WEST VALLEY CITY, Utah — Rep. Jake Fitisemanu pulled up a chair at sat at the intersection of 3500 South and 5600 West, counting all the cars that ran red lights.
"We’ve been here about 15 minutes and we’ve seen six people run red lights," he told FOX 13 News. "Pretty blatant."
It's not hard to miss. The light changes and a car or two sails through the intersection, delaying traffic going the other way or getting an angry horn.
Rep. Fitisemanu, D-West Valley City, is proposing a bill that could put Utah on the road to bringing back red light cameras, aka "PhotoCop." That's a system that takes a photo of a vehicle running a red light and mails a traffic ticket to the address of the registered owner.
"The light that I'm looking at right now is there are four people who lost their lives here because of running red lights," he said. "Really, what I want to introduce is a proposal to study this issue, at least look at some of the big problem spots, see if technology assisted enforcement can really help to curb this issue, reduce crashes, eliminate deaths, if we can."
Red light running is a problem in Utah. Data provided to FOX 13 News on Wednesday by the Utah Department of Public Safety's Highway Safety Office found an average of 3,000 crashes each year are attributed to drivers who disregarded a traffic signal. In 2024, 127 of those crashes resulted in serious injuries and 13 deaths. In 2023, 18 people died and 114 were injured.
But "PhotoCop" has always been a controversial issue on Utah's Capitol Hill. It was banned in the 1990s over concerns about privacy and the effectiveness of technology. Over the years, Republican and Democratic lawmakers have sought to reintroduce it, but it hasn't gone anywhere.
"The technology wasn't great back then, there were limited uses back then," Rep. Fitisemanu said. "I think there's a way we can do this today in a safe way that protects the community with the consent of communities."
Drivers FOX 13 News spoke with on Wednesday had mixed opinions like lawmakers.
"I think that’s a loaded question," said Eve. "I think there should be a person behind it. I do."
Brad said he could see the benefits of it.
"There’s a lot of people that are speeding that need to be slowed down," he said.
A study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety found that cities with red light cameras had documented as much as a 40% reduction in crashes. Rep. Fitisemanu cautioned he is only seeking a study on whether Utah cities should be able to introduce them.
"We should know that running a red light is not only dangerous, but illegal, and yet we see that it's a rampant issue," he said. "It's so frequent. Sometimes it is someone that's just cutting it through that yellow sometimes it's folks who totally blow through because they're on their phone. There's so many reasons why it happens, but it's wrong and it's dangerous, no matter what the reason."
