"Expanding automatic surveillance in Estonia is in the work plans of the Estonian Road Administration," Krisela Uussaar, manager for traffic organization defices at the Estonian Road Administration, told BNS on Friday. "This year, we began operating speed cameras on roads belonging to municipalities."

This spring, the Road Administration was given control of two speed cameras at an intersection in Tallinn's Kristiine District.

"We are now working toward expanding automatic surveillance to include running red traffic lights, which has thus far not been done in Estonia," Uussaar said. "Since recording the running of a red traffic light can be started within a shorter time technically and legally, we have chosen traffic lights as our next step."

The official added that the following step would be recording a vehicle's average speed on a section of road on the basis of the time it takes a vehicle to cover the distance between two speed cameras as well as checking for misuse of public transport lanes.

In order to begin doing the former, however, several laws, including those related to residents' privacy, would have to be changed.

"In addition to the Personal Data Protection Act, the Traffic Act and several other related laws would also have to be changed for that," Uussar explained. "The Estonian Road Administration has not initiated amendments to said legislative acts yet. A prior in-depth analysis of the subject is required with regard to the rights of citizens, technical possibilities, and keeping in mind the sectoral objectives and activities of different authorities."

She added that the Estonian Road Administration cannot estimate at this point when the relevant changes in legislation could take effect.

The Estonian Road Administration has installed 63 speed camera booths on Estonian roads and is entitled to use two speed camera booths at the Kristiine intersection in Tallinn. A total of 47 speed measuring systems can be operated in these booths.