Where Roving Speed Cameras Are Headed

The next wave of automated traffic control in Montgomery County will take a different approach -- it's fluid, not fixed -- and that may mean expanded ways to catch you speeding.

Roving speed cameras will patrol 18 additional locations throughout the county, moving around the length of a “corridor,” as opposed to patrolling a fixed location. There are 67 roadways in the program and for Germantown include:

• Cinnamon Drive, from Mateny to Clopper Road
• Darnestown Road, from Haddonfield Lane to Germantown Road
• Father Hurley Boulevard, from Middlebrook to Germantown Road, and from Wisteria to Crystal Rock Drive

“When people turn on the road, they know that that road is a speed camera corridor road,” said Capt. Thomas Didone, director of the police department’s traffic division. “And instead of looking for the camera, they just respect the speed limit on the entire stretch of the road.”

Portable camera units will be used to monitor the corridors, moving around and occupying different roads and different points on a particular road, as opposed to one designated speed camera location. 

The locations were chosen based on data from current speed camera locations and on resident feedback, said Officer Janelle Smith, a spokesperson for the police.

“People can just call and say, ‘I suggest that you have one here,' and they send officers out to monitor that location for a little while,” Smith said. “If people really are speeding, they can choose to put a speed camera there.”

In early May, the portable camera units and mobile vans were projected to start patrolling the corridors within two weeks. 

Drivers will not be cited during the first week of deployment, but a flash will be seen.

After the first week, tickets of $40 will be issued to motorists who are clocked going 11 miles or more above the speed limit.

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Germantown Patch Editor Tiffany Arnold contributed to this story.