Central Iowa Times

The Webster City Council was briefed on speed traffic cameras and data at a recent meeting.

The council heard a presentation from Rick Willing of Sensys Gatso, a firm providing traffic innovation and enforcement aids to municipalities. His background includes 32 years of law enforcement as well as over 13 years of photo enforcement. He presented information from a speed enforcement camera and the possibilities of changing procedures in the city.

"So it's been in business for 62 years," he said of the company. "We have 60,000 installations across the world. What that means to you is, is we've had to meet the very exacting standards of all the different countries across the world. So you can be assured that the equipment that we have meets the highest level of standards and certifications that there are around the world. We have a significant presence in the Iowa area. We have eight active programs in Iowa."

He also shared Iowa Department of Transportation information with the council, showing that the city had experienced 573 crashes since 2017, with 233 injuries and one death resulting from these, as well as over $3 million in property damage.

Willing showed a map displaying the density of crashes, most occurring in the downtown area.

"So they placed traffic counters throughout the area and did some 24-hour traffic studies, which showed a very high percentage of speed violations in excess of 10 mph over the limit," Willing said.

Adding automated speed enforcement to their current enforcement plans could decrease those violations by 70-88%, Willing said. 

The firm’s sophisticated camera system can add safety to anywhere they chose, sending any violations to the police department, which can decide how to handle each violation. The council is considering making violations through this system only civil, not going against a driver’s record.