Theme 1: Benefits and hurdles of coordinated/adaptive signal control (ASCT)
- “My cynical ass would not be surprised at all if oil/gas companies were lobbying against ASCT because idling cars are buying more fuel.” – Sohcahtoa82
- “Connecting traffic signals costs more … and the benefits may be subtle, hard to predict, and maybe even hard to measure.” – toast0
- “ASCT is standard practice … on most junctions in most towns and cities in the UK for over 20 years.” – mlaretallack
Theme 2: Poor synchronization and driver mistakes create unnecessary congestion
- “It blows my mind how many people don’t realize that’s what those circles near the stop bar … are for, and will then stop 3+ car lengths behind the stop bar, and then can’t figure out why the light is never going green.” – Sohcahtoa82
- “Two intersections, only about 500 feet between them … the lights were often exactly out of sync … traffic would only move about 500 feet then stop for 2 minutes. The backup would last well over a mile.” – at1as
- “If I had a nickle for every time I’ve had to get out of my car … and explain that they need to pull forward for the light to change …” – mock‑possum
Theme 3: Human oversight vs. automated/AI control (cops, power‑out experiments, safety concerns)
- “There’s a major arterial near my house. One day, the power went out … throughput … increased dramatically, as drivers simply cooperated with each other.” – WalterBright
- “When traffic is really heavy humans are better than machines at getting traffic through. However they cost a lot of money …” – bluGill
- “I guess the main reason traffic lights exist is to avoid incidents, not necessarily to maximize throughput.” – teelinger
- “It is not possible to certify an expert system (or … ‘AI’) because it is not possible to use formal methods to prove correctness.” – Tangurena2