Red light: the $500 fine and suspension after three offences

It is the 2026 law that clarified how traffic-light offences are counted. The amended subsection carries three figures: three hundred dollars for violating the traffic light provisions, five hundred if you ran the red light without stopping, and a three-year licence suspension if you reoffend three times within that licence’s validity period. That last phrase — within the validity period — is what the law came to make precise.

The law addresses every driver. It does not distinguish by licence category or vehicle type in the amended subsection’s text. The fault is administrative; what changes with the conduct is the fine’s amount, and what triggers the suspension is reoffending on three occasions within the licence’s validity period.

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1. 1

   Step 1: The three times are counted within your licence’s validity

   It is what this law came to clarify, so it goes first. The amended subsection provides that “in the event the person reoffends on three (3) occasions within their driver’s licence validity period, the licence shall be suspended for a term of three (3) years.” The time frame is that licence’s validity, not an open-ended count.

2. 2

   Step 2: Three hundred dollars, or five hundred if you did not stop

   The law separates two behaviours with two amounts. “Every driver who violates this Article’s provisions on traffic lights shall incur an administrative fault and shall be sanctioned with a fine of three hundred (300) dollars; if they do so in a manner that runs the red light without having stopped, they shall be sanctioned with a fine of five hundred (500) dollars.”

3. 3

   Step 3: The suspension lasts three years

   The term is worth being clear about because it is not symbolic: once the third offence within the validity period is met, the licence “shall be suspended for a term of three (3) years.”

4. 4

   Step 4: It is an administrative fault, not a crime

   The text expressly qualifies it: whoever violates the traffic light provisions “shall incur an administrative fault.” That places the matter in the terrain of traffic fines and not the criminal one, and it is a useful fact before assuming consequences the law does not impose.

5. 5

   Step 5: Which agencies must regulate, and in how long

   The law distributes the task and puts a clock on it: “The Secretary of the Department of Transportation and Public Works and the Superintendent of the Puerto Rico Police, as well as any other agency or instrumentality of the Government of Puerto Rico, shall have a period of no more than one hundred eighty (180) days to establish the regulations necessary to fulfil this Act’s purposes.”

6. 6

   Step 6: Since when it governs

   The law gives no grace period: “This Act shall be in force at the moment of its approval.” The certified copy we read carries the Department of State certification dated March 10, 2026.

This law creates no procedure: it sets amounts and the recidivism rule inside Article 8.02 of the Vehicle and Traffic Act. To check and pay fines, the guides on checking fines and paying fines explain the CESCO and AutoExpreso channels. For licence renewal, that has its own guide here. If what worries you is a suspension already notified, this law does not describe the procedure to contest it and we do not invent one.

• Believing the three offences are counted for life: the law counts them within the licence’s validity period.
• Assuming every traffic light fault costs the same: it is three hundred (300) dollars generally and five hundred (500) if the red light was run without stopping.
• Thinking the suspension is a matter of months: the term the law sets is three (3) years.
• Treating it as a crime: the text expressly qualifies it as an administrative fault.
• Leaving fines unattended thinking they do not count: recidivism is what triggers the suspension.
• Looking in this law for the procedure to contest: it carries none, and we do not invent one here.

These are the government pages this guide is based on.

• Departamento de Transportación y Obras Públicas (DTOP)

  DTOP

  bvirtualogp.pr.gov