SANTIAGO — Chile’s new speed-enforcement system has hit an extraordinary bottleneck: only 214 certified reviewers are available to check radar evidence from 1,840 cameras, according to figures shared by the transport ministry. The shortfall has put 74,300 potential citations on hold and prompted officials to pause the issuing of fines from the affected network.
The rule, introduced on 1 September, requires a trained person to confirm that radar software has read a vehicle’s movement correctly before a ticket can be sent. A surge in flagged traffic scenes and a slow certification course left the ministry needing nearly three times as many reviewers as it had, Peter Bartoš, a regional programme coordinator, said in an interview.
A human check, with no humans
The software is designed to interpret motion in traffic scenes, separating a vehicle’s direction and speed from nearby movement. But the new rule followed complaints that unusual lane changes and vehicles travelling close together could produce misleading readings. The system can flag a scene; it cannot, under the policy, approve a fine by itself.
Bartoš said the ministry had expected to certify 620 reviewers by the end of August. Just 286 passed the first examination, and 72 later left the programme or moved to other public duties. “The cameras kept working; our ability to turn their readings into lawful notices did not,” he said.
In Valparaíso, transport researcher Alison Barnard said the staffing gap exposed a weakness in the government’s timetable, not a flaw that could be fixed by switching the software back on. She has reviewed sample radar scenes for a public technical panel. “A machine can point to a moment. Someone still has to decide what that moment means,” she said.
The cameras kept working; our ability to turn their readings into lawful notices did not.
Peter Bartoš, regional programme coordinator
Jolayemi Bamisebi-Tella, who drives a delivery van between Santiago’s eastern suburbs, said the pause had left motorists unsure whether old notices would arrive later. He received an automated warning in early September, then heard nothing further. “People are asking whether the rules count, whether they can appeal, and whether a bill will suddenly turn up,” he said.
The cost of the pause
The ministry says existing penalties already issued remain valid, while unreviewed cases will be checked before any notice goes out. A technical team will publish a region-by-region backlog on 30 September. Officials have also requested CLP 4.2 billion (about €4.2 million) for extra training and temporary reviewers, a sum now drawing scrutiny in the lower house.
Lawmaker Manfred Fritz, who sits on its transport committee, said the government had announced a high-tech enforcement drive without first building the workforce it depended on. He wants a public count of overturned radar readings before the programme expands. “If the state asks drivers to trust an automated system, it must show that a real person can check its work,” he said.
The ministry says a second certification course will begin on 5 October, with a target of 400 additional reviewers by December. Bartoš warned that passing the exam is only part of the fix: reviewers also need supervised practice with difficult scenes, including dense traffic and vehicles crossing between lanes.
For now, cameras continue recording traffic while the queue grows. The government has not said when citation processing will return to normal, or whether motorists whose cases are cleared later will receive extra time to appeal. That uncertainty, Barnard said, is turning a technical staffing problem into a test of public confidence.
