reduce your carbon foot print losers, or face gods wrath.
reduce your carbon foot print losers, or face gods wrath.
I hate to say this, but living in Illinois, I actually agree with Rojo... Never thought I'd see the day
I thought of local political activity for the first time in a while for the same reason.
I see the sensors in one city, and in another, the downtown is so empty most of the time with full tilt 40 second waits for zero cars.
Even if they cannot afford sensors, why not schedule the lights to flash red and yellow outside of rush hour?
Transportation engineer here. Not an expert on traffic signals, but I know some.
Smart signals exist, but the technology is expensive and can be difficult to retrofit into existing signals and controller cabinets. Sometimes, a lot of equipment has to be replaced and modernized, adding more to the cost than just updating sensors and control units. Camera-based detection combined with AI can already differentiate bikes from busses and give an appropriate amount of green time for a variety of situations. Some things the computer can't cut short, like there is a legally mandated walk time for a pedestrian to cross the street based on a pretty modest walking speed to accomodate disabled people. As long as that regulation exists, people will still have to wait a while after a runner clears the intersection in a couple seconds.
The problem is that there are a lot of old traffic signals in this country. Some are still on very simple timing plans, or have malfunctioning induction loops in the pavement that have been damged by potholes, etc. This is especially true in older cities that are not flush with revenue from a supercharged tech industry and real estate market. The equipment is partly so expensive because of the zero tolerance for failure. Working 99.99 percent of the time is good for a lot of tech. For signals, that could result in dozens of severe crashes a year at a moderately busy intersection that sees over 10,000 vehicles per day. This stuff has to be pretty much 100% for 24 hours a day 365 days a year in the full range of temperatures that can exist in a shiny metal box on the side of the road.
rojo wrote:
Do you guys actually drive? These sensors are on probably less than 10% of lights - and hardly any of the major intersections which have the longest lights - and they are stupid as hell.
If I'm the only car at a major intersection and am in the left turn lane, I do not want to sit there for 2 minutes particularly when the only red light is a red arrow. The red arrow is the most infuriating light of al. Let me be the god damn judge of whether I can turn left or not at an empty intersection.
As for fully autonomous cars, here is my big worry. Let's say the tech worked perfectl 100% of the time. If we ignore pedestrians and animals, there would be no need for lights or even street directions. And self driving would naturally be made actually illegal.
And that's what scares me. The day they take the steering wheel out of the car is the day our freeedoms are really gone.
WTF are you talking about
Precious Roy wrote:
Traffic signals serve a dual purpose. They are there both to keep people from smashing into each other at intersections, but also are "traffic calming" devices that are used to keep speeds down in residential and commercial areas. Lights are often timed to keep drivers from being able to get through multiple green lights to keep speeds down.
Why would that be necessary when you can have speed limit enfocement, red light/speed cameras etc.
Getting 'flow' at the speed limit is more beneficial and less dangerous than being stopped every second light and/or blasting away from light to beat the next one