Drivers beware: Wigan Pier speed camera back weeks after sabotage

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This week the safety device on Wallgate, next to Wigan Pier, was reinstated following a vandal attack on its predecessor at the end of last year.

Already the device filmed on CCTV being disabled by a man wielding an angle grinder on Spring Road, Orrell, around the same time, has been reinstated.

Faces and places: pictures of Miles Lane in Shevington and Appley Bridge spannin... ^[2] A new speed camera has been installed on Wallgate next to Wigan Pier

Cameras on Whelley and Warrington Road more recently came under attack and they too will eventually have replacements, angry transport chiefs saying that the work will cost the taxpayer £100,000.

One man was arrested after the Warrington Road incident on January 6 on suspicion of criminal damage.

The 58-year-old – not a 67-year-old as initially reported by police – remains on bail as investigations and officers confirmed today that no further arrests had been in connection with that incident or the three other crimes.

In the case of the Whelley incident, the felled camera pole collapsed into the main road, a hazard worsened by the fact it is near the brow of a hill and there were wintry conditions at the time.

What some seem to regard as heroic, anti-establishment vigilantism has come under severe attack from both the authorities and residents saying that lives are being put at risk by incidents like the one in Whelley as does the removal of devices designed to protect other road users from people who dangerously break the speed limit.

Police say that 27 per cent of fatal collisions in this country were caused by speeding in 2022, with many more seriously injured for the same reason.

Last autumn it was announced that Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) had signed a contract with Jenoptik UK to upgrade many cameras across the region, including several sites in Wigan.

The state-of-the-art technology can catch motorists speeding in both directions at the same time without the need for road markings and there is no flash either.

They have since been installed in many parts of the borough.

Anyone with information on any of the attacks is asked to ring police on 101 or the freephone Crimestoppers line anonymously on 0800 555111.

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