is installed, there will be a sixty-day period in which speed limit offenders will receive warnings but not citations. At the end of the sixty days, the city will begin issuing citations to all violators.
“Too many Oaklanders are being hurt or killed because of dangerous speeding,” Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee said in a news release. “This program is a smart, life-saving step forward and brings us closer to streets where everyone can travel safely.”
The framework for the speed camera program was established in 2023 through Assembly Bill 645. The bill authorized a handful of California cities, including Oakland, San Jose, and San Francisco, to pilot a speed safety camera program until 2032.
Transportation technology company Verra Mobility will be administering this camera program. To ensure privacy and security, the cameras will only monitor speeding vehicles and will only capture images of license plates, according to city officials.
The city will engage in community education to raise awareness about the cameras, and more information is also available on Oakland’s website.
Looks like it’s time to get out the magnetic leaves again! Hard to read license plates when you got those magnetic leaves stuck to them.
Hahaha what a joke! I’m assuming all the speeding cars are one of the 40,000 vehicles that get stolen from Oakland yearly. It’s great that they are trying to stop speeders but how about focusing on stopping the criminals first.
I’d a thought they would put in more shot spotters – what do I know
What did George Orwell say about mass surveillance in his book, 1984?
Did George Orwell foresee a government that coddles criminals and allows them to run wild in our communities?
Who cares what happens in Oakland as long as they stay on that side of the hill?
There’s nothing good about this at all! The last thing that we need is more government controlled cameras to spy on the public. This is all about revenue generation and nothing else!!!
Yup!
Hardly a good move or good use of tax dollars! How about adding more police and tackling that decades old crime problem that has been enabled by the elected officials!
Keeping it real Oakland.
Get your car stollen and a speeding ticket in the same night!
Those cameras will go straight to Facebook Marketplace.
Who would want to buy a used traffic camera?
The cameras will likely be used for target practice and will be out of order within a month or so.
If everybody that got tickets within each county’s jurisdiction went to court to fight them there would never be any officers on the streets and by the way you can easily fight a camera ticket for speed or red light running by yourself no attorney needed.