Despite Brian Gugler's inventive scheme being roundly criticized as unseemly, might there be another way to monetize heavy vehicular traffic (30,000/40,000 per day)?
What about an ALPR camera recording and selling plates to the various national databases? Even if you only could get a tenth of a cent per plate it would be $10,000 a year!
How much does a reliable medium-range ALPR system cost, $2000-$5000? More?
Is it legal? I haven't found a reliable price per random plate, but when a plates matches a car to be repoed, $200 is not uncommon. Does anybody know what a plate would fetch?
Of course getting 30,000 plates a day at Gugler's place is not realistic due to the fact that you likely miss 1/2 the people getting off before they get to you, plus its multi-lane, plus close traffic makes it hard to see plates, plus weather...
But there's plenty of people who live near highways that would likely have way better capture rates.
Next time you're out and about, if you see a prime location, maybe strike an ADT style deal: free security system for the rights to put a crime-fighting ALPR system on their property...