Spy car ‘Beast’ on target to bag £100k in a year
BASILDON Council’s controversial spy-car is nabbing an average of nine motorists a day and is on target to bag £100,000 within its first year.
The CCTV Smartcar, dubbed “the Beast” by the traffic wardens who drive it, is collecting about £8,100 a month in fines from local motorists.
It has issued 1,115 tickets in its first five months. That works out at about 55 a week, or nine a day, because it does not operate on Sundays.
It uses a distinctive periscope-mounted camera on its roof to take photographs of cars parked in no-stopping zones.
Drivers then receive a £70 parking ticket through the post, which is reduced to £35 if paid within 14 days. The council has revealed it earned £40,500 between its launch on September 3 and January 31.
Of that, £26,600 has been collected and £13,900 is outstanding.
Details of fines collected in February are not available, but it is likely the £50,000 state-of-the-art vehicle has already paid for itself.
If it continues at its current rate it will generate about £100,000 for the council’s parking department in its first year.
The car, which ticketed 215 drivers in its first three weeks, has been slammed by motoring groups as being little more than a council cash cow.
It is hugely unpopular with local motorists, one of whom photographed the Smartcar itself parked illegally on a yellow line last month.
Critics claim its sole purpose is to make money as drivers are not given the five-minute grace period granted by traffic wardens because the car does not stop.
Taxi driver Gary Lynch, 65, of Great Oxcroft, Laindon, was given a fine when he stopped to help an old lady into her home, said: “I am still in the process of appealing against my ticket. I’d rather go to jail than add my hard-earned cash to its ridiculous profit margin.”
Malcolm Buckley, the council’s lead member for the environment, said all money recovered by the Smartcar is paid to Essex County Council.
source:
http://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/
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