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Car Forum / Driving, Maintenance, Tuning / Driving / March 2007Replace all traffic lights with STOP signs?
So there's this road near where I live with ALL the major businesses on it. You know, the wally world supercenter, the mall, the major supermarkets, the home improvement warehouses, strip malls, etc. This road gets backed up for miles, usually. Every day. The backup is usually long enough to stretch through several traffic lights. That is, you are waiting at light 5 (then 4, then 3, then 2) to go through light 1. It's not unusual to have traffic blocking intersections so that nobody can enter the main road from side roads or major driveways. This past saturday, the mall, home improvement stores, supermarkets, etc, were all packed as usual. Probably due to an earlier power outage, all the traffic lights were flashing. On the main road, the lights were flashing yellow. On the side roads and major driveways, the lights were flashing red. Traffic was moving very smoothly, with NO BACKUPs at all. Go figure. As a taxpayer, why am I paying to install all these traffic lights that are not needed? As a taxpayer, why am I paying for the electricity to run all these traffic lights that are not needed? Couldn't all these traffic signals be torn down and replaced with STOP signs to control access to the main roads? -Dave On Mar 5, 9:59 am, "Mike T." <n...@nohow.not> wrote: <brevity snip> > This past saturday, the mall, home improvement stores, supermarkets, etc, > were all packed as usual. Probably due to an earlier power outage, all the [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > not needed? As a taxpayer, why am I paying for the electricity to run all > these traffic lights that are not needed? Because it's usually not Saturday...? One anecdotal weekend example does not make for a situational rule that might be an improvement, and from which one might draw the conclusion that that situation might be best 24/7/365. After all, you only observed the situation for a minute or two at most. ----- - gpsman > So there's this road near where I live with ALL the major businesses on it. > You know, the wally world supercenter, the mall, the major supermarkets, the [quoted text clipped - 16 lines] > signals be torn down and replaced with STOP signs to control access to the > main roads? -Dave So you are advocating replacing all lights with 4-way stops? That would slow traffic to a crawl as every car in both directions would have to stop at every intersection and play 'after you". Or is it Yellow in main route, Red on intersecting? Won't work if traffic is anywhere near what you say as the side streets would never get a chance to enter. I suspect your powers of observation for that situation was seriously lacking. Harry K > So you are advocating replacing all lights with 4-way stops? No, I'm saying main road should have NOTHING, and side roads/driveways should have STOP signs or even yield signs. > Or is it Yellow in main route, Red on intersecting? Won't work if > traffic is anywhere near what you say as the side streets would never > get a chance to enter. Obviously it does work. I had to go to one of the home improvement warehouses. I was counting on 20 minutes to get there and 20 minutes to get back. The whole trip took 20 minutes, including the ~10 minutes I was in the store. Traffic was heavy (extremely) but moving near the speed limit. People from the side roads/major driveways were not waiting long (at flashing red), even if they were turning left. > I suspect your powers of observation for that situation was seriously > lacking. Well normally the road is a real cluster-f.ck, but with the side roads controlled by a virtual stop sign (flashing red), traffic was actually MOVING. And no, that doesn't mean that traffic was backing up on the side roads, either. What usually happens (when the lights are cycling red, green, yellow...) is that the main road gets backed up so far that the side roads get backed up, also. With the lights flashing, the main road traffic wasn't backed up, so the side roads weren't backed up, either. -Dave "Mike T." <noway@nohow.not> said in rec.autos.driving: >Well normally the road is a real cluster-f.ck, but with the side roads >controlled by a virtual stop sign (flashing red), traffic was actually >MOVING. And no, that doesn't mean that traffic was backing up on the side >roads, either. Your observation is only meaningful if there were equal numbers of cars in both scenarios. For all you know, the power outage could have kept many people from going out shopping, leaving traffic on Clusterfuck Drive much lighter (and thus less backed up) than normal.  SignatureI'm a wreckless driver and damn proud of it! > So there's this road near where I live with ALL the major businesses on > it. You know, the wally world supercenter, the mall, the major [quoted text clipped - 17 lines] > signals be torn down and replaced with STOP signs to control access to the > main roads? -Dave People don't pay attention to stop lights, what makes you think they will obey stop signs? It's a societal thing. Too many people thinking that they have a right to drive, and that includes anything they can do while driving. Like putting on makeup, talking on a cell phone, using a PDA, or viewing a laptop. Add about a hundred things to that list. People are just in a hurry. They're overworked. They're frazzled. They just don't give a sh.t about anyone besides themselves and getting to that soccer practice on time, picking up some Maxi-Tampons, or getting a burger. Politeness and order are almost dead in our society, and there's not enough practitioners left to make it anything but the seething pushing shoving rude mess that it is. Steve > People don't pay attention to stop lights, what makes you think they will > obey stop signs? That's beside the point. If people are running red lights and traffic is CONSTANTLY GRIDLOCKED, how is that better than people are running stop signs but traffic is moving? -Dave >> People don't pay attention to stop lights, what makes you think they will >> obey stop signs? > > That's beside the point. If people are running red lights and traffic is > CONSTANTLY GRIDLOCKED, how is that better than people are running stop > signs but traffic is moving? -Dave Well, then, according to your Pollyannish logic, maybe we should just chuck ALL traffic control devices? Steve > So there's this road near where I live with ALL the major businesses on it. > You know, the wally world supercenter, the mall, the major supermarkets, the [quoted text clipped - 16 lines] > signals be torn down and replaced with STOP signs to control access to the > main roads? -Dave Must be some seriously bad light timing. Everytime a traffic light in my area goes out and defaults to a stop, it's a clusterf**k. People who think that a dark traffic signal means GO and don't stop. People who are totally clueless... leads to huge backups and danger. If you have a majority of drivers with a clue, many areas can be improved with stop signs. The problem is that after several stupid people cause spectatcular collisions the lights go in and are set up incompetently or purposely to clog traffic. The area you describe would work very well and better than stop signs could ever hope to if all the traffic signals were appropiately timed together. > As a taxpayer, why am I paying to install all these traffic lights that are > not needed? As a taxpayer, why am I paying for the electricity to run all > these traffic lights that are not needed? Couldn't all these traffic > signals be torn down and replaced with STOP signs to control access to the > main roads? Better to replace them with roundabouts. And if a college town full of 18 to 20 year old inexperienced drivers can handle a roundabout, then traffic in your area can as well. > Couldn't all these traffic signals be torn down and replaced with STOP signs > to control access to the main roads? You need roundabouts. Graham Eeyore <rabbitsfriendsandrelations@hotmail.com> said in rec.autos.driving: >> Couldn't all these traffic signals be torn down and replaced with STOP signs >> to control access to the main roads? > >You need roundabouts. We need competent drivers. SignatureI'm a wreckless driver and damn proud of it! |
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