April 10,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, NJ.COM is reporting that casual commuter conversations on light rail trains are being recorded by NJ Transit.
NJT has long held the belief that video and audio surveillance systems are designed to make riders more secure and that
the on-board cameras and audio surveillance systems are needed to fight crime and maintain security.
In recent years NJT has installed video surveillance on transit buses and video and audio devices have already been installed on River Line light rail vehicles and are currently being installed on the Hudson-Bergen and Newark Light Rail.
According to the Port Authority ,PATH trains also have on-board cameras to monitor riders, which was a built in feature of the new PA-5 cars that replaced older trains.
While NJT claims commuter rail trains are not equipped with surveillance devices.We could not get a confirmation to the extent of which bus riders were under surveillance.
According to Transit all light rail vehicles that are equipped with surveillance have signs informing customers of their presence.So the question arises does on-board surveillance go too far when the agency records everything passengers are saying, without telling customers how long they keep or who has access to the recordings?
We are not sure , what do you think?
Disgusting. It is one thing to have video. There are NJT employees and passengers who get attacked and video is a key to deterring crimes and solving them. BUT there is no justification for audio. Maybe if there was audio by the driver for situations where the driver claims he was verbally assaulted but there is no justification for audio recordings in the back of buses or trains. It is creepy and wrong.