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A few weeks ago as I was sitting in traffic one day, I happened to notice a guy standing on the corner, pressing the cross walk button,
And then earlier today, I was sitting at a light in downtown metro area, same thing, someone was standing on corner pressing the cross walk button...and again, it did not make the traffic lights change any sooner.
I'm not going to press those crosswalk buttons anymore because someone will be writing about me in some thread somewhere on the internet. Instead I will just start walking when I want. Write about that!
I'm not going to press those crosswalk buttons anymore because someone will be writing about me in some thread somewhere on the internet. Instead I will just start walking when I want. Write about that!
In some areas of a major nearby city where I live, some people just do that. Walk across the street without caring that they mit get hit by a vehicle.
Traffic flow engineers have all the lights for many intersections work so that traffic goes smoothly (as best they can) and the button at crosswalks does zero/nothing.
Actually in my area, many parts of town, the lights are set up to CAUSE traffic...its crazy, but it really is this way.
One intersection is a great example...this is a busy main road, when the light goes red for the busy street, so the side street traffic can come out...the next light down for those coming out of the side street is red at the same time, so this causes traffic to back up every day, if that next light down were green, it would allow all that traffic to flow smoothly. Many people have reported this to the Dept of Trans, but they will not change it. There are numerous other parts of town where the lights are set up like this too.
One recently installed traffic light in my neighborhood is on the main road and a park entrance. It has four walk pushbuttons, including two to cross the park entrance parallel to the main road. Why? That is green by default.
I do not think the crosswalk buttons make the light change color any sooner, but they do set off a timer when the light does change to allow the walker enough time to make it across the street. At one intersection here, the light on the side street would change from green to yellow after about 15 seconds, but if a walker hit the button, you can see the timer on the crosswalk light start at 30 seconds.
Not true. The buttons give the pedestrians the feeling that they are somehow in control of some small aspect of their over-regimented lives.
I have to chuckle, though, over the supposedly tech-savvy people who push the button, then keep pushing it until the light changes. They obviously have no idea how the thing works (if it does). It is the same as an elevator button; once it is pushed, a latching relay (or its solid-state equivalent) is set, and any further button pushing does nothing.
But they keep punching the button, convinced that they are making the light change sooner.
Or perhaps they are venting their frustrations on a simple-minded mechanical device...
I sometimes tell those multi-pushers that pushing the button a second time cancels the request, and ask if they've pushed it an odd or even number of times. I'm dreadfully believable...
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