Average speed cameras to flash drivers 24/7 in pilot project

Average speed cameras on seven stretches of motorway in Belgium will now systematically operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week, justice minister Vincent Van Quickenborne has announced.

The pilot project will see anyone travelling at 129 km/h or more, taking into account the technical margin of error of the camera, receive a fine. Until now, there was an additional “margin of tolerance”, which meant some speeding drivers were not sanctioned. Some cameras were also switched off at certain times of the day. 

The seven average speed cameras can be found in Wallonia on:

• the E42 Fleurus - Jemeppe-sur-Sambre in the direction of Namur,
• the E19 Seneffe - La Louvière in the direction of Mons
• the E42 Bernissart - Péruwelz in the direction of Tournai,
• the E420 Charleroi - Pont-à-Celles in the direction of Nivelles
• and the E411 Assesse - La Bruyère in the direction of Brussels

and in Flanders on:

• the E19 in the Craeybeckxtunnel in the direction of Brussels
• and the E314 Lummen - Halen in the direction of Leuven.

This pilot project is part of the creation of a central prosecutor's office for road safety. It will make it possible to identify with precision the real additional workload that it represents for the police and the justice system for the cameras to operate continuously and without a tolerance range.

Currently, this tolerance range (not to be confused with the technical margin of error of the camera which remains unchanged, at 129 km/h), as well as the deactivation of the cameras at certain times, makes it possible to limit the influx of fines for speeding, and not to exceed the processing capacity of the prosecutor’s office.

In order to cope with the increased number of cases, the justice department is committed to strengthening the capacity of the "Cross-border" digital recovery platform. By the end of 2022, 45 employees will be recruited into the prosecution office and 30 employees into the courts.

The creation of this central prosecution office should make it possible to reduce the administrative burden of the police prosecution. Currently, 80% of traffic fines are immediate collections. Most of the time, these are simple cases, but they take a long time. By centralising the administrative processing of traffic fines, capacity will be freed up in the police offices to focus on the most serious offences.

As regards to the police, additional resources will be provided for the recording of offences. The procedure to recruit 35 people is under way. In addition, some tasks will be automated. Staff are currently wasting a lot of time processing and verifying data, so the goal is to fully automate the process in the long term.

The activation of average speed cameras – which calculate the speed travelled over a stretch of road, instead of at a fixed point – is continuing. For the moment, 72 active section speed cameras are connected to the regional police processing centres. In the coming months, 36 additional cameras will be activated, 12 in Wallonia and 24 in Flanders.

With 44 road deaths per million inhabitants per year, road fatalities in Belgium are higher than the European average. Research shows that average speed cameras reduce the number of fatalities by at least 56%. Fixed speed cameras reduce the number of accidents by 20%.