I don't (yet) have a ticket but I'm paranoid about these cameras having gotten my first and only ticket of any kind from one of them a few months ago. Now every common situation I run into has me worried about getting another ticket. I live in California where the cameras are popping up everywhere. Here's the latest situation that has me worried:
I was approaching a camera-controlled signal in a lane where one must turn right. The light was green. The speed limit was 30mph. The car ahead of me stopped during his turn and while the light was green, I'm not sure why but I believe it was because there were vehicles or pedestrians ahead of him on the cross street. I came to a complete stop and waited. The light was still green when I stopped. The light turned yellow, and at this point the other driver finally began to clear the intersection. Faced with a choice between trying to complete my turn or waiting, I waited through the entire yellow, and then waited while the light was red for several seconds while opposing traffic turned left through the same intersection. When the intersection finally cleared and there was no other traffic, I completed my turn against the red. There was traffic behind me waiting to turn so I felt I had to turn to avoid impeding the flow of traffic.
The thing is, I'm not sure that I was stopped at the "limit line". Can I get a ticket for what I did? It seemed to be one of those damned if you do, damned if you don't situations. I would argue that, if my vehicle was past the limit line, I obviously crossed while the light was green, and therefore did not violate the law against running a red light, and was entitled to complete my turn, even though it took many seconds to do so. From my stopped position I was not blocking any cross traffic.
Incidentally this is just one of many ordinary situations that arise every day and that before these doggone cameras started to pop up, I wouldn't have given a second thought to. Arg!

