GROVEPORT, Ohio (WCMH) — The Groveport Police Department has purchased several new traffic monitoring devices over the past few months, placing them around the community, some more visible than others.
If you’ve driven around Main Street in Groveport recently, you’ve probably noticed one of the devices. The police department is using them to better serve the community.
“When we get concerns from citizens, we want to be able to address those concerns and one of the ways we do that is with these devices,” Groveport Police Officer Josh Dillard said.
As part of the city’s Capital Projects Budget, the police department was allotted $21,000 to purchase different traffic monitoring devices.
“Which includes the small black boxes which just monitor the traffic, in addition to digital signage that also monitors traffic patterns and speeds,” Dillard said.
The devices have been placed in areas like a business district, residential neighborhood and a school zone where police receive complaints of speeding from residents.
“The black box devices are very concealed in the environment,” Dillard said. “You’ll drive by them and not even know they’re there. The speed signs that are on the trailers, those are a great deterrent.”
So, what information, if any, do these devices collect?
“So these devices do not track any personal information, they are not snapping photographs,” Dillard said.
In an example of a report generated by the devices, more than 2,400 cars over a week’s time traveled in the area where the device was set up over a week’s time.
“It gives you the days of the week and the times you would need to sit in the certain area where you’re getting the most speeders, whether they’re coming toward the device or going away, which is this graph down below here,” Dillard said. “It shows you where you’re seeing those peak times and where we would need to sit in those areas to adequately enforce traffic violations that we got from the data.”
Dillard, who has been with the department for two years, has adopted the project, saying officers can’t be everywhere at the same time, so this is another tool in the department’s toolbox.
“Traffic enforcement is one of the functions of our job, but again, we can’t be everywhere all the time, so we can put these devices, again, where we’re hearing concerns of speed and other things, and then we compile that data and then we can actually put patrol cars there,” he said. “We may not know that there are a bunch of issues until they’re brought to us and then we can address them from there.”
Drivers speeding past either of the devices won’t get a ticket. Dillard said that if they do notice an area where speeding seems to be an issue, then they’ll put an officer there to monitor, which is when tickets will be issued.
If you’d like to know more about how the devices work or request one for your Groveport neighborhood, contact the police department.
