Sprays And Plate Covers Not Likely To Defeat Red Light Cameras

The Institute of Transportation Engineers Journal has publishedthe results of an extensive Los Angeles Police Department evaluation of the effectiveness of license plate covers and sprays designed to defeat automated ticketing machines. The results showed that the countermeasures did not work well under actual field conditions. The report found:

“The countermeasures had no effect on plate legibility under dark conditions, with the exception of V-2 (license plate shield), which occasionally caused a slight increase in front-plate legibility in half of the images,” the study found. “All rear plate images were clearly legible, with no significant difference between the test plate images and the control plate image. A citation could have been issued in all cases.”

Some measures did better than others, such as Photoblocker that, when combined with sun glare, did make plates about 20% less legible for the cameras. Maybe that is why Pennsylvania has banned Photoblocker.

[Source: Thenewspaper.com via The Truth About Cars]