Are There Still Red Light Cameras in Hollywood, FL? What Those Intersection Cameras Actually Are
- Daniel Reinfeld
- 14 hours ago
- 8 min read
If you've driven through Hollywood and wondered whether that box mounted above the traffic light is watching you, you're not alone — this is one of the most common questions we hear. The short answer: Hollywood's red-light ticket camera program ended years ago, but there's a different, currently active camera program you should know about, and most of what you're actually seeing above intersections isn't an enforcement camera at all.
Does Hollywood Still Issue Red-Light Camera Tickets?
No — not currently, as far as public records show. Here's the history:
Hollywood launched a red-light camera enforcement program around 2011, contracting with a vendor (American Traffic Solutions) to issue $158 citations to drivers photographed running red lights.
In 2014–2015, a Florida appeals court ruled that Hollywood's program improperly delegated police authority to a private vendor — the vendor, not an officer, was effectively deciding who got a ticket. Hollywood stopped issuing citations after that ruling.
Facing mounting legal setbacks and a program that was costing the city roughly $50,000 a month rather than paying for itself, Hollywood commissioners voted to terminate the camera vendor contract entirely.
By 2018, Hollywood was publicly named — alongside Boca Raton and Delray Beach — as a city with no plans to bring red-light ticket cameras back.
We could not find any indication Hollywood has restarted a red-light citation program since. If you want absolute certainty for a specific date or intersection (for example, if you're disputing an old citation or need to know whether a specific camera was active on a specific day), the most reliable move is a direct call to Hollywood PD's Traffic Unit or the city's Public Works/Traffic Engineering Division — camera programs can be revived, and this is the kind of detail worth confirming directly rather than relying on any article, including this one.
Former red-light camera intersections (pre-2015, historical reference only):
A1A and Sheridan Street
I-95 and Sheridan Street
Federal Highway and Pembroke Road
Northbound SR-7 (US-441) at Sheridan Street
Eastbound and westbound Hollywood Boulevard at SR-7
Northbound SR-7 at Hollywood Boulevard
Northbound SR-7 at Washington Street
These are no longer believed to be active for red-light ticket enforcement.
What Hollywood DOES Actively Run: School Zone Speed Cameras
This is a separate, currently active program, and it's easy to confuse with red-light cameras since both mail citations based on photo evidence.
Hollywood's School Zone Safety Camera Program covers 33 public, private, and charter schools citywide, launched at the start of the 2024 school year under Florida Statute 316.0776.
A violation triggers at 11+ mph over the posted speed limit, enforced 30 minutes before school starts, throughout the school day, and until 30 minutes after school ends.
Fines are $100 civil penalties — no license points, no insurance impact.
Some schools confirmed with active cameras include Apollo Middle School, Attucks Middle School, Colbert Elementary, Driftwood Elementary, Driftwood Middle School, Orangebrook Elementary, Sheridan Hills Elementary, Chaminade High School, Boulevard Heights Elementary, Championship Academy, Hollywood Academy of Arts, Hollywood Central Elementary, Hollywood Hills Elementary, Hollywood Hills High School, Hollywood Park Elementary, International School of Broward, International Studies Academy, Little Flower School, McArthur High School, McNicol Middle School, Nativity School, Oakridge Elementary, and Stirling Elementary, along with several additional charter schools. This list is compiled from city announcements and a city ordinance — for the complete, current list of all 33 school zones, check the city's official School Zone Safety Camera Program page directly, since school assignments can be updated.
Even during summer break, some cameras stay live on modified hours (for example, certain elementary schools ran mornings through mid-July during a recent summer session).
Program administration:
In person: 1954 North 30th Road, Suite A, Hollywood, FL 33021 (Monday–Friday, 9 a.m.–5 p.m.)
Mail: City of Hollywood State of Florida, c/o Photo Speed Citation Processing Center, 4411 Oakwood Drive, Chattanooga, TN 37416
Questions: 855-252-0086
Important distinction: these systems are designed to document speeding violations — not to continuously record every collision. A school-zone camera may have captured a vehicle or a crash near it, but availability depends on the camera's direction, whether it was actively triggered by a speed violation at that moment, and how the vendor's retention system handles non-violation footage. Don't assume a crash near a school-zone camera was necessarily recorded.
Private Surveillance Footage: Often Your Best Bet
In Hollywood, private video is frequently more likely to capture a crash than any government traffic camera. Worth checking (or requesting a preservation letter for) after any incident:
Gas stations
Restaurants and stores
Shopping centers
Hotels
Condominiums and apartment buildings
Parking garages
Banks
Doorbell cameras
Dash cameras
Buses, rideshare vehicles, and delivery vehicles
The catch: private systems often overwrite recordings within days, sometimes faster than any of the government retention windows covered in our other guides. If you believe a nearby business or resident may have caught your accident on camera, a preservation request should go out immediately — and it should identify the exact intersection, date, time range, direction of travel, and vehicles involved so the business can actually locate the right footage before it's overwritten.
FDOT/FL511 Traffic-Monitoring Cameras
The road owner matters here. A camera on a federal highway or state road — I-95, US-1, A1A, Florida's Turnpike, State Road 7 — is typically controlled by FDOT, not the City of Hollywood, while a camera at a city or county intersection is maintained locally.
FDOT operates publicly viewable FL511 cameras at several Hollywood-area locations, including Young Circle, Hollywood Boulevard (multiple points), I-95, Florida's Turnpike, A1A, Pembroke Road, and State Road 7 (US-441). These provide real-time traffic views for FL511.com and the FL511 app — but FL511 explicitly states that its displayed video and images are neither stored nor recorded. That means the mere existence of an FL511 camera near a crash does not mean archived accident footage is available anywhere. There's no rolling buffer, no clip to request — the feed is live-only.
Where Are FDOT Traffic Cameras Located in Hollywood?
Current FL511 data identifies publicly viewable cameras at locations including:
Hollywood Boulevard near South Rainbow Drive, North 35th Avenue, Park Road (both directions), and west of I-95
Young Circle (US-1/Federal Highway)
I-95 southbound before the Pembroke Road off-ramp
Florida's Turnpike near Hollywood Boulevard (several mile-marker points)
A1A northbound at Sheridan Street
Pembroke Road at Dixie Highway
US-441/State Road 7 at Johnson Street, Sheridan Street, and Griffin Road
(Camera-count and exact ID details can change as FDOT updates its network — treat this as a general location guide rather than a live, guaranteed inventory.)
What May Still Be Requestable
Even though the live FL511 feed itself isn't archived, other records tied to the same corridor may still exist:
Hollywood Police body-camera or patrol-car footage
School-zone enforcement-camera footage (if the incident coincided with an active violation trigger)
Incident-specific footage manually saved by an agency at the time
Broward County traffic-system records
Private business, condominium, hotel, or residential video
Bus, rideshare, delivery-vehicle, witness, or dash-camera recordings
The key distinction: the live FL511 feed is not recorded, but a separately preserved video file or incident recordcreated by an agency or private party during a specific incident is a different thing entirely — and that's what's actually worth requesting.
What About Cameras on Florida's Turnpike?
Florida's Turnpike has its own traffic-monitoring cameras near Hollywood Boulevard and other stretches through the city. Like the rest of the FL511 network, the images displayed to the public are not stored or recorded. However, Florida's Turnpike Enterprise separately monitors its roadway through its own traffic-management system, and depending on the incident, operators may have preserved a screenshot, an incident-specific video clip, or related traffic-management records that aren't part of the public live feed.
A preservation and public-records request for a Turnpike-adjacent incident should go directly to Florida's Turnpike Enterprise — not just FDOT District 4 generally. Potentially useful records beyond camera footage include traffic-management event logs, operator notes, camera screenshots, Road Ranger dispatch records, incident timelines, message-board activation logs, and other SunGuide/intelligent-transportation-system records. Florida Highway Patrol dash-camera, body-camera, dispatch, and crash-investigation records should be requested separately from FHP.
Florida's Turnpike Enterprise public records contact:
Phone: 407-264-3171
Office: Florida's Turnpike Enterprise, Office of General Counsel, Milepost 263, Turkey Lake Service Plaza, Building 5315, Ocoee, FL 34761
What Is That Camera-Looking Thing Above Every Intersection?
Here's the part that trips up most drivers: the majority of devices mounted at intersections are not enforcement cameras at all. There are three common types, and they all get mistaken for red-light cameras:
Device | What it actually does | Does it record/store footage? |
Video vehicle detection camera (VIVDS) | Detects when a car is waiting at the stop line so the signal knows to change — this replaced the older in-pavement induction loop sensors | No — used live only, not stored for later viewing |
FDOT/FL511 pan-tilt-zoom traffic monitoring camera | Lets city/state traffic engineers and the public view congestion in real time via FL511.com | No — FL511 states these feeds are neither stored nor recorded |
Small black box with a light on the signal arm | Usually an infrared emergency-vehicle preemption sensor that turns the light green for an approaching fire truck or ambulance | No — it's a signal receiver, not a camera |
None of these three exist to write you a ticket, and none of them retain footage the way a body-worn camera or a dedicated enforcement camera does.
Are Any of the Cameras Fake?
We could not find any confirmed source indicating Hollywood uses non-functional "dummy" cameras for deterrence. Some jurisdictions elsewhere have reportedly used decoy boxes historically, but we don't have anything specific to Hollywood either way — so we're not going to assert this as fact. If you're curious about a specific intersection, the city's Traffic Engineering Division would be the place to ask.
So — How Do You Actually Request Footage?
Given everything above, here's the realistic path depending on what you're looking for:
A school-zone speed camera citation: The footage tied to your citation is provided with the Notice of Violation itself. Disputes and record requests for that specific violation go through the vendor process referenced on the citation — not a general public records request. Remember: these systems document violations, not every collision, so don't assume footage exists just because a camera was nearby.
A crash near an intersection with only vehicle-detection or FL511 monitoring cameras: Footage is not retained — FL511 confirms its feeds are neither stored nor recorded, and VIVDS cameras are live-view only. There is nothing to request from these systems.
A crash where Hollywood PD responded and a body-worn or dash camera captured it: That's a standard police records request — see our companion article on requesting Hollywood police reports and body-worn camera footage.
An incident on I-95, US-1, SR-7, or another state road: The live FL511 feed itself isn't archived, but FDOT or the relevant operating agency may have separately preserved incident-specific records — check with FDOT District 4 for state roads generally.
An incident on Florida's Turnpike specifically: Direct your preservation and public-records request to Florida's Turnpike Enterprise directly (contact info above) rather than FDOT District 4 generally, since the Turnpike operates its own separate traffic-management system.
Anywhere near a business, hotel, condo, gas station, or residence: Private surveillance is often your best chance at real footage. Send a preservation request immediately, with the exact intersection, date, time range, direction of travel, and vehicles involved — private systems can overwrite in days.
Bottom Line
If someone tells you Hollywood still has red-light ticket cameras, that's outdated information based on a program that ended roughly a decade ago. The active camera enforcement in Hollywood today is the school zone speed program — and most of what you see hanging over an ordinary intersection is just helping the signal do its job, not watching for a ticket.
Need Help With a Citation or an Accident Near a Camera-Monitored Intersection?
Whether you're dealing with a school-zone speed citation, trying to track down footage after a crash, or just trying to understand what evidence exists for your case, we can help sort out what's actually available and how to get it. Call Dan: (954) 923-6110.
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