07-24-2017, 10:14 AM
Traffic signals are one of the things that drive me absolutely nutty in our region, mostly because they're pretty close to as bad as possible.
Even on intersections where a beg button is justified, even when considering only automobile traffic, they are still so far away from optimum.
Why, on a street with almost no pedestrians crossing ever does the walk light come on for 10-15 seconds? If your modelling suggests there will be no other pedestrians in that timeframe, you've just wasted 8-13 seconds of driver's time. You could have higher throughput on that intersection. More importantly to me, when the next pedestrian arrives in 30 seconds, he'll have to wait 8-13 seconds less for a walk as well.
I honestly do not understand why our lights are so badly designed.
Even on intersections where a beg button is justified, even when considering only automobile traffic, they are still so far away from optimum.
Why, on a street with almost no pedestrians crossing ever does the walk light come on for 10-15 seconds? If your modelling suggests there will be no other pedestrians in that timeframe, you've just wasted 8-13 seconds of driver's time. You could have higher throughput on that intersection. More importantly to me, when the next pedestrian arrives in 30 seconds, he'll have to wait 8-13 seconds less for a walk as well.
I honestly do not understand why our lights are so badly designed.