At the very least, red light cameras must be accurate

People who run a red light or roll through a crosswalk at either of two intersections may be caught on the city of Naperville's candid camera this weekend and fined.

Or maybe not.

Since March 1 the city has been photographing license plates of such drivers at Aurora Avenue and Fort Hill Drive and at 95th Street and Book Road in testing a system that will result in drivers being charged and fined based on violations detected by this electronic system.

The program is supposed to reduce right-angle traffic crashes and turning collisions. An additional goal is to reduce traffic accidents overall at the intersections and lower the number of violations involving red traffic signals.

The monitoring started March 1 with a "warning ticket" grace period. Citations carrying a fine of up to $100 originally was to start April 1, but the beginning of actual enforcement was put off until this coming Thursday, the first of May.

The reason for the delay?

"Equipment issues and installation problems" according to City Manager Pro Tem Robert Marshall.

The 95th Street and Book Road project has apparently been the biggest problem, with motorists reporting seeing city installation and repair crews working on the cameras and lights there on numerous occasions during April.

But if all these technical issues have been resolved by the middle of this week, tickets and fines are scheduled to start going out Thursday.

As we have stated before, there is an element of "Big Brother" to all this that The Sun finds distasteful. And if the cameras are being installed, and the system enlarged later, to pad city coffers, we have even more of a problem with it.

But that having been said, if the cameras have the result of lowering accidents at those intersections as opposed to, say, increasing them if drivers slam on the brakes to avoid going through a light that is turning red, then perhaps this will be a case where the ends justify the means.

But whatever else, the city has an absolute obligation to make sure these cameras work as accurately as they can before implementing the system and risking ticketing drivers unfairly.

Whatever credibility with residents the city hopes to have with this rests on the system being accurate.