Police officers will be able to fine drivers based on dashboard or surveillance camera recordings

Those who catch various possible violations of the traffic rules will be able to send the audio-video recordings to the police, who, based on them, but also on other evidence, will be able to sanction drivers who deviate from the rules of the Traffic Code, according to a draft ordinance under public debate. To sanction unruly drivers in traffic, the police will also be able to use road traffic monitoring data received from public road administrators.

More precisely, the project provides that “the traffic police can also find contraventions when verifying a notification regarding a possible act of non-compliance with a traffic rule by a driver of a motor vehicle, agricultural or forestry tractor or tram, the production of which was perceived by another traffic participant and captured by him in an audio-video or video recording, as the case may be”.

Practically, now an exception is introduced from the current rule, which establishes that the traffic policemen must ascertain the contraventions directly or with the help of certified technical means or technical means homologated and metrologically verified. Thus, those who witnessed the violation of some traffic rules will be able to upload the recording containing the road event, made with the dashboard camera or with the phone, for example, on a website. The notification must be made to the traffic police within the radius of which the alleged violation of the traffic rules occurred.

The following violations may be detected and sanctioned by the police, based on the video recordings received: failure to observe the meaning of the red color of the traffic light; adopting an aggressive behavior in driving vehicles on public roads; not granting the priority of passage to pedestrians engaged in the regular crossing of the public road through the specially arranged and signposted places, located in the direction of movement of the motor vehicle, the agricultural or forestry tractor or the tram; not giving the right of way to vehicles that have this right; non-compliance with overtaking rules; not stopping at the level crossing with the railway when the barriers or semi-barriers are lowered or in the process of being lowered or when the signals with red lights and/or sounds are in operation; the performance, by the motor vehicle driver, on the highway or on the expressway, of turning or reversing, driving against the direction of traffic, driving or crossing from one direction of traffic to the other through prohibited areas, respectively through the median area or the junctions between the two carriageways.

To be considered valid and taken into account by the police, a video recording will have to have: the extract of the frame from the audio-video or video footage that captures the possible contravention act perceived by the traffic participant; the date and time when the possible contravention was caught; the vehicle involved and its registration or registration number, as the case may be; the road signage of the public road sector on which the possible contravention was caught, relevant for its detection.

On the other hand, a notification will be classified directly if the registration is missing or does not include all the elements mentioned above, if the data of the person who submits the notification is missing, if he refuses to undertake, by declaration on his own responsibility, the notification formulated, but also to give details regarding the circumstances in which he discovered the possible contravention or if he reaches the police later than 30 days from the date of the discovery of the possible contravention. This measure aims to “involve civil society in the process of reporting serious violations of the road regime, in order to strengthen the degree of discipline in traffic”, as it appears in the explanatory note of the GEO project.

Drivers, also sanctioned based on surveillance camera footage

Also, the police will be able to process the road traffic monitoring data collected by the administrators of public roads of county or local interest with the help of technical means installed on the roads they manage and, if necessary, apply sanctions to drivers based on them. In these cases, the possible violation of traffic rules on public roads or in the case of the presence in traffic of some vehicles subject to confiscation, searched according to the law, or which can be used as evidence in a judicial procedure, will be checked.

The possible violation of traffic rules on public roads will concern: the maximum allowed speed limit for the vehicle category on a certain road sector; prohibition or restriction to drive a vehicle in a lane of the direction of travel; the meaning of the red color of the traffic light; prohibition to drive on public roads a vehicle whose registration is suspended; level crossing with the railway; the prohibition to adopt aggressive behavior when driving vehicles on public roads; overtaking columns of vehicles stopped at red traffic lights or at railway level crossings.

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