The Washington Times wrote an editorial today about public perception when it comes to fraudulent red light cameras and photo radar systems.

These mechanical money snatchers have been hated worldwide since their proliferation began, but around the Washington D.C. beltway, they’re beginning to be exposed as a revenue scheme just as they have in the testing ground cities like Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles and Phoenix.

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In an effort to chip away at the incredible amount of profit that Redflex Traffic Systems and American Traffic Solutions skim from motorists, cities and courts in Arizona, legislature has sent a bill to governor Jan Brewer that would rid the state of imaginary red lines inside the stop bar of a crosswalk that are used to justify 100,000s of illegal red light camera tickets.

[The diagram above represents the new definition of an intersection (red) in Arizona, if Governor Brewer signs HB 2557]

That’s the good news. The bad news is that it won’t take effect until 2014 and may not ever need to be enacted, considering the political pressure mounting every year for the state to make photo ticketing illegal outright.

In fact, legislation which has been introduced in the last two sessions which would ban photo ticketing will be introduced again in the Summer 2012 legislative season, according to various opponents of the system and activists who have been fighting for to outlaw it since 2008.

The Republican dominated senate had the final say yesterday on sending this bill, which had been modified several times, to the governor.

Nanny-state stalwart, Linda Gray, who admitted earlier in the session to voting against a ballot measure to ban photo ticketing because an email from an activist in the CameraFRAUD group to Senator Adam Driggs upset her after reading it.

Also voting against the bill from the Republican side was Jerry Lewis, no not that one, who feigns ignorance about the dangerous conditions caused by installation of speed and red light cameras, but then continues to vote in favor of them each time.

If anything, this bill is a litmus test of where the governor stands on the issue and will further the debate about the eventual ban of the system in Arizona. Motorists across the state and those who come to visit can’t wait to see the system scrapped in favor of proper signal timing and careful engineering at intersections.

The question now is will Brewer sign it or cave to the pressure of her transition team manager and Redflex honk, Jay Heiler.

Arizona has long been an easy target for flashing bandits installed by Redflex and American Traffic Solutions (ATS). One of the chief reasons for this is that those two private (foreign - Redflex) vendors get to make up almost all the rules, including where an intersection starts.

Arizona is one of only two states who don’t clearly define an intersection and it leads to a lot of dangerous practices by both Redflex and ATS, such as painting confusing “imaginary” lines in intersections.

The city of Tucson is one of the worst offenders in this category and has even been reprimanded by the Federal Highway Administration for illegal intersection lines.

The East Valley Tribune’s article points out that intersection lines could be clearly defined, if new legislation passes in the form of HB 2557, which is working its way through state legislature.

The article also points out that since Tempe, AZ has ditched their photo ticketing program, accidents have dropped. Maybe Arizona will join the rest of the country in defining just where an intersection starts instead of leaving that up to the scamera profiteers, just as they typically do with all their traffic laws in the last decade.

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