30,000 traffic tickets issued through new system

Head of the Public Safety and Traffic Enforcement Branch (PSTEB), Assistant Commissioner of Police Gary McKenzie, has described the e-ticketing traffic system as a success.

The system, which is designed to be a more efficient and accurate alternative to traditional written traffic tickets, provides officers with the ability to issue a printed ticket on the spot. It was rolled out on December 30 last year.

"So far quite a number of traffic tickets, in fact, I believe that we have issued over 30,000 tickets with it," McKenzie told THE STAR.

An e-ticketing pilot programme that targeted Kingston and St Andrew was launched in December 2021. Some 100 smart Android devices and portable printers, which will give officers the ability to issue traffic tickets and reference driver and vehicle information, including ticket history and outstanding tickets, were given to cops. Following the successful pilot, more devices were issued. McKenzie is pleased with the results he has been seeing.

The head of the PSTEB said that once the ticket is issued, it goes directly to the various agencies, such as the Court Administration Division and the Tax Administration Jamaica. One benefit, McKenzie noted, was the immediacy with which a fake licence can be spotted.

"If the police is given a driver's licence, and the number that is imputed is not on the system, it may be that that licence is fictitious and calls for an investigation, because all licences should be on the system, and that also applies to the registration plates. So you could recover stolen motor vehicles, you could arrest persons for uttering false documents and so on," he said.

McKenzie told THE STAR that the authorities are in the process of procuring several other machines to be deployed islandwide, as it is currently only concentrated in the Kingston and St Andrew metropolitan region.

"That will go a far way of enhancing the potency of it and that is being worked on as we speak," McKenzie disclosed.