It's a sign of the times.
Gov. Hochul has put her autograph on the law reauthorizing the city's speed camera program, keeping the life-saving, traffic-calming devices in place for another five years.
Stating a clear fact that scores of state legislators reject, Hochul said in a statement, "Speed cameras save lives and keep New Yorkers safe. Strengthening New York City’s speed camera program means safer streets for everyone — from kids walking to school to seniors crossing the street to cyclists commuting home.”
City data indeed shows that severe traffic injuries declined nearly 30 percent at locations where speed cameras were recently installed. And a city report shows the cameras reduce crashes: One in four traffic fatalities involves speeding, and speeding has dropped by 94 percent at locations with cameras. The report found that 74 percent of drivers who received a violation did not get more than one more in 12 months — indicating that cameras work.
Yet despite that overwhelming success, 22 Assembly Members and 21 Senators voted against reauthorization earlier this month, a reflection of the simple fact that street safety measures are seen as controversial to legislators who drive or are driven everywhere.
Typically, approved legislation takes weeks or even months before getting the governor's signature, but Hochul needed to sign the reauthorization before July 1, when the cameras would have been turned off under the provisions of the last reauthorization in 2022, which Hochul also signed (that time with a ceremony).
The bill's main sponsor, Sen. Andrew Gounardes, echoed Hochul's signing statement. "Speed cameras save lives and make our streets safer for everyone,” he told Streetsblog earlier this month. “But the true benefit is impossible to really measure: fewer New Yorkers — loved ones, friends and neighbors — needlessly killed in traffic crashes. I'm proud to have fought for this program from the beginning, and to renew it now for five years.”
As Streetsblog has reported, reauthorization of the speed camera program is never a given. In 2018, Republican lawmakers blocked the reauthorization of the then-140-zone program. Then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo created a workaround to reinstate the cameras by executive order before the beginning of the school year, and the program was reauthorized by the legislature in 2019.
In 2022, Mayor Adams tried and failed to get city control over the system so the city would not have to rely on Albany to reauthorize it again and again. Albany electeds reauthorized the program, expanding it to the current 750 zones and allowing the cameras to operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
The speed camera bill signing today expands Gov. Hochul's support for automated enforcement in New York and beyond. In October, she signed a bill reauthorizing the city's red light camera program, expanding it from 150 intersections to 600 — a compromise from the 2,250 corners that supporters sought.
She has also authorized pilot camera programs in several upstate cities.
