Revealed: Transport officials want to quadruple speed cameras, triple traffic tickets - and save lives

Police are handing over to NZTA Waka Kotahi the job of running traffic cameras - and the road safety agency has some big plans. David Fisher reports on a plan to boost the number of cameras on our roads - and Transport Minister Simeon Brown’s views on what his agency should be focusing on.

Our road safety agency is taking over speed and other traffic cameras with plans to massively increase the number of cameras on our highways and more than triple the number of tickets issued each year to 3 million.

NZTA Waka Kotahi is also planning to increase the number of cameras on our roads from the current 150 fixed and mobile cameras to around 800.

The plans are laid out in a Privacy Impact Assessment carried out by NZTA Waka Kotahi ahead of the planned high-tech development of a national camera network. Other documents show an expectation the changes will save $1.5 billion and between 1563 and 2431 lives over 20 years.

Traffic cameras have traditionally been managed by police but the role is shifting to NZTA Waka Kotahi after being seen as a better fit with its role as the road safety agency.

The privacy assessment said: “Over the next 10 years it is intended to expand the road safety camera system to approximately 800 fixed site and mobile cameras.

“Cameras will be more visible, with fixed cameras clearly signed, and mobile cameras used in a more covert, general deterrence mode.”

It said: “(NZTA) Waka Kotahi estimates by 2030 it will be processing around 3 million infringements annually, and their processes and technology will be capable of issuing these infringements close to real-time.”

That was more than three times the current level of camera-sourced ticketing with police headquarters data showing traffic cameras caught 979,319 speeding drivers in 2023.

The number of speed cameras was projected to increase from 150 to 800. Photo / Michael Cunningham

NZTA Waka Kotahi estimated a network of 800 cameras would need about 400 staff to “manage the system and its information flows from collection through to prosecution”.

The road safety agency’s high-tech solution included a plan to use artificial intelligence to carry out the checks needed to see if someone had broken the law, although it “acknowledges the need to strike a balance between efficiencies and maintaining the public’s trust and confidence in the system”.

“This will mean a balance between automation and maintaining viable human oversight.”

The expanded camera network would be accompanied by a public relations campaign “explaining the purpose and promoting the role of safety cameras” in a bid to win public support.

Road to Zero initiative to save lives

The agency’s regulatory strategic programme lead Tara Macmillan said increasing camera numbers to 800 could save a projected 130 lives a year.

She said the agency was waiting on a green light from the new Government with plans to increase the camera network designed around the “Road to Zero” road toll initiative launched in 2019 under a Labour-NZ First Government.

McMillan said the agency’s plans were at a “foundation” stage and the initial steps would see an increase to 200 cameras including point-to-point cameras. The existing network of 150 cameras would be boosted with 24 sites under construction and another 27 sites being scouted, she said.

Among those were a dozen areas where point-to-point cameras measuring average speed over a distance were planned, she said.

She said advancing beyond that was down to the Government’s transport priorities. Transport Minister Simeon Brown had been briefed and the agency was awaiting the government priority statement and “clarity around the Government’s priorities and investment envelope”.

“The transport minister has been very interested in safety cameras. We’ve provided the minister with a lot of information. The Government understands the importance of road safety and are really committed to positive outcomes for New Zealanders.”

Police said speed was a factor in this 2022 crash which left several youths with critical injuries. Photo / Hayden Woodward

McMillan said artificial intelligence as part of the infringement notice regime would not be a part of the revamped system on launch.

“Initially we’ll be doing manual verifications but that is certainly something that we’re looking at down the track.”

She said “maintaining the trust and the confidence of New Zealanders” was critical so it would not go ahead without integrity, security and verification checks.

McMillan said there were also discussions under way with police as to what information it might want from the camera network. That would then be weighed against the Privacy Act and the burden it might place on NZTA Waka Kotahi.

Documents show NZTA Waka Kotahi largely has to build the network from the ground up with functions held by police at “end of life”. That included the processing of images captured by cameras and a system that would generate and send infringement notices.

McMillan said the agency would shortly be putting out a contract for tender for the operation of the mobile speed camera vans.

Transport minister wants cameras to save lives

Brown wouldn’t be drawn on the camera network expanding to 800 cameras and 3 million tickets.

He said NZTA Waka Kotahi had funding for an additional 50 cameras to bring the new network to a total of 200. He expected those cameras to be placed in high-risk areas to improve safety.

“The focus of these cameras is to ensure drivers in these high-risk areas comply with the legal speed limit, reducing the risk of deaths and serious injuries.”

Brown said he was writing the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport as part of the new Government’s 100-day plan and it would have “a strong focus on safety enforcement on our transport network”.

Documents show the agency’s plan was to use advanced camera technology to have “automated oversight of the roading system”.

Minister of Transport Simeon Brown. Photo / Alex Cairns

That included speed cameras, cameras detecting speeds travelled between two points, red light cameras and, in the future, cameras that detect mobile phone use and seat belt wearing, and those managing transit lanes which require more than one person for legal passage.

The agency already had trials under way on point-to-point speed cameras in Auckland and, shortly, at Moerewa in Northland.

The document said in 2019 speed was a factor in 73 fatal crashes and 408 serious injury crashes - and that the introduction of speed cameras in 1993 saw a 23 per cent drop in fatal and serious injury crashes in cities and towns and an 11 per cent drop in rural areas.

NZTA Waka Kotahi’s assessment of the impact on privacy raised concerns about the level of intrusion into people’s lives and recommended that the information collected be limited to only what was needed. It also said deploying cameras as a “national system” needed “national senior management oversight”.

The caution around privacy reflects the expanse of the roading camera network and its ability to scan and track number plates - and in some cases even scan body heat through vehicles.

“Although cameras and recording devices are ubiquitous in our society, these tools are viewed as intrusive and potentially generate emotive commentary alleging unwarranted surveillance systems.

“Technology systems such as CCTV and surveillance type systems are of considerable public interest.”

Caution sounded over risks to reputation

It urged the road safety agency to use the assessment as a “living document” to which it would return “when new uses for cameras are contemplated and when existing deployments are altered or used in different ways”.

Failure to manage the risks could see the agency “suffer scrutiny and reputational damage” at a national level, the assessment said, which could lead to constraints on expanding the network with “a resultant negative impact on the Road to Zero programme”.

Labour’s transport spokesman Tangi Utikere said it was important the “primary focus” of an expanded system was road safety and saving lives and not generating revenue from traffic tickets.

“Fewer deaths on the road and fewer injuries - that’s the key thing.”

Five teenagers were killed in a high speed crash in Timaru in 2021.

Road safety campaigner Clive Matthew-Wilson of the Dog and Lemon Guide said many accidents occurred because of inappropriate but not necessarily illegal speed.

“Installing cameras on our main highways is not going to affect the majority of offenders. Reckless speeding by idiots is a huge problem on our roads, but these idiots aren’t going to be stopped by a speed camera.”

Matthew-Wilson said the strategy was designed to “slow down the average driver but the average driver is not the problem”.

He said automated systems sending out tickets were “useless for the highest-risk offenders”.

“Almost every study ever done has concluded that the threat of fines and disqualification have zero effect on the groups most likely to cause fatal accidents. You send them a ticket, they add it to the pile. You disqualify their licence, they drive anyway.”

NZ Council for Civil Liberties chairman Thomas Beagle said he was concerned at the inclusion of artificial intelligence into law enforcement.

He said our system of law required those accused of a crime to be able to examine the judgment exercised when accusing citizens of wrong-doing.

It was also a basic rule of the Official Information Act that the Government explain its decision-making and it was difficult to understand how such explanations could be easily extracted from AI, he said.

David Fisher is based in Northland and has worked as a journalist for more than 30 years, winning multiple journalism awards including being twice named Reporter of the Year and being selected as one of a small number of Wolfson Press Fellows to Wolfson College, Cambridge. He joined the Herald in 2004.