I saw a pylon

You saw one of ours.

It does not know who you are. It followed a shape across the intersection and gave that shape a number. The number is retired when you leave and never given to anything else.

Fig 01

A pylon on its pole, seen from the sideA side view line drawing. A pole stands at the left, with a short arm at the top. A long sealed tube is mounted sideways on that arm, out over the road. The underside of the tube has a window for the lamp and a window for the sensors. A dashed cone runs from the sensor window down to the road below. One arrow leaves the top of the tube and points away from it. Five numbered markers match the numbered list under the drawing.12345
  1. Tube. Sealed and bolted to the pole. The counting happens in here, not somewhere else.
  2. Radio. It sends out. Nobody can log in to it or ask it about you.
  3. Sensors. A camera and others, looking down at one piece of road.
  4. Lamp. It is a street light first.
  5. Pole. An ordinary light pole.
Design drawing, not to scale. Nothing is installed on a public road, so there is no photograph to show.

01 / The pylon

What it is

A street light that also measures traffic. It counts what moves through the intersection and how fast. The city can use that to adjust the traffic lights and check that work it paid for actually happened.

02 / The denials

What it never does

Yes, there is a camera in it. We keep the pictures for far less time than the counts.

No plate reader

Nothing in it turns a plate into a name.

No face recognition

Nothing in it was ever built to recognize a face.

No history

Nobody can ask it where your car has been.

03 / Lookup

There is nothing to look up yet

The ID printed on the pylon tells you who owns this road and who approved the pylon standing on it.

Nothing is installed on a public road yet.

When the first pylon goes in, you can look its ID up here. If you are looking at a box on a pole today, it is not ours: tell us what you saw.

04 / Requests

Can police get this?

They can buy footage of a place and a time. We publish every request, whether we grant it or refuse it. They cannot ask where you went, because nothing here can answer that.

How this worksWhat police can buy

I do not want it there

Fair, and we would rather hear it. Tell us and we log it and respond. The agency responsible for the road decides what stands on it, so tell them as well.

If it is leaning, dark, or damaged, report it. Please do not climb the pole.