Do a round trip on an 850 yard stretch of road in Langley Hill in Reading, Berkshire, UK at 31 MPH and you could face six speed cameras dealing out £360 (US $625) in fines and 18 license demerit points, enough for an instant driving ban. Four fixed speed cameras were joined by a pair of mobile speed camera vans, with half monitoring each direction of travel. Scottsdale, Arizona has a permanent six camera trap monitoring a far larger 7.8-mile stretch of road.

"With road safety failing to improve we desperately need to move away from this one-track road safety policy," said Association of British Drivers spokesman Mark McArthur-Christie. "We have a system which appears to believe a new speed limit enforced by a camera is the answer to all our road safety problems. I only wish it was that simple -- the causes of crashes certainly aren't."

Speed camera operator Dan Campsall of the Thames Valley Safer Roads Partnership suggested to The Mirror that the fixed cameras were not working, saying, "We have a lot of camera sites, many not loaded all of the time."

The move comes as the UK Department for Transport has signaled plans to install 233 more speed cameras across the country, ending a temporary moratorium on new ticket cameras.