Here's a surprising anecdote I've discovered living in South Africa wrt traffic lights.
When they're not working at a busy intersection in my area, the intersection effectively becomes a four way stop. And I've found that as long as everybody follows the rules, traffic actually seems to flow FASTER than when the traffic lights are actually operable.
I see so many places that could have roundabouts instead of lights. Plus, if the maximum speed inside my town was lowered to 40km/h, we could have shorter yellows. You can never reach the 60km/h limit for more than a few seconds anyway.
Speaking for Johannesburg, we can't have shorter yellows because too many people treat them is "last chance to speed up to make it through before it's red for too long!" and JMPD is beyond useless at law enforcement.
Where I live they've been actively removing traffic lights. One strategy is to turn multi-lane roads into single-lane ones with a lower speed limit, and crossing islands for cyclists and pedestrians. Cars move slower, but more consistently, traffic is better able to self-regulate, so while I haven't timed it, I'm fairly sure traffic is actually moving faster despite driving at lower speeds.
Of course, it helps that infrastructure adjustments over the decades ensures that many people that don't need to be in cars, aren't in cars.
Sounds like you're living in a country where local government actually cares to improve things rather than doing as little work as possible while also self-enriching themselves as much as possible.
There's plenty to criticise at all levels of government here, but overall I indeed am pretty satisfied with my local government. And on the infrastructure level especially - whenever there are roadworks, they're annoying, but I'm always looking forward to what it'll end up as.
If the lights are at an intersection where a very busy road crosses with a less busy road then turning it into a four way stop just turns it into a traffic jam on the very busy road. I’ve seen this happen during rush hour in the United States multiple times.
When it’s not rush hour though maybe the situation is different? Not sure.
Seriously though, speaking as a South African living basically next to Sandton, there are plenty of traffic lights near to me which cause complete chaos when they are out. They will cause significant delay for the entire working day on certain routes, e.g. anywhere on Winnie Mandela (formerly William Nicol) Drive.
There is however one intersection (Stirling and Balmoral Ave) on the way to my kid's school on a non-major road which definitely works better when its traffic light is out, and this is at any time of day in my experience.
Some traffic lights definitely should rather be mini traffic circles, e.g. on Peter Place by the one office park and had the exact same frustration for the one on Grosvenor Road near to Bryanpark.
As the Johannesburg Road Agency (like all City of Johannesburg Municipal companies) is so incredibly incompetent, our traffic lights are incredibly unreliable, I shudder to think how much it sucks out of our economic output all the people sitting in traffic longer than is needed simply due to an out of order traffic light.
And the local police also don't help with regular roadblocks while at the same time being terrible at law enforcement (yes, you'd think roadblocks are a sign of law enforcement, in practice though they're more for soliciting bribes while screwing up traffic).
skc · · focus · HN ↗
When they're not working at a busy intersection in my area, the intersection effectively becomes a four way stop. And I've found that as long as everybody follows the rules, traffic actually seems to flow FASTER than when the traffic lights are actually operable.
I've timed this a few times.
forinti · · focus · HN ↗
jonathanlydall · · focus · HN ↗
Vinnl · · focus · HN ↗
Of course, it helps that infrastructure adjustments over the decades ensures that many people that don't need to be in cars, aren't in cars.
jonathanlydall · · focus · HN ↗
Vinnl · · focus · HN ↗
ViktorRay · · focus · HN ↗
If the lights are at an intersection where a very busy road crosses with a less busy road then turning it into a four way stop just turns it into a traffic jam on the very busy road. I’ve seen this happen during rush hour in the United States multiple times.
When it’s not rush hour though maybe the situation is different? Not sure.
werdnapk · · focus · HN ↗
jonathanlydall · · focus · HN ↗
Seriously though, speaking as a South African living basically next to Sandton, there are plenty of traffic lights near to me which cause complete chaos when they are out. They will cause significant delay for the entire working day on certain routes, e.g. anywhere on Winnie Mandela (formerly William Nicol) Drive.
There is however one intersection (Stirling and Balmoral Ave) on the way to my kid's school on a non-major road which definitely works better when its traffic light is out, and this is at any time of day in my experience.
Some traffic lights definitely should rather be mini traffic circles, e.g. on Peter Place by the one office park and had the exact same frustration for the one on Grosvenor Road near to Bryanpark.
As the Johannesburg Road Agency (like all City of Johannesburg Municipal companies) is so incredibly incompetent, our traffic lights are incredibly unreliable, I shudder to think how much it sucks out of our economic output all the people sitting in traffic longer than is needed simply due to an out of order traffic light.
And the local police also don't help with regular roadblocks while at the same time being terrible at law enforcement (yes, you'd think roadblocks are a sign of law enforcement, in practice though they're more for soliciting bribes while screwing up traffic).