Wellington's most dangerous intersection proves lucrative for police as the red light camera kicks into high gear.

It's a newcomer to the game but Wellington's only red light camera is not just leading the pack nationally - it's lapping it.

Police have three red-light cameras in New Zealand - two in Auckland and one on the intersection of Karo Dr and Victoria St in Wellington.

But Wellington's camera easily eclipsed both, issuing more than $220,000 in tickets in a single year.

The other two - at the intersection of Lambie Dr and the South Western Motorway and Ti Rakau Dr and Te Irirangi Dr in Manukau - made a little over $180,000 in 2016 combined.

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Details for the first months of 2017 become sketchy as some cameras seemingly recorded no tickets in some months but data for June 2017 shows 89 and 22 tickets in the Auckland cameras and 161 at the corner of Karo Dr and Victoria St.

KEVIN STENT/STUFF Karo Dr, at the corner of Victoria St, in Wellington has New Zealand's most snap-happy red-light camera.

The news does not surprise Mark Quinn, who owns Villas on Victoria, right beside the intersection.

While the building was being built he saw three crashes that he believed were directly-related to red-light runners. In one, a red-light runner got smashed into a pole and cars twice ended up in the small garden area outside the building.

"A lot of people go through the red lights even with the cameras there," he said.

ROSS GIBLIN/STUFF The Wellington camera in question.

He believed the syncing of the two sets of lights - at Karo and Victoria then Karo and Willis - was partly to blame as people believed if they pushed their luck on the first set of lights they would be able to get through the orange on the second "and I'm on the motorway, gone".

Road policing inspector Peter McKennie would not comment on driver behaviour but said there were no plans to educate people more about the Wellington intersection. Money gathered from the tickets went into the general government fund - not directly to police, he said.

Automobile Association road safety spokesman Dylan Thomsen said red-light cameras were the most popular road safety enforcement measure there was.

ROSS GIBLIN/STUFF Vehicles running red lights on Karo Dr and Victoria St.

A survey of its members found 89 per cent of people wanted more of them. AA was also calling for more.

There was no one reason Wellington was so bad but various factors - including traffic volumes, intersection design, or people simply not wanting to wait for another green light - could play a part.

"There have been serious crashes there in the past with people going through red lights."

But any set of traffic lights in the country would have red-light runners, he said.

Road safety campaigner Clive Matthew-Wilson, editor of the Dog and Lemon car review website, supported the use of red-light cameras.

"Running a red light is a really stupid thing to do. There's no excuse; you can proceed on orange, but to roar through a light once it's red could cost you your life, or the life of someone else."

Studies consistently showed that red-light cameras were highly effective at reducing intersection accidents, he said.

"There is a huge difference between red-light cameras and speed cameras. It is entirely possible to innocently exceed the speed limit. You can't innocently drive through a red light - it is red or it isn't."