Article from: www.thenewspaper.com/news/70/7037.asp

4/19/2021

France, Italy: Speed Cameras Cause Accident, Revenue
A speed camera in Italy injured a motorcyclist while moving violations bring French $1.7 billion in revenue, despite lockdown.

Lockdowns in France last year cost the government over a hundred million euros in speeding and parking ticket revenue. The Court of Auditors last week released budgetary figures showing the virus scare caused a 25 percent drop in photo radar revenue nationwide. Permanently installed speed cameras generated 553 million euros (US $663 million) in profit, off 24 percent from the 729 million euros (US $874 million) that had been expected. Combined with other forms parking and moving violations, the government still brought in 1.4 billion euros (US $1.7 billion) in revenue.

Vigilantes continued to do their best last week to reduce those figures one camera at a time. In Friaize, the speed camera on the RD923 that had just been installed ten days earlier was flipped upside down on Sunday. In Jayat on Saturday, vigilantes used yellow spraypaint to blind the speed camera located on the RD975. On Tuesday, vigilantes poured gasoline at the foot of the speed camera on the RN12 in Plenee-Jugon and started a fire that scorched the automated ticketing device without causing significant damage.

On Saturday, a speed camera in Polaveno, Italy, injured a motorcyclist after the device failed to prevent an accident on the Via Roma. The twenty-three-year-old motorcyclist had to make a sudden swerve to avoid hitting a man on a bicycle who crossed his path, and the maneuver threw him against the automated ticketing machine, which knocked him onto the gound. The motorcyclist was transported to a hospital in Brescia. Vigilantes in Castiglione Torinese on April 12 ripped the orange "Velo OK" brand speed camera on the SP92 right out of the ground. Only the bottom half of the camera housing was left behind.