“In St. Petersburg, Florida, the yellow time at intersections was shortened by fractions of a second for thousands of drivers, enabling the red light camera program to generate an extra $259,910 in revenue in 13 months. The data show at seven city intersections, the yellow time dropped between 0.1 and 1.1 seconds for some tickets from the date the cameras started ticketing. St. Petersburg depends heavily on split-second timing misjudgment. The city generated 45 percent of its revenue — $2,128,576 — from tickets generated in a half-second or less after the light turns red. In the first three-tenths of a second, 31 percent of the city’s tickets were issued.”
