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California Tracks Everyone Using Toll Transponders
obtuse writes "Direct monitoring of traffic sounds pretty cool, but some people don't want their toll transponders tracked. They aren't installing direct driver tracking for law enforcement now, but the collected data could be subpoenaed. Of course, anyone who didn't want to be tracked could just put it in the glovebox anyway, so they won't be catching clever felons or tracking real paranoiacs."
Here in north Texas, the NTTA is the toll authority. If you drive around town, you can find Amtech transponders mounted high up on telephone poles -- miles away from the tollroads! Not only does NTTA track you on the tollway, they are apparently keeping tabs on you when you're not on the tollway.
For the non-believers in Dallas: Look in the median on Valley View, just west of Marsh in Farmers Branch.
In New York State, an "EZPass" must be in a special bag for it not to be read. Looks like an anti-static bag and it may be, I don't know.
I know people who have tried to get the thing to not be read (to get a reciept in order to expense tolls for work) and without the bag it is very hard to "hide."
The poor design of the system means it can screw you at times if you don't do what is the expected traffic pattern. I was told once at the toll booth getting on that since my EZPass had been read, I was unable to turn around and must now get on the truway going the wrong direction and proceed to another exit or be faced with a $30 fine for illegal U-TURN. Problem was an accident closed the on ramp for the direction I needed to go.
(I turned around at the next "NO U TURNS" turn around to go the direction I needed to once I had though out how the system worked and knew the turn would not be "detected" by the crappy EZPass system.) Also, it takes at least 24 hours for a credit on your pass to work at most ramps.
The system in NYS sucks technically. I am quite worried about it being used for speed enforcement purposes and such.
-Pete
Soccer Goal Plans
Growing up in the NE, we often traversed the Penn. State Turnpike. Back then, they gave you a punch card (Hollerith card for you purists) at the entrance booth, and you handed to the attendant when you exited. If your calculated speed was above a certain limit, you were referred to a Penn. state trooper waiting at the booth for a "consultation."
My father was a cop, so it was never a big deal, professional courtesy and all that...
I expect the option of anonymity and privacy and identity and freedom etc.
It's all about choice and freedom. If I want to be anonymous in a so-called "free" country I should. If I want privacy I should be entitled to that as well. As well as anything else that I damn well please as long as it's within the scope of myself and no one else.
Should no one be allowed these things?
Wether I'm actually going to make use of them or not if irrelevant. As long as they're available to me then that's all that matters.
--
Garett
In fact, France almost completely relies on correlating the times between toll stations to catch speeders. It's why when you're driving in France you see a lot of people with flashy cars at the side of the road eating lunch or talking for a bit just outside of the toll stations. =)
what if the clocks at each endpoint are not properly synchronized? you might be able to challenge the ticket claiming the second clock was a few minutes "slow".
cpeterso
That reminds me of a really strange movie we saw back in first year calculus class. (Yeah, movies in math class. Weird in itself.)
Had to do with just such a situation, with the driver being referred to the cop for speeding. The trooper proceeds to explain Rolle's Theorem and Mean Value Theorem to the driver as proof that somewhere in between the two toll booths, he had to have been speeding.
I guess to the extent that I remember the name of Rolle's Theorem, the movie served its purpose. OTOH it always seemed kind of intuitively obvious to me.
-- Alastair
Let's say this system goes into effect, and it can track traffic in real time and provide that data to the people who are causing the traffic. Everyone on the road figures he's smarter than the drivers around him (I can confirm this mentality is the norm in Northern California, where this is being implemented). Drivers on US 101 simultaneously get a report from their cell phones that they're facing bumper-to-bumper traffic from Moffett Field to University Ave, and people respond by getting off the highway and flooding Middlefield Road, which runs parallel to 101. Only this causes Middlefield to become even more congested than 101 (which is still congested because Middlefield just can't handle that much traffic). So some people abandon Middlefield to go back to 101, causing more problems, while a steady stream of cars begins to work its way through the side streets around Middlefield. The end result is that no one really gets to their destination any faster (this actually increases travel time for many people as they hop between routes).
More importantly, the data becomes useless. If the drivers had not been supplied with the raw traffic information, they would have followed predictable traffic patterns that could be studied to determine where roads need to be widened or otherwise changed (any Bay Area commuters familiar with the northern end of 85 can already tell you where roads need to be changed). Since the otherwise sheep-like traffic now has thousands of minds of its own, the result is chaotic traffic in which patterns constantly change unpredictably as people try to adapt. Therefore patterns cannot be studied and the flow of traffic will not improve.
Ideally, the system should analyze the patterns without providing raw data to the drivers and suggest that drivers whose license numbers end in 4 or 8 take Middlefield, drivers whose license numbers end in 5, 6 or 7 should take 280 if possible, and everyone else should stay on 101. Intelligently-managed traffic is better than chaotic traffic.