Foxy’s Blog

Speed cameras can cause erratic driving by motorists, according to a survey. As many as 81% of drivers said they looked at their speedometers rather than the road when a camera came into view, the poll by insurance company LV= revealed.

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Thousands of speed cameras could be switched off after the Government slashed cash for road safety by 40%.

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Arizona has turned off every speed camera on its highways after complaints that they violated privacy and were designed to generate revenue rather than promote road safety.

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The TaxPayers’ Alliance and Drivers’ Alliance last week calculated that UK speed cameras issued £87,368,227 (US $131,256,380) worth of tickets in fiscal 2009 without any demonstrable safety benefit. Since speed cameras were first installed on British roads in 1991, the roads became more dangerous than they would have been without photo enforcement, according to the report.

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A young Tennessee computer network designer now has a high-profile outlet to complain about speed cameras: He bought the expiring website name of the Bluff City Police Department that gave him a $90 ticket, the Bristol Herald Courier reports.

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PHOENIX — Arizona is ending a groundbreaking and contentious program that put speed cameras along Phoenix-area freeways and in vans deployed across the state.

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High-tech speed cameras which use satellites to track motorists on secret trial in Britain. Speed cameras which communicate with each other by satellite are being secretly tested on British roads.

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Speeding motorists who slow down for cameras face a new threat as Britain’s first urban average speed traps are switched on in the capital. Eighty-four new cameras are being placed on the A13 to the east of London in a bid to reduce the high accident rate on the commuter route.

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Press release. Drivers using a speed camera alert system have less accidents. People using a GPS navigation system increase road safety as well. And now amAze GPS, the leading mobile navigation service, offers both functionalities for the best price in the market.

is a worldwide speed cameras warning system working on mobile phones. The system is collaborative and self-managed: The users “tag” the speed cameras and special electronic trust engines check the quality of the posted information. FoxyTag contains today more than 35′000 fixed speed cameras, mainly in Europe, Australia, Brazil, Taïwan, USA, Canada, Russia, South Africa, Bulgaria, China, Denmark, New Zealand, Singapore, Slovakia and Israel. FoxyTag signals also mobile speed cameras and ghosts (places where there are often mobile speed cameras).

Speed cameras help to slow down the traffic in dangerous areas and increase therefore the road safety. However, they cause also many accidents, typically by people that brake just before them, by fear of being flashed, even if they weren’t speeding. The solution is obvious: If the main role of speed cameras is to increase road safety, then these cameras must be placed in dangerous areas and well signalized to the drivers. More and more reports (the first was http://www.foxytag.com/news/20070716.pdf) show that people having a speed camera alert system have less accidents than the others.

Another fact, which is less known but still important, is that people using a GPS navigation system in unknown areas provoke less accidents. This fact becomes even more true as these systems improve every day. The new intelligent features that help you to drive efficiently, like telling to change lane in preparation of an oncoming turn, reduces hesitations and last-second dangerous changes of direction. The amAze navigation solution is typically one that meets all the requirements we expect from an efficient “co-driver”.

Today amAze GPS is integrating the FoxyTag speed cameras in its navigation system, further improving the driver’s road safety and allowing the driver to save money by avoiding potential fines. The current version of amAze GPS alerts the driver about fixed and mobile speed cameras on his driving direction. It is enough to turn amAze on and to have a valid GPS signal for the warning system to be activated.

According to Ofer Tziperman, President of LocatioNet (the developer of amAze), “We believe that the FoxyTag database and tagging system is a perfect match to the amAze GPS navigation system. The amAze GPS users can enjoy the peace of mind that the speed camera alerts provide, and they can also report additional fixed and mobile speed cameras. This is a valuable user-generated content for the benefit of all drivers. It is mainly about increasing road safety”. Michel Deriaz, the FoxyTag project leader, is very satisfied with this partnership: “FoxyTag and amAze GPS share a similar philosophy: No useless and expensive gadgets, just precise data presented in a very clear way. I think that current FoxyTag users will easily switch to this nice worldwide navigation system.”

The amAze GPS application is available on most mobile phones and can be tested for free for one month.

amAze in action

For more information please visit:

http://www.foxytag.com
http://www.amazegps.com

– Foxy

Press release. With its new server, FoxyTag proposes a speed camera information with a reliability that was obtained only in labs so far. GoldRadars is the first iPhone application that benefits from it.

FoxyTag is a worldwide speed cameras warning system working on mobile phones. The system is collaborative and self-managed: The users “tag” the speed cameras and some electronic trust engines check the quality of the posted information. FoxyTag contains today more than 35′000 fixed speed cameras, mainly in Europe, Australia, Brazil, Taïwan, USA, Canada, Russia, South Africa, Bulgaria, China, Denmark, New Zealand, Singapore, Slovakia and Israel. FoxyTag signals also mobile speed cameras and ghosts (places where there are often mobile speed cameras).

With the constant increase of the number of users, FoxyTag had to migrate to a new server that greatly increases its power. To make it profitable, FoxyTag proposes a “Gold” service that allows a deeper exploration in the trust links in order to provide an even more reliable speed camera information.

The first commercial application to benefit from this high reliability is proposed by EverdreamSoft. It is called GoldRadars and works on the iPhone 3G. His name, his look and his price clearly position GoldRadars in the up-market products. EverdreamSoft’s CEO, Shaban Shaame, is convinced that the tendency to propose the cheapest speed camera warner of the market is soon over: “People attach more and more importance to reliability. Actually we already observe this new tendency for GPS navigation systems, where recognized branded applications gain market shares over free solutions.” According to Shaban Shaame, people are ready to pay more for quality: “Cheap products are more and more compared to down-market products. And people do not want to have down-market products anymore, especially if they need to trust them to signal speed cameras.” Download statistics of his application show that he is right, at least for the moment.

But is there really a significant reliability increase with this new “Gold” service? For Michel Deriaz, the responsible of the FoxyTag project, the answer is a bit more nuanced: “Lab tests show a real improvement. But in practice it is rare to have speed cameras that are badly or not signalized.” However, when we ask him which speed camera warner he uses personally the response is very clear: “I use and recommend to my friends GoldRadars. The price difference is quickly compensated by the possible speeding ticket that we avoid thanks to this increased reliability.” In other words, people that want to drive really peacefully will have to switch to up-market products when they chose a speed camera warner.

GoldRadars in action

http://www.foxytag.com/en/download.html

– Foxy