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How to shorten red light clearance times without reducing safety
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- Опубликовано: 15 авг 2024
- The Netherlands uses a much more precise way of calculating the red light clearance when changing from one signal phase to another than Ontario.
For more information, see:
Muller, T., Dijker, T. & Furth, P. (2003) Red clearance intervals: Theory and practice
CROW (2013) Handboek Verkeerslichtenregelingen
Ministry of Transport (2012) Ontario Traffic Manual Book 12: Traffic Signals
CORRECTION: The Netherlands is not the only country which uses a conflict area approach with entry times. According to commentors, other countries (may) include the UK, Germany, Poland, Belgium and Switzerland.
CLARIFICATION: Entry time is calculated based on vehicles entering the intersection at speed, which obviously cross the intersection faster than vehicles starting from a standstill.
Heavily condensed version of this video, intended for North American traffic engineers:
• Dutch red clearance ca...
0:00 Intro
1:41 Intergreen times
2:47 Conflict Area Approach
4:56 Entry Time
7:05 Benefits of Dutch methods
9:35 Risks of Dutch methods
11:55 Conclusion
![Stroads are Ugly, Expensive, and Dangerous (and they're everywhere) [ST05]](/img/1.gif)
To clarify: the entry time is calculated based on a vehicle which was already moving at speed when the light turned green. Such a vehicle will cross the intersection much faster than vehicles starting from a standstill, even if they accelerate very quickly.
I'll make a followup video in which I discuss the calculations in more detail, as well as discussing the potential obstacles to implementing such calculations in Ontario.
Honestly though, I think you literally stated the limitations in the video: traffic moving at the speed limit or a reasonable speed for taking turns. I can't grasp how people didn't hear that, apparently. It sure has caused much confusion in the comment section.
So is it assumed they are going at the speed limit? What if someone is going over the speed limit towards a light and planning to break heavily at the last minute, but then it changes green?
@@zephyrmj That's the general assumption, yes. If you act like an idiot you will cause accidents, just like in any other country. I have seen Dutch intersections detecting overspeed, with the light delaying \l the green phase, but that still isn't the norm.
If you drive like a moron you will cause accidents. That's life.
@@zephyrmj Then they can be charged not only with speeding but also reckless endangerment. Timings should not be designed to facilitate reckless illegal driving.
awesome content
Having lived in the Netherlands for over 20 years spending a lot of time driving, I think there is another benefit to their system. Unconsciously, you always know why you are waiting for a red light. You tend to keep track of what’s going on while waiting, because it can be your turn to go suddenly. Because have to keep paying attention, I believe there is some added safety.
Good point I didn’t think of.
But. But. But. If drivers can't predict when the red will end, how do they know when to stop pretending that they aren't texting.
@@HweolRidda That's easy, they don't pretend. They just wait for the car behind them to honk their horn.
"Suddenly"... I live in an environment where almost all lights have countdown timers, for at least ten years, and by now I completely lost the former habit of "keeping track [of the light] while waiting". I'm not sure which is better or worse - the gain of a few seconds, or the predictability. But i'd rather reduce the number of "suddenlies" wherever possible.
@@jmi5969 While waiting, you don’t keep track of the light. You keep track of the traffic using the intersection and learn when to expect a green light, it’s a matter of situational awareness.
This was very interesting and it's definitely something I've noticed driving in the Netherlands and Ontario. There are certainly a lot of red light runners in Ontario, especially on the left turn, and this is very scary as a pedestrian. Anything they can reduce that would be a huge improvement.
I just mentioned your multi phase pedestrian crossings video in a video about crossing the street that releases on RUclips today. Your analyses are always great! Keep it up!
Not Just Bikes Squad?
Thanks for the community post!
London especially is notorious for red light running. Turning left feels very dangerous, because even when the light is long red, you must be careful about cars flying through.
Ooooh, this is where you got the inspiration for that video you just premiered.
@@deldarel Not exactly, Jason and I had a chat about signals a while ago, but we made these two videos completely independently. They were also posted at the same time and we didn't share them with eachother beforehand
For those not convinced that this is safe: the fact that no one here in the Netherlands is actually aware this "dangerous" method is applied should say enough. No one notices, until they have to wait longer at a traffic light in another country.
I'm just amazed that many traffic lights in the US and Canada are 'dumb', you can pull up to them in the middle of the night with no one around and still be waiting upwards of 30 seconds. That's horrific.
I live in the UK and much like the Netherlands if you approach a red light and there's no traffic, it changes for you.
Seems like the US and Canada is unfortunately very far behind technologically when it comes to traffic management. 'Add more lanes to reduce traffic' seems to be the go-to rather than make the infrastructure smarter.
@@VoxelLoop You also have these dumb traffic lights in spain, having to wait as a pedestrian crossing for 70 seconds even if no-one is coming
It’s rather unfortunate. Some intersection have the induction loop to trigger phase changes outside rush hour but they only work with passenger cars or bigger vehicles. Motorbikes or any other mode of transportation smaller than that, you’re out of luck.
"I live in the UK and much like the Netherlands if you approach a red light and there's no traffic, it changes for you." Not where i live, they don't. The traffic lights definitely are dumb. I also live in the UK.
@@VoxelLoop Uh no. I work as a traffic engineer in the US and I've only come upon a handful at most of dumb timed signals. Many use inductive loops or cameras.
A thing I would like to add: Traffic light phases in NL are put in such an order that the overall red light clearance time is the shortest possible.
Yes I implied that at a few points in the video but I didn't go into detail because that is a topic for a future video
@@OntarioTrafficMan I didn't know Dutch traffic phases even had an order. Would love to see a video about this!
They do have a default order, but phases can also receive "alternative" realisations in other parts of the cycle if there happens to be time for them
@@frafraplanner9277 The default order comes mostly in use during rush hour. When there's always more traffic waiting then that there is green time for.
used the have one like this (actually it's 4 signals, 3 times 3 way intersections and a 4 way in the middle, highway on/off, main road, multiple smaller roads). then they renovated it, and added many more traffic sensors. it did improve overall performance as the signals now keep traffic flow up better (longer phases reduced overall clearance time, even clearance time per cycle went up). the only downside was, that from the direction I usually drive trough, i have to options to reach the highway. before, because it was completely predictable (fixed cycle with minimal clearance time per cycle), I could always guess and chose the best option. now it has become to unpredictable, with just for people like my, means about 10 sec more waiting time. (Switzerland, Dutch Style clearance times, but seems to me, traffic engineers use either lower speed or something like a general reserve, as the always seems the be a bit more clearance time, than in the video.)
All the shots of Vaughan in this video are so depressing, lmao.
Story of my life
and that's a modernized suburban hellscape! it gets so much worse around there.
I mean what did you expect it’s B roll of Vaughan. Move into a shitty apartment downtown or to Montréal or some shit brother you won’t regret it
I’d rather live in Sarnia I swear to god
Canada is such an urban nightmare.
And this is only the beginning! Average wait times over the whole cycle are even shorter in the Netherlands, because of the many sensors that enable real time adjustments of the phases themselves.
Especially at Night when there is almost no traffic, the difference is huge
Yes that will be a topic in a later video in this series
@@OntarioTrafficMan I was wondering why that wasn't mentioned...
I more and more seem to realize how laughable the USA really is...
@@blinking_dodo Umm... pretty much all traffic lights in large cities have sensors for cars and buttons for pedestrians that adjust light duration (with other factors too). I don't expect a middle of nowhere intersection to have them as the cost of such a system (and its maintenance) for the huge countries the US and Canada are to be worth it.
@@OntarioTrafficMan in some of the busier streets we have linked the traffic lights to produce a green flow as we call it
We also have intersections where there is basically a rain meter. If it rains bikes get green faster.
im a structural engineer so I only took one "intro to transportation" course. the most mind-blowing thing you've taught me is that the Dutch method is actually incredibly simple. (I had assumed they were doing some incredibly complex stuff with stop lights)
The Dutch method combines a lot of items which are fairly simple in themselves, but together form a complex-seeming system.
In addition to their more precise clearance calculations, they also have
- multi-stage pedestrian crossings with green waves
- controllers which control each phase individually, instead of in groups
- many vehicle detectors per lane, to end the green precisely at the right moment
- fully-protected left turn signals, etc
@@OntarioTrafficMan Thanks for your reply. I wonder what are the main obstacles to implementing the technology elsewhere? I am guessing it's the cost of induction loops?
@@erikgiesenloo1871 Traditionally the maintenance cost of induction loops has indeed been the limiting factor, especially in the northeast US and southern Canada where there are numerous annual freeze-thaw cycles. But nowadays a handful of IR cameras with AI image recognition can provide the same information as dozens of loops, with a far lower maintenance cost.
The limitations now are the conventions regarding how signal phases are grouped. Especially in the US there are fairly rigid specifications for how signal controllers need to be programmed, and those specs include constraints which have become irrelevant with modern computing. For starters I think there would need to be some studies comparing the effectiveness of NL vs US controllers to demonstrate the need to update the US standards
@@OntarioTrafficMan There's also 'green waves' like: if you drive the exact speed limit, you'll get a green light at the next intersection(s). There's also some which prioritize ped- and bicycle signals whenever it's raining :)
As a Belgian, visiting the Netherlands by car is such a breath of fresh air. Barely any potholes or cheap tarmac, well thought out intersections, well timed traffic lights and generally better drivers because they are not all driving around frustrated by horrible traffic like in Belgium. I find myself speeding to catch an orange light so often because I know that I'd have to wait a full minute regardless of the amount of cars. I'm much more inclined to follow the rules of traffic in the Netherlands because they make sense. The perks of having a functional government I guess...
ehh, we like to argue that our government is as much of a disfunctional mess as it is in most other countries. In practice we're probably not even doing all that bad 😆
I agree but as a German driving in the Netherlands is atrocious. I get why they introduced the 100 kph daytime speedlimit but man there is nothing more mentally exhausting than only doing 100kph for long distances. I can go 8h without a break at 130 but 4h of 100 and your brain is just goo from the sheer boredom
The reason for the 100kph is our excessive production of nitrogen. If we didn't have that, the speed would be 120/130kph.
@@Qopzeep as i Said i know the reasons they did it, doesn’t change that it is a extremely annoying speed To be restricted to. Same goes for US with 55 or 65mph speed limits on surprisingly large sections of highways
@@derfurz8618 you should try driving in Australia. 100-110kmh on long American style freeways, 80kmh in some big wide urban freeways. Long waits at traffic signals. Drivers who have no idea which lane to use. And the only enforcement of the rules is an insane amount of speed cameras on these safe Highways - dishing out exorbitant fines to safe drivers while ignoring all the slow, oblivious and dangerous drivers.
This is a very high quality and entertaining video about our Dutch traffic light system. As a Dutch driving instructor I teach my students a lot about "reading" intersections that are regulated by traffic lights. I find our intersections fascinating and the efficiency is like no other. Where we used to stop for yellow, we hardly have to now. So our driving has changed a lot.
As for the entry times, it is good to know that average entry times are being checked and adjusted over the years. With electric cars accelerating at a slightly higher pace due to the lack of shifttime, the expectation is that the entry time will become slightly shorter, so the red light will stay on slightly longer. It shouldn't affect the total cycle time for the intersection.
Fun fact, my driving student encounter much more red lights on average than any other driver on the road.
The entry time is calculated based on a car which is arriving at the intersection at speed. Accelerating a bit quicker from a standstill is not a problem.
@@OntarioTrafficMan It depends on the intersection. We have a couple of newly installed intersections that have some differences compared to the previous generation. They measure if cars are approaching at speed or are already lined up at the line. They then give you green slightly quicker when you have to go from a standstill.
These same intersections can give a certain direction an extra go in the same cycle. This can be done with for example a truck carrying hazardous or dangerous cargo like petrol. They want that truck out of the city as quick as possible.
Same goes for the firebrigade and ambulances. If they have a call, their route has been send to the system regulating the intersections. You can actually see the route being cleared by the intersection clearing all traffic going the same direction the ambulance is going and holding all traffic that wants to turn onto the road that the ambulance is using. It saves them a lot of time. Pretty cool to see.
I’ve owned fast cars and if you’re a douche you can cheat the system and run into someone by accelerating hard. But that’s a choice the driver makes.
An electric car is no excuse for flooring it. The police can actually find you for such behavior in The Netherlands, as they do at car certain car shows where some douchebaggery takes place.
@@RustOnWheels the police can not do anything against you for accelerating fast. As long as you aren't spinning your wheels or doing a burnout, accelerating fast is not punishable.
As for what I was saying about adjusting the timing, I am not talking about full acceleration. The normal acceleration is becoming faster and the lights have small tolerances in time.
@@dutchdrifter8740 they can fine you for either making too much noise (ICE) when accelerating fast (or even stepping on the loud pedal) or put it underneath one of the umbrella acts like good old #5 for creating a dangerous situation, which would be the case if one is willingly accelerating into traffic still occupying the road.
Of course this is all very theoretical because these fines are rarely given by except at car shows and at the TT but they are at their disposal.
This is a brilliant and incredibly efficient system. At the end you said that even if small pieces could be introduced in Canada, it would improve the driving situation. I’m not familiar with the driving culture of Canada, but here in Utah, I think implementing something like this would be safest if done in incremental steps.
I fully agree that implementation would need to be gradual and cautious
I came here from not just bike's recommendation and woah, this is an awesome video! Well researched, great footage, and clearly explained. Well done!
Thank you for so beautifully laying this out! I reviewed a proposal recently for a study on warrants for protected signal phase to avoid "rampant" use of these measures. You're entirely correct that many in signals engineering see protected phasing as an efficiency loss for intersections rather than an opportunity to cut wasted time elsewhere.
Exactly. They see the possible restriction on left turn opportunities, but they don't see the increased flexibility and efficiency which comes when any phase can start or end independently without worrying about Yellow Trap or uneven starts with permissive lefts
@@OntarioTrafficMan Also, is it true that some Dutch intersections will calculate amber and clearance time dynamically, based on the measured speed of vehicles approaching the intersection? I thought I remembered seeing this. Maybe an opportunity for an extra-nerdy follow up to your video :)
@@pindermf Yes but for vehicles it is still purely experimental at this point. As far as I'm aware the only regular use of variable clearance times is for pedestrian phases.
@@pindermf That sounds so cool
@@pindermf In the UK, the amber light is always 3 seconds long, but the clearance time can be varied by detectors.
All 98 provincially owned traffic lights in Nova Scotia are running the “reduced red” timing as of yesterday. We use this calculation but if the all red clearance is less than 1 second, we have to default to 1 second. It’s much faster, considering there were some all red clearance times of over 4 seconds in some places! Next project will be pedestrian overlaps I’m hoping!
How does the reduced red timing work?
@@OntarioTrafficMan I have the equation in my computer but it’s not far off from the exit time minus the entrance time!
@@TheTrafficTech Very interesting! I don't suppose there's any publicly accessible document where I could read more about it?
@@OntarioTrafficMan I haven’t seen it publicly but if you wanted to reach out, send me an email (check my channel) and I can fill you in on what we’re doing!
Accounting for Entry Time is so intuitive once the principle has been laid out but I'd never considered it before. Great video!
1:35 you nailed the Dutch pronunciation, even getting the individual letters in the acronym right. Impressive.
As a Dutch driver, I had noticed that in recent years more cross traffic seemed to be running red lights than in the past. Thanks to your video, I realize that what’s *actually* going on is that I enjoy the fast response time on the electric car a bit too much, thus screwing with the entry time calculation. It was me all along 😮
The old adage about checking your own shoes if everywhere smells like s-t remains unbroken.
Dankjewel!
Als je sneller optrekt met een elektrische auto, kom je natuurlijk dichterbij de auto's die het kruispunt aan het verlaten zijn. Maar zolang niemand anders door rood is gereden, zou je in principe nog steeds genoeg oprijtijd hebben. Want de oprijtijd is berekend op basis van een auto die al op snelheid was toen het licht naar groen is gesprongen. En om zó snel door het kruispunt te kunnen rijden vanaf stilstand zou je héél erg snel moeten optrekken. Ik ben van plan om te berekenen precies hoe snel dat moet zijn, en ik laat het jullie weten in mijn volgende video.
Not Just Bikes sent me here - this is fantastic! Thanks a ton - looking forward to watching your other videos!
I didn’t anticipate watching the entire 13 minutes of this video. But it was compelling. Actually succinct given all the issues involved. Glad you highlighted that overly long red-to-green intervals just encourages drivers to run red lights.
Ontario Traffic Man: "Hmm, video is getting more views I wonder what-"
*NJB has entered the chat*
Great video, I was aware of many, and yet not all things about our traffic lights.
I don't think it can be understated how well put together this video is. The clarity of the information, how easy the animations are to follow. Well done indeed :)
This was very enlightening! I'm Dutch but I have always taken our traffic lights for granted! One thing that I have always preferred our system over the American traffic light system is that they are before the crossing instead of after. That never made sense to me, I mean yes you can stop closer together but that only reduces the time you have to react if you accidentally run a red light. And it's not even faster because you spend most of the time on the crossing accelerating anyway, whereas in our system you're doing it before the crossing and you're out of there in a sec!
At 9:03 is basically the extreme edge case.
White van is just crossing at the red signal (kinda running red to be honest) and the scooter is arriving with some speed and it still works out perfectly.
Well spotted! The same clip is also at 1:15 in real time (the one later on is 2x speed).
The van didn't run the red light, it's already fully in the intersection when the light turned red. It's worth noting that it's also longer than the 6m vehicle length assumed in the calculations, so the back of the van might slightly block the green for a fraction of a second. But that's not a safety issue because people won't accelerate into the side of a large vehicle already blocking their path.
In United Arab Emirates they police red lights with vigour. As soon as lights change people brake aggressively.
This sort of enforcement approach as a precursor to implementing these sorts of changes will dramatically reduce the risks of transition and reduce the time required to reach the optimal settings.
Great video. Thousands of years of life can be unlocked right here.
Dude! How can this video be so good and interesting! I am from Germany and recently went to the Netherlands and I was also impressed with the Dutch traffic light system.
I recognised the conflict area approach in Germany occasionally. But one detail I saw in the Netherlands which I really miss in Germany is this: When you approach a junction there are detectors on the ground that give the traffic light a signal that there is a car waiting (both in Germany and in the Netherlands). So if the junction is not busy and free the lights turn green to let you pass the junction. The difference is that these detectors are in the Netherlands are in a long distance to the junction. It’s the exact distance that takes a car to approach the junction at the maximum speed limit. So if the junction is free you can just cross the junction without losing time, cause the lights turn green at the time you approach the lights. In Germany for example these detectors are right before the traffic light/junction. So you always have to slow down and stand before the red lights to let the system know you are there and then you have to wait until the lights turn green even if the junction is clear in the first place.
The Dutch system saves time and gas as well, cause you don’t have to decelerate and accelerate again.
Indeed the detection is very important, but I can't talk about everything in one video. I will discuss that in future videos
@@OntarioTrafficMan Yes! Totally understandable! Thanks
Living in the Netherlands I've indeed noticed this behaviour everywhere. When on the motorbike I have the sport of trying to never fully stop. When in the car at night I don't even apply the brakes because light will turn green on time for me if I don't see conflicting headlights coming. All in all a very efficient system, thanks for the explanation!
10:47 if you acquire the habbit of entering the crossing after the light has turned red, it'll drain your bankaccount pretty quickly also. As the fine is € 259 per instance and there are a lot of red-light traffic cameras.
Wish we had as many cameras and the fines were actually dissuassive. Our red light cameras only work for traffic going straight through an intersection. People turning right on red (legal here) don't have to worry about coming to a stop first because there are no cameras to monitor this. In addition, the Ottawa Police switched to a reactive position a number of years ago; therefore, there are few traffic cops and they rarely go anything about traffic violations unless a number of complaints are received. Pretty lidicrous isn't it?
@@SlickBubbles one of the ways the harsh increase in traffic fines (across the board) was rationalized was through the idea that it a) serves safers streets and roads and b) increases revenue for the government thus reducing the need to increase some taxes.
I first knew that the Netherlands has the best cycling network in the world, but I think it also has the best roads in the world as well. It also has the highest road quality in Europe, especially when roads in the Netherlands are much better than in Belgium and UK (the country i live in). I definitely think that roads in Belgium and UK are some of the worst in the developed world after looking at the Netherlands. However, Belgium does have a better cycling network than UK, but definitely behind the Netherlands.
Looking at your last name, you are somewhat biased in your opinions about Holl .. eh .. the Netherlands. 😂
@@hendman4083 Nah, it's a pretty common name.
@@therealdutchidiot It's still funny
I've been watching many American and Canadian dashcam video compilations of accidents and plenty of incidents are at least in part caused by less intelligent road planning. You explain it perfectly in this video. My job involves me driving thousands of kilometers a week in Dutch traffic and understand the calculations traffic lights make quite well. It has a degree of predictability and I make a game out of deducing when they turn green. It helps me to maintain a low speed on approach so I can keep momentum, facilitating fuel economy.
There’s another problem with intersections in the US. Everything’s set as per the speed limit and the speed limits are high. But without the hierarchical separation between roads and streets, people spend the entirety of their time between intersections either accelerating and decelerating. That’s even ignoring congestion. And because the speeds are high and the intersections are large, the stops need to be long to give a chance for cars to accelerate closer to the limit. So in the US a typical road might have a limit of 80km/h. The top speed people drive is likely closer to 100km/h. But the average speed is something like 25km/h for most of the day. Meanwhile a typical Dutch road with a limit of 40 or 50 also has an average speed of about 25 so Americans aren’t getting anywhere faster. But they’re wasting fuel and brakes. They’re wearing their car out faster, they’re more stressed and the road is just noisy, unsafe an unpleasant. But if you suggest reducing the roadways to the benefit of everyone or at worse no detriment to drivers, they lose their minds.
Only the dumb drive like you stated. By driving smart, aka looking at red lights far ahead(common sense? Maybe not), i got 50-55mpgs out of a car rated at 40mpg.
A lot of things seem to be more noisy and stressful in the USA in my experience.
Even Canada is better in that regard.
@@0xsergy Common sense isn't. Well, it depends on what you're talking about, but if the overall driver mentality is more aggressive, they're going to think less.
@@0xsergy how wonderful for you. The fact is people are dumb and do drive like that so I’m not sure what your point is? And whatever mileage you’re getting, it’s worse than it would be if your top speed was lower and you didn’t waste all that energy making large stops (which means more accelerating). That’s not a difference of skill or driving decisions that’s just physics. That 40 rating is probs where they tested it in the conditions we’re talking about.
@@Freshbott2 ban all cars. the microplastics they create ontop of the issues you stated means that they aren't worth the risk anymore. People can't be trusted so just let them ride bicycles.
Back in like... 2007? when these kinds of ideas started to get implemented here, I had a bit of interest in the topic and read both the CROW guidelines and some SWOV research. I had no historical knowledge of traffic light patterns but it was so cool that I couldnt stop talking to friends and family about ruimingstijden and dynamische fasering. As it turns out, I was way ahead of the curve and just happened to live exactly where this was implemented first (Rijswijk and Delft). I always wondered why nowhere else used it... Real fun to see more discussion finally! Dutch VRIs are really something you can build years worth of content on
I do plan to make many more videos on Dutch signals. Like you said, there are so many other fascinating aspects to them!
Amazing video and you explained it very clearly!
Also great Dutch pronunciation!
Would love to see a video on the fact that a large amount of Dutch lights are split in left, straight and right, while most North American lights are just 'all directions' and turing right on a red is generally allowed
That will be next topic in this video series. (but first I will do a more detailed video on clearance times)
1:34 This is by far the best Dutch pronunciation I've heard from a non-native Dutch speaker!
Very good. What we needed at the end of the video are some traffic accident statistics for the two systems.
Great video. I knew there was a difference, but you explained it in detail, going from the actual manuals.
I keep being puzzled how North America seems to be stuck in the 1960s for road design, and has not taken to the lessons learned since then.
I would love to see some kind of interview with those making the policies in North America, to explain the politics and processes involved that hinder similar innovation.
Alot of it simply due to scale. It's easy for a country the size of the Netherlands to make drastic changes as they are basically a pimple compared to the size of the US or Canada. Making sweeping changes here takes a lot more time and effort (and money) then it does in most European countries. That being said a lot of new development does follow newer standards and techniques but it takes a lot longer to upgrade all the old infrastructure as there is just so much of it out there. New York City ALONE has nearly 300,000 traffic lights. Imagine the time and cost to upgrade them all.
@@RCLapCar don't buy the "larger country = harder to upgrade" theory. Yes, ten times as many roads cost ten times as much, but a country ten times as large also should have ten times the budget, yes?
@@riccardoorlando2262 Not really. Let me use the example of the Netherlands vs Canada. Canada has a population of about 38 million to 18 million in the Netherlands (so about twice as much). The land area of Canada is almost 10 million km2 vs barely 42 thousand km2 for the Netherlands. So about 240 times larger. The money for road works comes from taxes so you can't expect a country 240 times larger but with only twice the population to be able to pay for the same level of upgrades. (And yes I'm aware not all of Canada is populated but these are just an example of the scale of things.) I looked up another stat and is appears Canada has about 1.1 million km of roads vs 140,000 km in the Netherlands (which is also apparently very dense for Europe). So about 8 times as much.
One of the other things done in the Netherlands is that updates to traffic engineering practices don't trigger road rebuilding; they trigger _code changes_ for the next new street or major maintenance.
There are downsides, however; code changes might have less bling in the US political realm, and might invite criticism of being "talk only do nothing".
@@RCLapCar While to some extend that is valid argument, I don't see why this couldn't be implemented on the main arterials within a city or town. Within cities I doubt the traffic flow, and therefore required budget, is so different between the countries.
I always thought the traffic lights in the Netherlands looked so incredibly efficient, beyond what could be explained just by less traffic and phases/crossings being more split apart. This explains it!
It's worse than that, because the explanation only considers default signal timing without active intervention by things like RADAR or multiple magnetic loops.
@@therealdutchidiot Oh yeah, I forgot the extra loops, that's a huge factor.
Most people that don't speak Dutch struggle to pronounce a word like 'Scheveningen' and here my man really just went for it and nailed 'Handboek verkeerslichtenregelingen'.
'verkeerslichtenregelingen' is een woord die ik regelmatig zeg op werk. En ik ga ook vaak naar Scheveningen wat ook volgens mij geen probleem is om uit te spreken.
Havent watched to completion, filing under "nerdtalk I absolutely need to watch but can't justify the time spent" . But I'm absolutely thrilled that for every problem, someone will take time and effort to absolutely optimize the shit out of it. :D
As an American driver, I will say that one interesting adaptation I've seen at our intersections, (lagging left turn arrows in Tucson, AZ) is that when a (for example) northbound driver is turning left to the west, and obviously enters the intersection about 2 seconds after the left turn arrow has turned red, people don't just go as fast as they can eastbound to try to hit that driver. On the contrary, most people will pause for an extra second or two to make sure the driver clears the intersection.
I say this is an adaptation, because it seems like a Dutch person would follow the lights much more stringently than an American, given that they can "trust" the lights to be looking out for them. In America, we can't trust the lights, so people run red lights all of the time, and we all end up in more danger and needing more caution all the time.
Incorrect causation. We can't trust the _drivers_ who consistently follow the leader rather than the traffic signal, so our red lights actually aren't long enough.
This is a symptom of insufficient policing, by the way.
It's sad that the likely result of a change would be an immediate increase in accidents, lasting as long as it took people to get it through their thick skulls that they couldn't run the red lights by 2-3 seconds and get away with it. If you tried a pilot program somewhere in North America then people would be extremely likely to crash when they first visit. This would make it a pretty hard sell.
@@ribbonsofnight Very obvious red light cameras would take care of most if not all.
@@apveening That's a good point. Welcome to [city] the home of faster traffic lights and the most red light cameras in the country. Smile.
Happy to see another video !
You made a lot of excellent points here, and I would love to transfer this information to the US.
I especially liked your point about the red clearance, if it’s too long people will run it. There’s a bicycle signal crossing in my town that gives 4 seconds of bicycle red clearance to cross a 30 foot road, and because I know this, I will run the signal if it just turns red. 1.5 seconds of clearance is all that was needed
Great video. And I fully agree with your point that realistic timings are safer and make people behave better.
This also goes for realistic speed limits. As a Dutch person spending a while in an Eastern European country I am very disappointed about all the unrealistic speed limits everywhere. Nobody keeps these speed limits here and you will literally be driven off the road by people angrily passing you while trying to keep them. It has made me give up on trying.
This happens mainly because the roads are not designed to the speed limit. E.g: most provincial roads when crossing through villages (with zebra crossings, shops and houses close along side them, (and literal horse drawn carriages being used on them),). Will have a speed limit of 50km/h but have exactly the same width and straightness as outside the village limits where the speed limit is 100km/h. It makes people barely slow down and life very dangerous for the villagers.
Greetings from the Czech traffic engineer,
what you described in the video as the "Netherlands system" is not only used in the Netherlands. Below I send a link to the Czech manual for the design of light-controlled intersections. If you translate it, you will see that the exact same principle is also used in the Czech Republic. For those who do not want to waste time, the TLDR is that the Czech system takes into account:
- the time it takes for a vehicle leaving the intersection to leave the collision area between the entering and exiting direction,
- the longest possible length of the vehicle leaving the intersection,
- the time it takes the oncoming vehicle to reach the collision area,
- safety gap [s] (to prevent vehicles from narrowly missing each other).
The entire system describes all intersection movements quite precisely and takes into account the relationship of all relevant directions with each other. From these, a matrix of intermediate times is created and, according to it, the optimal sequence of phases is determined, so that the resulting cycle has the most favorable characteristics (mostly to be as short as possible or to have the largest capacity).
Manual:
www.pjpk.cz/data/USR_001_2_8_TP/TP_81.pdf
Thank you for sharing! It is interesting to see the Czech guidelines as well
For those who think this is unsafe, you likely already drive with these concepts in mind: When you're turning left on a road with traffic, you factor in clearance time and entry time in your left turn, someone will by in your path and coming at you when you go, you time your left turn with the predicted gap in traffic the only difference is there is a system to guide your traffic with pre-calculated clearances.
Something that would be an interesting idea is calculated idle acceleration entry-times, (so you'd see things like negative 5 seconds,) probably would only be an interesting idea for a simulation considering the transition phase for a real society might kill a few people, but it would be interesting to see the potential fuel/energy savings.
As a US-ian, I fully understood and really like this idea... while also knowing this would never fly here (especially here in Seattle), it would just encourage more people to _intentionally_ run red lights... because it would _increase the probability there's something for them to hit._
Wel, the us is dumb, cant change a system if the people wont change
I don't understand that reasoning. Are people over there suicidal?
@@longbow857 No, just homicidal. But that encouragement can be easily reduced by making them feel it where it really hurts, in their wallets.
Thank you for disseminating these concepts which help us better understand our streets!
your pronunciation of "verkeerslichtenregelingen" is much better than i would have expected from any non-native speaker lol, good job
0:25 I have installed this trafficlight (only the cabinet with the hardware/software) a few years back. Most of the intersections of this stretch of road (N470) has our latest generation of trafficlightcontrollers
Every time I see a comparison between Dutch traffic and another country I see that we are always better at it. I really wish the best for everybody and if they simply did look at us a bit more.
Say the Netherlands had just adaopted this idea and the City of Ottawa, ON follows its usual pattern, it will be another 40 years before the traffic regulators 'figure this out.' In 1983 in Liechtenstein at a red light, any driver that was more than 3 cars from the front of the line was required to turn off their motors. Here we are, almost 40 years later, and the idea hasn't slapped them in the face yet.
You'd think with many German-built vehicles turning themselves off at a stop the City would have a light bulb turn on, but alas they remain clueless!
@@SlickBubbles it is highly irresponsible in Canada to do such a thing at -30 if you turn your engine off while waiting there is a chance it wont turn on again on the first ignition and it creates a domino effect if you add in the fact that chance increases with the number of car doing the same in that lane. It means slower traffic, more dangerous situations, etc. Cars which are programmed to do so will do so when the temperature of the engine allows it and therefore aren't much more dangerous, but it's insane to ask the same of a 20-30 year old car.
@@jeanjacques9365 Every country should look at other countries and see what they can take that fits in their situation. The turning of of the engine might be a bad idea if mandatory but I do not see a problem during summer.
Placing the traffic signals on the entrance of the intersection encourages drivers to stop behind the line so they can see the signals. Signals on the far side rewards poor stopping behaviour.
Here in Russia, often the traffic signals are both on the nearside and farside of the intersection, even though only nearside signals are required.
It's also a lot clearer on approach. You see the lights way before you see the intersection itself, let alone the exact line where you need to stop. Having the light on the near side gives you a nice clear target when slowing down. Again, it improves traffic flow because you'll have less people being overly cautious AND less people stopping too late. You could even say it's better for the environment, because when you know where you have to stop, you can anticipate and let the car slow down on its engine (or on its charger nowadays) and use the brakes less.
They just completed a new intersection at my local town here in Australia that uses this, everyone gets confused and think people are running reds but it helps.
Strict enforcement of red lights (fines) has a tendency to cure that problem.
Thanks very much!
As a French living in Canada I was so shocked by how "normal" it is to run on red lights here in Canada! More particularly the Pick-up drivers...
Not just bikes moment
If you have the chance, come to Den Bosch, I believe I read once we have an even more advanced traffic light system, with countdowns for cars and cyclists and detection loops that are so well tuned you rarely wait for unreasonable amount of times. Examples would be in the Maaspoort, or Orthen
Yes I have visited Den Bosch to check out the traffic signals but I will certainly return. Your traffic signal designer Eric Greweldinger is known for supporting innovative traffic signal practices and technologies.
@@OntarioTrafficMan ah interesting! I didn't know the person, will definitely look him up.
I knew the dutch system was better but I didn't really understand the intricacies of what made it better. This is an amazing explanation, thank you!
This is an exceptional video, extremely well done. As someone that has worked with the Institute of Transportation Engineers on this topic, I would encourage you to join in on the discussion in the listserv.
Thanks Peter!
I'm working on a followup video where I walk through the calculations in more detail, which should hopefully be up within the next couple weeks. I'm hoping that will help bring more NA engineers up to speed on how it works here in NL, which should hopefully help the discussion. I'd be happy to join the discussion, though I'm not an ITE member and I'm not sure how the listservs work.
As far as I am aware, here in the UK we use a similar system to the Dutch clearance times table, and you can see this in action at certain junctions. However, there are some differences - amber time is fixed at 3 seconds here, regardless of the speed of the road (anything from 20 mph to 70 mph). I believe additonal red time is added on high speed roads to compensate. Because we use a 2 second red+amber phase before green, it makes the normal minimum time between phases 5 seconds, instead of the 3 or even 2 seconds you see in the Netherlands. A 1 second overlap of amber and red+amber is technically possible to create a 4 second intergreen time, but I've never seen it used. We also have a minimum green time of 7 seconds (vs Dutch 4 seconds), which makes complex phasing much less efficient here when there is less traffic around. A 5 second minimum green is technically possible, but I've never seen it used either.
You know, I'd never thought about this but as we go red, to amber, to green, the amber actually makes sense as 'Proceed with caution' as a car may still be in the intersection.
For the min green time, are you sure about that? Here's a clip from my local town which looks to be less than that unless I'm misunderstanding how the other signals may look:
i.gyazo.com/19072f1b2f342d33e16c373e6f504e0d.mp4
@@VoxelLoop Red+amber means stop by law, but it acts as a “get ready” warning. Especially useful in a manual car. Red+amber is still part of the clearance period, so it’s important not to shoot off into the junction the second amber appears.
In that video, I think the right filter arrow was on for your direction. Generally, we don’t like to just turn off a filter arrow without warning, so they turn the light to red first, then straight back to regular green so the oncoming traffic can go. Though for some reason, up north they don’t seem to have a problem with this - turning filter arrows off without warning is standard up there!
@@ado543 If only the UK used amber filter arrows, just like Ireland does. This would make the stage sequences a lot more flexible, because you wouldn't have to change the main traffic light to green just to safely terminate the filter arrow.
Alternatively, the filter arrow could flash green for 3 seconds before terminating, as is done here in Russia.
3 seconds for 70mph? How are drivers not getting trapped in positions where entering on red is physically unavoidable?
In the US, the yellow time tends to be around (mph/10 + 0.5) seconds, and depending on where the approaching vehicle is when the light turns yellow, they might need every bit of that warning.
@@princekamoro3869 British traffic lights are fitted with dilemma zone protection when the approach speeds exceed 35 mph.
It holds the light green until all the vehicles have cleared the dilemma zone. Technically, this is known as "speed assessment" (SA).
I really enjoy the psychology aspect of street/intersection design that comes up in situations like this. It reminds me of designing a theme park or a game level to lead people's eyes to different places - but applied to transportation and safety instead of just entertainment.
Cool video!
It's quite obvious if you think about it from perspective of pedestrian/cyclist. I know countless number of big intersections in my city where pedestrian/biker has red to cross a lane of traffic going one way, while all the cars on this lane also have red because they need to also pass multiple other lanes. And this situation lasts for 5-10 seconds. Sometimes those 5-10 seconds would be enough to give people extra green phase an massively reduce waiting time. Unsurprisingly, a lot of people decide to just run the red light in this case. I mean, what's the point of waiting if you don't actually give a way to anybody?
I've heard many Dutch people (car drivers, obviously) complain that the Dutch method of putting traffic lights on the same side of the intersection makes them "harder to see". Now I learnt that it is actually safety measure: fascinating.
It's not only a safety measure. The state of the light is only valid at or in front of the stop line. So the light is placed where it's valid to prevent misconceptions.
At this point only pedestrian lights are still at the far end, and it causes no end to confusion to pedestrians: the light turns red so they start to move faster, even though they're still iin their exit phase. I'm starting to see more and more pedestrian signals on the near side though.
I live in Indiana and my dad and I were just discussing how crap our signalling algorithms are, but I was crap at explaining what I was thinking.
This is MUCH further along and more through, but I'm still sending this video his way!
And to think this is just part 1 of the series really. These are basics.
Part 2, actually. Part 1 was multi-stage pedestrian crossings.
@@OntarioTrafficMan looks like I have another video to watch! 😁
@@OntarioTrafficMan Ofcourse, how on earth did I forget about that one?
Great analysis and explanation.
I think the far side lights are one of the biggest flaws in Ontario's traffic signal design....but also one that is the hardest to fix.
Even just convincing people they are in the wrong place would be an overwhelming challenge, before you even begin to move every signal...and it would be pretty disorienting to have them mixed for any period of time.
It's unfortunate, because it makes it seem like it's something that simply can never be fixed in Ontario....but if Sweden managed to change the side of the road they drive on...anything is possible.
Yeah it is unfortunate. However I've noticed that Ontario is much more insistant on putting them on the very farthest edge of the intersection than other places. Many US states commonly place them in the middle of the intersection if it's large, which avoids the need to add auxiliary signal heads when the main heads are too far away. I think Ontario just loves clutter.
The difference is that sweden is aa european country, and a scandanavian too, america cant even properly adapt metric over imperial, something that doesnt need to be opposed
@@charlestonianbuilder344 I guess Canada should be fine then, considering we changed the every speed limit sign in the country from mph to km/h over the course of two days in September 1977.
@@OntarioTrafficMan Indeed. I think this comes a little bit to conservatism. And I do mean little c conservative (Ontario is strongly big C conservative, but not little c). Conservative leaning places seem to be able to do low effort high reward/minimal designs more readily. Ontario seems entirely unwilling not to overbuild things. Like...now paving the the road and a full gutter isn't enough, some engineering teams are paving a 1 foot strip of concrete on the other side of the gutter for some reason.
It's also overwhelmingly difficult to change in the US, because far-side signals are required under MUTCD. You'd have to take it up with the Federal Highway Administration (or whoever writes MUTCD).
Dutchman here, and it's absolutely true that our traffic lights are pretty smart, most of the time, meaning we wait less at red lights. The traffic detection also works really well. In general, if the light's red over here, it's a very stupid idea to run the red light, and it leads to people almost universally respecting the red light. I can't remember the last time I saw someone running a red light, apart from maybe someone rushing through an intersection like 0.3 seconds after the light turned red.
I'm impressed by the quality of this video ! Thank you this is so clear and useful !
Thanks! I always wondered why traffic lights seemed to automatically turn green in the Netherlands, whenever I needed them to be that way! It honestly looks such fun to drive there
What I also noticed while driving in the NL is that the traffic lights turns orange before the last car goes over the line (for example a queue of 5 cars) so that it doesn't waste any time turning orange and after that red. The other directions can go immediately. It's kind of the same what you explained only pretty interesting to notice.
Super interesting video. I used to live in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and a lot of their lights had zero dwell time for all red (at least at the time; I've noticed going back that there are more delays at some intersections.) It was a double benefit just like your video says: not only did it keep traffic moving by taking advantage of entry time, but it also discouraged people from racing yellow lights or blowing through reds, lest they get hit.
Now that I spend most of my time in metro Detroit, and everyone seems to have forgotten how to drive after the pandemic, the long dwell times feel like they've led to people treating reds like they're somewhere between a green and a yield sign. (I'm a professional driver so I see a lot.)
I'm glad they changed this most of the times in the Netherlands. Lots of them used to be timebased. Not even checking for how much traffic there is. I recall coming home late driving in Rotterdam and had to wait for a red trafficlight whilst there was no other vehicle or pedestrian on the road. We waited there for a good minute. Nowadays most of the roads have pre-checks to see what traffic is passing by.
You're totally right. This traffic light method hasn't always been there. In my younger years I would way more often cross at a red light. Later on I didn't do it so much, because the cycles were much shorter. Nobody wants to wait for an intersection where everybody is waiting.
Up until you started to discuss the psychological effects ("oh, there's such a huge time between changes, I can run this light!") I was highly skeptical, but that definitely makes sense to me. I think as people got used to more rapid cycles they'd be less worried about rushing to make them to avoid a long wait too. However, I found the difference in which side of the intersection a signal is on most interesting! I'd be very curious to know what kind of effect on driving behavior signal position makes even with equal timings.
Having traffic lights on the near side makes drivers more aware of when they are entering the intersection, so if these Dutch principles are applied on intersections where lights are on the far side, an extra delay (of maybe a second or so) might be necessary to truly make them safe. Near-side placement will help prevent drivers from accidentally driving too far forward, since that keeps them from seeing the light. It also means that vehicles will block crosswalks less often, and that pedestrians will be safer.
There are potentially other benefits as well, but these ones stand out the most to me. I'd also say that driving under the light meant for your lane is more clear, but that's likely just because I've never had to deal with far-side traffic lights. Either way, after entering the intersection the light has no further purpose, so placing them on the near side shouldn't really have any drawbacks.
@@Gamesaucer I found whenever driving in Europe, the near side traffic lights were difficult to see. I had to lean my body to see around the car's A-pillars or under the roofline. Maybe I am doing something wrong. How do you normally get around that, just stop further back?
@@SagBobet You can definitely stop a little further back. Not a full car length away from the line, but maybe up to 1.5m or so?
In general, though, it's not a bad thing if you're moving a little while driving. Your awareness of your blind spots is going to be better if you learn to lean your body while driving. For example, leaning forward gives you a wider field of view, which is helpful when turning.
Of course, if you have to fold yourself over the dashboard to see a light that's a different story. Definitely stop further back in that case. Same with the A-pillar blocking your line of sight. Stopping in a slightly different position is probably a good idea in that case as well.
As an aside: if you let yourself slowly roll forward the last of the distance, you can stop exactly where you can easily keep track of the lights. If you find yourself stopping in an inconvenient place often, it's important to make a habit of this.
I'd also recommend to let off the gas pedal very early on, if you're not already doing this. Let friction and air resistance do some of the work for you... and if the light turns green on approach, you didn't slow down more than you had to, which saves energy.
Really interested in the points you raised at the end about how to transition to better practices.
When there are so many factors in design and behavior, it seems like a huge challenge to making a meaningful incremental change. There is so often resistance to making individual changes since many people see them as at best making no difference at significant expense, without seeing how multiple improvements could compound to improve everyone's experience; and big, comprehensive changes are just too expensive or disruptive to get support.
Yes the video originally had a big section at the end where I examined the challenges in detail but I removed it because the video was getting out of hand and I never would have been able to finish it otherwise. I might still do those items as a followup video
I'm loving the nerdiness of this.
There is actually one traffic light intersection in Canada that got it right: the main intersection in Canmore, AB (Benchlands Trail/Bow Valley trail intersection). They even have the traffic lights over the stop line, instead of across the intersection. It's the most European feeling traffic light system I've come across.
Having lived in the Netherlands for over two decades I can say their road design and implementation of traffic laws are far more efficient in general. Stop signs are few and far between and most intersections are regulated with either traffic lights or roundabouts. Even those that aren't are regulated by one basic rule: traffic coming from the right always has right of way. No awkward 4-way stop sign madness.
Intersections in the Netherlands also have much better lane sorting systems. Except for the city centers where there's limited space, you will not find yourself waiting for an endless row of cars on a left turn while blocking the road for everyone behind you.
Wow, that's a very European intersection indeed! I had no idea there were intersections with near-side signals in Canada. Thank you for sharing!
Poland here. Intergreens work like you describe NL situation, so definitely not just "One country where...". The intergreens table is also uploaded to a secondary CPU which performs monitoring of the signals and intergreens calculations basing on feedback from the signal groups, verifying the main CPU adheres to the intergreens table. And there's a bit of jumping through hoops to assure red+yellow on conflicting group can turn on even before intergreen time is elapsed even in case the intergreen time is zero, which at a glance seems like predicting the future (but is in fact just extending the conflict green by a second past its normal activation time).
Yeah, I should have been clearer that NL isn't the only time where entry times and clearance matrices are used.
The latest versions of Dutch controller firmware do natively support intergreen times, so they can handle times lower than the yellow duration without issue. I work only with the software, so I'm not sure how they get the conflict monitors (secondary CPU) to understand the negative clearance times (intergreen < yellow)
@@OntarioTrafficMan The secondairy works with a conflict matrix that has all the times filled in.
That was really interesting, thank you 👍😁
One of the reasons it is *really* safer than overregulated systems is that it actually relies on people paying attention and thinking for themselves. People generally don't crash into each other, and when they do it's because they are not paying attention. Regulations, buffers, safety margins etc let people stop paying attention. Consistently having a green light while other vehicles are still in the intersection trains your brain to not immediately consider it safe to go just because you have the green light, and it's legal to go. It trains your brain to look at what's actually happening in the intersection, what's where, who's moving, who's slowing down or stopped etc, instead of assuming everyone else will always be stopped.
Dedicated bikes paths and signals are the key thing that enables reducing red clearance times.
Only then can you assume that road traffic will clear the conflict zone near the speed limit.
Precisely. This shows that protected cycle lanes will actually speed up car traffic even if they have their own phases for the cycle lanes.
I do think for it to work, you'd still need sensors that detect slow traffic (tractor, horse drawn traffic, cyclists on road; slow crossing pedestrian etc) as well as very long vehicles (truck with trailer).
So US traffic engineers do everything in their power to make car flow better, but at the same time they don't put in the effort for something like this. Yup, sounds like the US to me
Somebody gets a nice fat contract for making the street wider. Nobody makes money out of just doing the math to make the existing intersection more efficient.
@@eljanrimsa5843 that's exactly the short-sightedness I sadly see in many things within the US. In this case, it's whatever is 'easiest' to do in the moment. If you were to make it more efficient however, it'd save a lot of time in the long term, as well as making intersections safer with fewer people running red lights.
My parents lived in a condo at center and Bathurst for a few years. That intersection was horrible for pedestrians and cars. I see they've redone it since I was last there but I'm sure it still sucks for both.
I remember my mom calling me and and asking when I'd be there. I could see the building so I said five minutes. Between the traffic (it was rush hour), security, parking and the elevator I walked in the door 25 mins later.
I never understood why pedestrians didn't used to be allowed to cross on the west side. The green light for southbound cars was long enough for pedestrians to cross anyway. I think they were inconveniencing or endangering pedestrians just on the off chance that there is less southbound traffic and they could give a few extra seconds to the northbound left turning cars
Another great point why this is great, it removes congestion wait times, gives more life time minutes that add up for people and thus also improving the economy as a whole on top of the safety benefits
I totally agree with this. I have driven a number of times in Delft and other areas of NL and it is so much more efficient than here in Ontario. I always felt that their light system was so much more smarter than ours.
Great video! The closest I can say I've ever done to this is at a ramp with a displaced right turn. Using a delay green (aka Leading Ped Interval) on a phase that doesn't have a ped phase associated with it, a logic statement says if the EB phase is timing and NB+NBRT phases are next, to call the ped phase for the phantom NBRT phase. So the NB phase gets a green (red clearance timed for the shorter conflict zone) and the NBRT is delayed another second.
But this array of clearance intervals is crazy...and not anything I've heard of here in the US.
The second point is done, but not to the same extent. Usually it's taking no more than a second off the all red.
Good stuff!
Cool! I was wondering how they dealt with the clearance times for those displaced rights.
I've used both methods while calculating clearances for turning streetcars. The dummy phases which enable the phase to occur at different points in the cycle use different clearances depending on the phases which can follow them
The array of clearances is actually a lot simpler than the dummy phases, dummy LPIs, and overlaps we end up with in North America anytime we want to do something out of the ordinary. The clearance table also doubles as the conflict matrix which North American controllers have anyway.
@@OntarioTrafficMan I'm not sure that's the common way, but that's the way I did it! You could also just use a dummy phase I suppose, but this way seemed more straightforward.
@@OntarioTrafficMan Wouldn't mind seeing a bit more detail about how european traffic signals work, and how they're different/similar to North American signal controllers.
It's great to see what other countries do, but can be frustrating if it's not even possible to do here.
Was also just reviewing another signal where we use logic statements to use different all red intervals depending on which phase is next. Sort of along the same lines here, but still a lot more 'basic'.
The US/CA setup where cars can go over a crossing that should be 'protected' is insane. What about people who are hard-of-hearding? Blind? Or just have very poor sight?
In the UK, we have an audible tone when the crossing light is green, as well as a little 'spinning wheel' on the bottom of the pedestrian button that helps people with disabilities to know when it's safe to cross, and sure enough, green for the pedestrian does mean it's safe to cross. You are protected from any car traffic.
I think it just sort of screams as to how archaic the US road systems are. They've got a disgusting amount of traffic for a reason.
Fascinating to see how details like this matter. It helps that in NL, a traffic signals seem to be more rigorously adhered to. In Ontario, the amount of red/yellow light running has dramatically increased over the last quarter century with it now being a cultural norm that the yellow should be treated as a green. I only noticed this difference in comparison to Thailand where the first part of a red is treated as a green. Canadian behaviour has slowly become more like Bangkok.
Only laziness and sheer incompetence can explain why this is so rarely implemented in North America. Literally superior in every possible way. Should be used everywhere!
In the Netherlands , let's say 25 years ago, we had a clearance situation as now in Ontario. And a lto of accidents because red light runners. Than engineers increase the clearence time....result MORE accidents because more and laterr red light runners. That was the reason they started to shorten the idle time on crossings....knowing that only that would decrease the amount of red light runners.
But there is another note about dutch traffic lights....they know when traffic is coming. If tehre is no traffic that part of the phase will be ignored to the next round. Also decreasing waiting time quite often.
But also those traffic lights do have a very bad habit....Even close following lights are not programmed to have a green wave. And constant stopping and accelerating is not good for energy usages...in other words bad for the envireonnement...
I guess it helps that in the Dutch case, they don't need to account for slow moving bicycles in the clearance time, due to having completely seperate cycle paths. This means that they only need to take into account cars which will clear the junction faster.
Indeed. Dutch intersections often include bicycle paths even when the streets leading up to them do not.
Cyclists are not the only slow or vulnerable road users, and it appears in the future there will be more.
@@Barnaclebeard What are you trying to say? Other "slow or vulnerable road users" would also use the cycle path, so @Liverpool Cyclist's statement is still valid.
@@dykam i wondered if he referred to things like e bikes. In Canada they are (supposed to be) limited to 30 kph which is far too fast to mix with pedestrians, faster than most bicycles and slower than motor traffic. North American design decisions about unmotorized transport are so bad that ebikes probably can't make things substantially worse. On the other hand, I can imagine that they might disrupt assumptions in optimized systems.
We do account for bicycle lanes. Even when they are seperate, they still cross many roads. Bicycle paths and pedestrian corssings usually have seperate lights, that may have shorter green phases and an extra light for pedestrians halfway on an isle to clear the first part earlier. So yes, the shorter green phase for cyclists will indeed make sure cyclists and pedestrians have cleared the crossing, but it is an extra consideration in the matrix.
As someone who grew up in Vancouver and drove there for years and now lives and drives in The Netherlands I can honestly say the dutch system is substantially better. Not only do you spend less time stuck at traffic lights it's also considerably safer. Some this is down to the placement of lights on the intersection as well. In The Netherlands the traffic lights are on your side of the intersection and not the opposite side, this means you can't see what the cross traffics light is doing and it practically eliminates people jumping a light.
I grew up in Ottawa, spent 5 years living in Europe after high school and then moved back to Ottawa. I have tried to inform the staff at the City of Ottawa that their traffic signal cvycles REALLY need work. Part of making the intersections more efficient is that the wasted fuel, caused by excessive idling (Ontario doesn't mandate drivers to turn off their motors like Liechtenstein did almost 40 years ago) which would reduce emissions.
Ottawa has at least one intersection where the full cycle is at least 2 minutes long (Yes, green to green). Traffic from all directions is about equal in this intersection. Plus, there are few pedestrians!
If I just miss my usual left turn, I go straight across, over a bridge, turn left at another set of lights, make a U-turn into a right turn lane, go back over the bridge, make a right turn, over another bridge that starts at least 100 m away and start going up yet one more bridge, before my 'original' left turn signal turns green!!! I feel sorry for the residents that live right beside half of the intersection!
Ottawa City Hall doesn't listen to logic no matter how it's presented.
Time to make them listen is at election (and make sure they become unelected when they don't).
This is so true... I sometimes find myself just starting to cross when it's still red if there aren't cars around as I know it's GOING to turn green soon. However, sometimes you get caught on this... as it doesn't turn green. for through traffic and the opposite side
In the NA system, you end up moving in antipation. In the dutch system, the signals are anticipating your movement. Smart!
That... makes you part of the problem. Wait your goddamn turn.
@@GreyMaria Nah, not really. Architects and Engineers only have so much sway when it comes to decision making. They have to take into account both human nature and cultural norms.
That's why expressions like "paving the cowpaths" came into existence. Working WITH the natural form and human bias will result in a better, safer, piece of infrastructure.
In this case, humans can SEE the other lights and anticipate it turning green. They know that there's a few seconds where nothing is going to happen so TWO things happen...
1) people run the red light knowing that they have a few extra seconds.
2) People start to move just before the green anticipating the green light knowing the other side has a red.
Is it safe for me to anticipate a green at an intersection I'm familiar with? No! Of course not! No stopping at a stop sign ALSO isn't safe or legal... but 0 out of 10 drivers actually come to a complete stop at a stop sign... when the intersection is clear and for cyclists that are travelling MUCH more slowly, stop signs really are more like like yield signs.
Counterintuitively having the "all-sides-red" for too long ends up being LESS safe than only what is necessary. You end up taking some of the risk away from running red lights and then red lights (especially when they've JUST turned red) become a suggestion instead of a rule.
Speeding in a school zone is a bad idea, but if the road was designed with a speed in mind, fewer people would speed through a school zone.
People anticipating the green may be PART of the problem, but it's a small part of the problem compared to the part played by those responsible for road safety as a whole.
I also noticed that the phase you show in the Netherlands has its signals slightly after the stop line, forcing drivers to be at or before the line to see the light, whereas the Ontario light and much of the US use signals that are on the opposite side of the intersection, especially for "stroads."
Here's one more reason why I love the Dutch! Thanks for a fascinating video!
All this time I thought the last car to cross in front of me was running a red light... Seems it's all on purpose! Thanks for explaining it to us Dutchies 😅
In the Netherlands, especially in some of the larger cities there are timer bars next to the traffic lights to give a rough estimation on how long to wait as well.
Also the green wave, on high trafic roads where trafic lights at the next crossing is already signalled the traffic is comming.
Then there are several magnetic loops at most trafic lights signalling a trafic light it has traffic waiting, speed of vehicles, with a queuelength, which CAN(mainly used on magnetic loops outside of traffic lights) even divide the vehicles in 3 categories of length(roughly car, car+trailer, anything larger, but specified in meters).
Queuelengths are stored in central databases where a few main parties(government like "Gemeentes", "Provicies" and "Rijkswaterstaat") dump and receive data for traffic analysis. To optimize it even further or plan road work when a certain amount of vehicles have past.
The most infuriating thing is, some Ontario side street traffic lights will stay green long after the last car.
Assuming it's not waiting for a pedestrian phase, the issue is that they only have a single detector which is too close to the stop line to provide accurate green durations. This is also the topic of a future video
In many intersections in The Netherlands also use detection loops in the road to detect if traffic is approaching. This specially helps when its relatively quiet. They even get used for bicycle lanes, so when there are no bicycles waiting, they get skipped in the cycle. Same for pedestrians, though they of course have to press a button (once, more then once doesn't make the cycle go faster ppl 😉)
So when the intersection is quiet, all lights default to red, and can switch instantly to green when traffic for that side is approaching. This helps unnecessary breaking+accelerating, and just plain annoyance by the driver waiting for an empty intersection.
Lots of pedestrian crossings in Poland use radar detectors to detect pedestrians waiting. There are of course buttons in case of radar failure, but there's a little light by the button that lights up if the crossing has been activated so you don't need to press the button if the light is lit.
"AllRed" is one strategy, used with traffic similar on all entrances. Another is "Preference" where the main road gets green non-stop if there's no-one on a side inlet or the left-turn lane. Only if demand is registered the light on the main road turns to red.
And today, in the category "things you never knew or noticed even though you've lived in the Netherlands all your life"...
Thanks for this amazing bit of insight in how our traffic signal system works! It sure explains why traffic signals always feel "off" while I'm on holiday elsewhere. Turns out they aren't off, the ones I'm used to are. Who knew? xD
Hey, I noticed something about the positioning of the lights: in the shots from the Netherlands, they're before the intersection, whereas in the shots from Canada, they're after it, even though both countries drive on the same side of the road. Could that also be part of the Dutch traffic safety policy?
Wondering about my own country, I fired up Google Earth and took a look around the capitals in Australia, and it seems that traffic lights hanging over the lanes are actually pretty rare here. Seems the local councils prefer to just put them on a straight pole on the side of the road, or on straight pole on a traffic island in the middle. For the few examples I was able to find in the capital cities, all except Hobart seem to have them before the intersection, so it's clearly something done on a per-state basis, with Tasmania as the odd one out.
Oh, and the reason I looked in the capital cities and not my own town is because we only have two sets of lights, and no roads with more than two lanes in total.
If I recall correctly it's an additional safety measure. If the traffic lights are far away, it's easier for drivers to advance past the stopping line, whereas if it's right over your head you need to maintain adequate distance to be able to see the lights.
@@Martmists Is there any benefit in placing them after the intersection? Or why are they doing this at the first place? Always looks weird to me and very confusing in urban environments
I wondered why I'd never thought about where our traffic lights are placed. Of course that's because we often have 3 traffic lights for a particular direction of travel so we can always see one.
@@etou1146 One big benefit is that it makes it easier to see especially if your car has a smaller thinner windshield or you have the sun visor down. This is also one of the reasons most European traffic lights have an extra one of the right side that's lower. Having far lights also allows for more compact intersections as you don't need to put the stop line further down the incoming lane and can squeeze it right at the pedestrian walkway (which also tends to be right at the road edge). Most European traffic lights are located on the near side while most North American are on the far side. There are some place in the US especially that have them hanging over the middle of the road (less infrastructure to install them that way).
In busy settings, it is much clearer which lights are yours. Car, tram, pedestrian, bike lights do add up. These lights are also placed quite low, so from far away you will see them.
Nice ! How does the entry time work if drivers are approaching the intersection at a high speed as the signal changes to green ?
This is actually what the entry time is based on. It's based on the worst case scenario where a driver is slowing down for red, but then it turns green and they speed up to the speed limit
I originally included a section talking in detail about the calculations but I cut it out because the video was getting too big and overwhelming. I might make a followup video where I go through the calculations for an intersection by hand
@@OntarioTrafficMan please do
@@OntarioTrafficMan I look forward to any and all new videos you make on these subjects. I should make some of my own on my other channel
@@OntarioTrafficMan please do make that follow up video.
This was one of the two questions that stayed in my head throughout.
The other is expanding your simple example to a more typical example of 2 way roads in both directions. Otherwise it seems like you've omitted this on purpose to support your argument.
This is great. The only thing that would make this harder to implement in North America is that right turning traffic must almost always yield to peds, i.e separate right turning phases separate from the parallel ped movement are very rare.
In that case you couldn't have cars receiving their green light before the pedestrians on the parallel crosswalk do, as that could mean drivers will see the "don't walk" signal is still illuminated and start accelerating across a crosswalk, when suddenly the walk signal appears and a ped steps out.
Of course, these issues already exist due to right turn on red anyway to an extent, but that's a different topic!
Indeed this method is most effective with fully-protected turning phases, which are increasingly being implemented in Ontario to improve pedestrian and cyclist safety.
The situation where peds receive their light later than parallel cars already exists all over North America, at signals which default to Don't Walk and jump to Walk when someone presses the button. The requirement for drivers to yield or not is based on the presence or absence of a turning arrow. It would help if we make sure to always include a turning arrow where a protected turning possibility exists, to reduce the "crying wolf" effect where there's a green ball, but turning drivers actually don't need to yield to anyone.
Finally I have understood why I felt like I was always waiting for much shorter time at red lights in the Netherlands compared to where I am from in Germany. I always guessed Dutch road engineers would be somehow more talented at their job, but now I am pretty sure, German traffic lights are calculated similarly as the Ontarian ones.
Based on other comments, it sounds like Germany uses the same calculations as the Netherlands. The difference is more that the vehicle detection is less accurate and the signals have less flexibility to change the phase order in real time
@@OntarioTrafficMan A big reason why Dutch traffic signals are more efficient than elsewhere in Europe, is because Dutch controllers use a group-based structure. This allows each approach to operate independently, as long as there is no conflict between other approaches specified as "opposing".
Elsewhere, the controllers mostly use a "stage-based" structure. A stage is a set of non-conflicting movements that always run together. This limits flexibility and often causes unnecessary delays.
For example, let's say that there are 2 protected left turns running back-to-back, and traffic on one approach runs out quicker than on the other approach.
Under group-based control, oncoming traffic opposite of that approach would get their green earlier, while left-turning traffic on their side would still have their green.
Under stage-based control, that approach would remain green, because the other approach would be holding it green. Oncoming traffic opposite of that approach has to wait for no reason.
@@NewBuildmini Exactly. That will be the next topic in this video series
German traffic lights use the same equations as Dutch ones
I was very surprised to only see 6k subs for you. Keep it up!!
I experience that behavior in Switzerland, too (traffic lights in one direction changing shortly after the other, cars are regularly in the intersection though other light just went green). Interesting to see the explanation!
When I saw your video in my recommended list, I thought it was odd. After watching it, I'm glad it did. This was really interesting and well presented. I've often been stopped near an intersection and noticed that no one was moving. I had always assumed it was something that couldn't be avoided.