[gpm]

Crazy idea that would be next to politically impossible in North America: Have every traffic light with a countdown also be a speed camera.

It'd eliminate the incentive to drag race, would give drivers more information earlier allowing better driving, and would generally make speeds limits actually a limit on roads with traffic lights.

[s1artibartfast]

First you have to deal with the issue of cities selling camera data to third parties and using it for license plate tracking and face ID

[gpm]

That's a solved problem in responsible cities, say New York. The cameras only take a picture if they see someone speeding [1], and once they see someone speeding a citation is issued and that's a matter of public record [2] so there is no data to sell.

But like I said, politically impossible, there's a very strong constituency and lobby of people who like cars and like speeding and will come up with excuses for why it couldn't work. For instance New York State restricts New York City to only putting speed cameras in school zones because of that group of people.

[1] https://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/speed-camera-faq....

[2] https://data.cityofnewyork.us/City-Government/Open-Parking-a...