Traffic lights. 95% of the time useless. Discuss
Discussion
In particular, I tend to drive often in the early hours of the morning. And I get really pissed off sitting at a set of traffic lights, uselessly changing colours, when there's absolutely no requirement for them at that particular location at that moment in time. This has lead me to form the opinion that MANY traffic lights are in fact completely useless, and actually cause congestion rather than prevent it. I suppose we've all come across the failed traffic light that amazingly hasn't resulted in traffic crash mayhem, but has turned a previously notorious junction into an easy flowing one. I've yet to resort to actually jumping an early morning light, but my patience is wearing thin.
At certain hours of the day I would agree that they are all useless however I believe that during rush hour most serve a good purpose. There are some which are crap though and make things worse, personally I'm a fan of the mini roundabout but then the flow gets ruined by a terrible driver who does/doesn't pull out at the right times.
If you're sitting there and they're changing colour then maybe you should go at some point 
But yes, you're right. IMHO a large portion of traffic lights would allow traffic to flow more freely if they were only active for high traffic periods.
A bit like those boards they put up to stop you maintaining progress on entrance into a roundabout. Pisses me off and quite frankly I'd have thought the government would be against all that as its less economic to slow down and speed up as opposed to maintaining a constant speed.
But yes, you're right. IMHO a large portion of traffic lights would allow traffic to flow more freely if they were only active for high traffic periods.
A bit like those boards they put up to stop you maintaining progress on entrance into a roundabout. Pisses me off and quite frankly I'd have thought the government would be against all that as its less economic to slow down and speed up as opposed to maintaining a constant speed.
CrowCrow00 said:
I work night shift and I swear every single time I approach a green light in the dead of night it turns red.
That's because you're not flashing your lights at them Geographical location plays a part too.
Overly roundabout on the 525 into Chester is a pain but when the lights fail the tail backs disappear. Same thing happens in Wrexham, 10 miles up the road and everyone sits there like frozen rabbits in a confused blind panic.
dave_s13 said:
Failed lights at an otherwise busy junction are brilliant, you get through so much quicker.
My experience is largely the opposite - that you get through a little faster if you're on the right road approaching the junction and a LOT slower if you're on the wrong one. I can't say I've ever had a problem with having to wait a few seconds off-peak for the lights to change. Then again, I don't live in the middle of a city which I suppose would be worse.
0000 said:
Perhaps there's a junction somewhere I can't think of that would benefit from them. They certainly have their uses where a road is down to the width of a single vehicle and oncoming ones are unsighted. But I'm pretty certain there isn't a roundabout that needs them.
Generally I agree that they're sill in roundabouts, but I have come across ones that don't have them where I've thought they'd be useful. There's one near where I used to live whose flow of traffic is such that one little entrance onto the roundabout is almost impossible to get out of in the rush hour. I've been stuck there for over 10 minutes before without there being a gap. Even if the lights only went to that phase when you got out of your car and pressed a button like on a pedestrian crossing that'd be an improvement.
The Moose said:
A bit like those boards they put up to stop you maintaining progress on entrance into a roundabout. Pisses me off and quite frankly I'd have thought the government would be against all that as its less economic to slow down and speed up as opposed to maintaining a constant speed.
But but but! Slowing down means fewer children are killed. Surely you don't like killing children?Warwickshire County Council, in a previously unheard of bout of usefulness, are actually working on a couple of roundabouts on my commute to try and get traffic flowing through them quicker - though I believe the overriding motivation is stopping the traffic leaving the M40 at J14 queueing on the carriageway.
joewilliams said:
The Moose said:
A bit like those boards they put up to stop you maintaining progress on entrance into a roundabout. Pisses me off and quite frankly I'd have thought the government would be against all that as its less economic to slow down and speed up as opposed to maintaining a constant speed.
But but but! Slowing down means fewer children are killed. Surely you don't like killing children?Warwickshire County Council, in a previously unheard of bout of usefulness, are actually working on a couple of roundabouts on my commute to try and get traffic flowing through them quicker - though I believe the overriding motivation is stopping the traffic leaving the M40 at J14 queueing on the carriageway.
The ones that hack me off the most are the ones at the bottom of motorway slip roads.. Utterly pointless and infuriating when you're just building up enough speed to join the motorway and then you have to brake, then move off again, then stop as the lights only let one car through. They have these onto the M25 a lot and they're usually active in the mornings even when the motorway isn't particularly busy and it's no real issue joining it otherwise 
I don't think i could disagree with this thread more
yes of you are on the road that would have priority or flow more freely without the light they cause congestion, but for the other roads they massively releave the congestion, it might be that for some people they could have their journey to work almost completely uninterrupted without any lights. But there would be all sorts of housing estates in the mornings which would just be grid locked, as hundreds of cars try to leave for work within a space of an hour, and only 1 car every few minutes is able to get out in a gap of all that free flowing traffic.
Some times things go wrong and traffic gets so backed up that a side road can effectively get ignored, as even when it is green they have no where to go, but i wouldn't say that's 95% of the time, or even 5% of the time
And as for traffic light deliberately changing to red when a car approaches in the dead of night, it must just be down to where you are or possibly they are trying to slow cars down, as i have found a lot of the lights in my area if you approach in the dead of night at the speed limit, quite the opposite happens i have very regularly seen lights just changing to red turning back to green clearly reacting to my approach
yes of you are on the road that would have priority or flow more freely without the light they cause congestion, but for the other roads they massively releave the congestion, it might be that for some people they could have their journey to work almost completely uninterrupted without any lights. But there would be all sorts of housing estates in the mornings which would just be grid locked, as hundreds of cars try to leave for work within a space of an hour, and only 1 car every few minutes is able to get out in a gap of all that free flowing traffic.
Some times things go wrong and traffic gets so backed up that a side road can effectively get ignored, as even when it is green they have no where to go, but i wouldn't say that's 95% of the time, or even 5% of the time
And as for traffic light deliberately changing to red when a car approaches in the dead of night, it must just be down to where you are or possibly they are trying to slow cars down, as i have found a lot of the lights in my area if you approach in the dead of night at the speed limit, quite the opposite happens i have very regularly seen lights just changing to red turning back to green clearly reacting to my approach
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