Important note! I accidentally cut a really important point out of this video about the first phase that makes it extra confusing, and I only just realised. Can anyone tell me what the established rules of the road are when a motorist comes up to a stoplight that doesn't have any lights on? Well the usual assumption is that there must have been a power cut, so I would personally approach this type of intersection with extreme caution. Weirdly enough with the HAWK beacon... it's the exact OPPOSITE. Madness.
Well if they didn't put up big signs that say crosswalk signal. I have normal crosswalk signals and emergency signals where I live in North Carolina with just the yellow and red stoplights. They are turned off unless someone using them and they have signs, so you just get use to them being turned off.
At a regular Intersection signal, if they are off, you stop like a 4-way stop sign. But at a railroad crossing there is no green, they are just off. Same as the HAWK. So you just need to know what situation you are in. Problem is lack of situational awareness by both drivers and pedestrians.
The Ontario Driver's Handbook instructs drivers to treat a blank signal as a stop sign, but there doesn't seem to be any actual law supporting this. Many US states have similar guidelines which is why the lights on a HAWK signal are arranged in a triangle instead of a line, to avoid counting as a traffic signal. For reference the Ontario Highway Traffic Act defines a flashing yellow as "proceed with caution" and flashing red as stop, yield, then proceed
Was thinking that, would treat no lights with a lot of suspicion and expect danger. It's still ok to drive through but you have to expect that everyone else also doesn't have guidance. Unless stated otherwise, in the UK there's often deactivated traffic lights on some roundabouts connecting to A roads/motorways that are only used at certain times to deal with congestion, and otherwise use it as a normal roundabout, but that's fine because the failsafe is an already safe junction, just not necessarily optimised for the traffic level at peak times
In California the law says to treat non-working traffic signals as if they were flashing red, which requires "Stop, then proceed only when safe to do so."
Also, what are the elderly or physically infirm (walk with a stick) supposed to do. It seems to me that American drivers are in dire need of education as to the presence of OTHER road users.
Yes and when that happens at a signalized pedestrian crossing you can stagger each half so pedestrians have a green wave in whichever direction they're going and drivers don't need to wait while the pedestrian is on the opposite side of the intersection. For a great example of this from Madison Wisconsin, search for the video "Two Stage Crossing at University & Ridge St." by Jerry Schippa.
2:14 - as a Brit, I find the idea that our crossings might be 'Too inconvenient for drivers' to be a frankly bizarre concept. Never once have I thought that stopping to allow pedestrians to cross is inconvenient - it's just not how we learn to drive. I get that there are impatient drivers in Britain - including many who will jump red lights. But ignoring a pedestrian at a crossing is like pushing in front in a queue - it's just not the done thing here and you will get frowned at.
@@ec8107 so I guess you wouldn’t do what we have to do here in the UK and that is giveaway and priority to any horse that might be on the road. I mean with the rider on it. Obvious The horse won’t be galloping and I’m not talking about the motorway.
@@Cheepchipsable but not at any cost to surely. It’s not even negotiable here. If it slows down traffic then that’s ok. We have extremely narrow country roads where you sometimes have to try and find somewhere to pull in to allow other cars to pass, so we just accept the lack of speed.
@@Cheepchipsable I guess that's the cultural difference. Most motorists in the UK (not all, but most) are not inconvenienced by having to stop. We just don't have the car culture that deeply ingrained (in most places, I make an exception for Aberdeen).
Being from the UK, a lot of the problem with crossings in the US is that they are kind-of just there and kind-of disappear into the other noise around you. UK crossings typically have zig-zags and sometimes other things (like barriers and traffic islands) that make you very aware that this is different from the rest of the road.
Most crosswalks in the US do have things like zig-zags and islands and things but they're often not lit or marked well enough. As a driver, it is difficult to even SEE a crosswalk before you get to it. Where I live there is a variant of the light shown in this video that is a bit simpler and better marked and I think it's a lot better than just having the zig-zag pattern on the street that you can't even see when you're going 40.
Same! I never knew I'm in any way interested in things like urban planning until I found well made videos about it. (That applies to many other subjects too, almost anything can become interesting when presented in the right way.)
I've never seen this channel before, and youtube suggested this to me a few hours after it was released, because I subscribe to dozens of urbanist channels. Now I am a new subscriber. I guess sometimes the algorithm works?
9:06 As a Train Conductor in the USA, i'm glad Evan talked about the contrast between the flashing lights of the crosswalk compared to a railroad crossing. It's something that other channels miss when talking about these new crosswalks.
Yeah, they should get rid of one of the alternating red lights so the cycle follows: flashing yellow (caution), solid yellow (light change), solid red (stop), flashing red (stop-and-proceed). If they wanted to distinguish the light fixture, they could combine it with a white reflective triangular yield-sign shape as the backplate for the signal-light.
@@weatherupstairs4814 Or they could...and stay with me here...throw out the whole idiotic ideal and actually go with a sensible, simple solution instead.
It would make more sense to have flashing red as "stop" and solid red as "you can go if crossing clear". That would be closer to existing practices in the US where "right on red" is a thing.
I moved from Scotland to upstate NY about 3 years ago, and you are spot on about it being scary for pedestrians. I had never driven before moving here, and so I spent the first 9 months in Utica unable to drive, it was horrific trying to get most every day things done. People drive like they have free healthcare here and it's genuinely frightening as a pedestrian. My parents gave me grief for driving a mile up the road to get groceries or do errands and I can't explain to them how the 5 lane stroad between myself and the strip mall is a literal deathtrap. The carcentric design of American spaces is one of the most culture shocky thing I have found about it.
Ok but this is a very city centered take. We need cars in suburban and rural areas. America is huge. The car helps with that. In cities it makes more sense to make it pedestrian friendly, but also unlike Scotland, our winters are not usually mild in most of the country. The humidity added to the cold can be deadly. Yeah public transport is great, but some of us have irregular schedules and wouldn't dream of biking in very cold weather.
@@amicableenmity9820 I don't think they were suggesting getting rid of cars; just altering the laws and systems that make it dangerous to be a pedestrian when surrounded by so many cars.
It depends where you are. Around here there are no stroads of that type, but, I remember staying at a hotel in the midwest and wanting to go to a restaurant that was like 300 feet away and getting in the car because most of that was a massive stroad with no sidewalks and no pedestrian crossing signals either and I was not going to get myself killed before getting my Culvers. (And preferably not after either)
I can imagine a courtroom scene where a driver’s lawyer asks witnesses if the pedestrian/victim was carrying a “See Me” flag when hit, to deflect blame from the driver.
@@nsnopper yeah, it's the same approach that's taken with cyclists. Unless I'm dressed in neon clown paint, it's my fault for not being "visible enough" despite the fact that the law clearly states the onus is on the driver to, err, not drive into anyone or anything else.
as a note, here in sweden at least, blinking yellow light means "there is an issue with the crossing, disregard light signals and proceed with caution"
Similar in New Zealand, though I've usually heard 'proceed with caution' expressed as 'treat as an uncontrolled intersection'... Which is basically just 'proceed with cation' with a hint of added 'remember the default priority rules'. Because we actually have uncontrolled intersections (though they're getting ever less common) and Don't have 4-way-stop/yield/give way equivalents. (after all, a four way 'give way' and an uncontrolled intersection are identical, save that one costs more to build and maintain, so why bother? And we're generally pretty conservative with stop signs. They are only used where there's an Actual specific Reason why give way signs aren't suitable. Usually obstructed sightlines, but sometimes other weirdness. Which means people know to pay attention to them when they show up (even if people who go through the same one a Lot are prone to performing 'rolling stops', which is technically a violation but isn't actually the same as just not stopping at all either.)
Similar here in NSW, Aus flashing light means proceed with caution. Usually it's a turned on for maintenance on the control unit rather than a malfunction though.
Indeed this is how it's taught in Europe. Blinking yellow = disabled/non functional light/maintenance, proceed with caution. Most often seen on traffic lights that are set on a program so they turn off at night when there is little to no traffic.
Here in the U.S., blinking red at intersections can typically mean, "there is an issue with the equipment. Treat like a full stop sign, look and cross when safe and/or other stop sign rules."
😂 I've never seen anything more ridiculous. If they don't care about hitting a person, which is objectively larger and more visible, why would they care about a flag?? Maybe they should make it an American flag? 🇺🇸 People in America seem to love this thing, so maybe they'd care about not ruffling that?
@@beccasalt8960 Its more about passing the blame on the pedestrians for not being visible enough- instead of the oversized cars with limited visibility.
A "see me nail carpet" would be effective too. Thinking about it... that could be integrated into signaled crosswalks, as long as there's a system that automatically lowers it for emergency vehicles.
The weird thing to me about American crossings is right on red, and jaywalking. Can I cross when there is a red man? No, wait until it is green. OK, so when it is green it is safe to cross then? Maybe, just look out for the cars turning right. But aren't they supposed to stop at the red light? Yes, but they can still cross it, oh and there is a decent chance they can't see you in their pickup truck, good luck :D
What we should do for right-on-red, is have it only allowed when there's a flashing yellow right arrow beneath it. This way, right turners can proceed when there's no conflicting traffic, treating it as a normal stop sign, and pedestrian crossings can hold traffic in place, when the walk signal is active. You pretty much have to slow to a stop anyway, to take a right turn. As for crossing on an orange walk signal, it isn't really something that is enforced. If you can judge the traffic for yourself, and know that no one will conflict with you, you can cross parallel to traffic with a green light, even if the walk signal is orange.
@@maxbooth8611 I am from the UK, and here it does generally mean safe, but still make sure traffic is stopped. The thought of traffic going through a red it weird, because that's the whole point of a red light, to stop traffic.
@@carultch This is technically how right-on-red is supposed to operate in Georgia (USA). By law, people are supposed to come to a complete stop and then yield to oncoming traffic and/or pedestrians, but you're lucky if they even yield to cars.
When I first saw a hawk beacon I had no idea what to do, I had to look it up but it still confused me. There's no reason why they can't just use a normal red yellow green traffic light at a crosswalk.
Perhaps one reason is for colour-blind people? I honestly don't get it either, I am just thinking of a reason why they didn't want to use different colours. Although in the whole rest of the world that has green and red lights, colour-blind people are just taught what icon to look out for instead of what colour. Another problem is that it is just the flashing of the light that changes. In Europe, the pedestrian crossings also have different icons, so you know that if you see an icon walking 🚶♂️ that means that you can cross.
I can't tell if it's hilarious or horrifying that the success of this crossing was measured by DRIVERS TIME SAVED rather than... PEDESTRIAN LIVES SAVED holy...
I think you missed the even crazier part: They compared crashes to not having a stoplight at all, but motorist delay was compared to a regular stoplight. In other words: Instead of showing how these are inferior to a stoplight, they only used the "better than nothing" data for crashes, and then showed "saves time" with a stoplight. Extremely misleading - it's designed to encourage putting these where stoplights should be.
I. Do. Not. Understand. Why. This. Is. Not. Just. A. Normal. FUCKING STOPLIGHT Traffic engineers, if a five year old cannot intuitively understand the signal you're making, the average driver won't either. Just make it an always green light that goes red when a pedestrian presses the beg button
They don't want to show a green light because the side street vehicles do not have signals, they just have a stop sign. If they displayed green, people would be caught off guard by drivers entering the main street while the main street has a green light. The better solution to this problem, which Evan almost references around 6:43, it to just use a normal traffic signal but have flashing yellow instead of green. This is exactly what is done in some States such as Massachusetts. In British Columbia they use flashing green instead of flashing yellow but the function is the same. If they really want an interval where drivers can proceed once pedestrians finish crossing they can just use an ordinary signal with ordinary flashing red (not alternating!)
@@OntarioTrafficMan also, with a green light the drivers would not need to stop for pedestrians who did not press the beg button. Now pedestrians always have priority regardless of what the lights show. Hey, wait a minute, that's not even true since the pedestrian has a red light. So if a pedestrian waits for the red light but forgets to press the button, the driver must still let him cross. It's a deadlock situation.
The traffic logic typically follows a pattern where blinking lights are used to get your attention for a situation which may deviate from expected practice.... So where I am in the US, one blinking yellow light warns of a potential intersection use (like a fire station dispatch or other possible traffic). Two alternating yellows (on the same fixture) warns to be cautious of traffic movement into a street (such as a low-visibility / low-use intersection). One blinking red indicates a stop-and-proceed treated as a stop sign (frequently paired with a blinking yellow facing cross-traffic to indicate right-of-way). Two alternating reds (on the same fixture) indicates you must stop and wait for movement into the street (for railroad crossings and school bus stops).
@@OntarioTrafficMan Side roads feeding onto main roads through a stop sign are already a thing; whether or not there's a signal on the main road, pedestrian or otherwise, is irrelevant; the side road vehicles are governed by the sign, and therefore responsible for checking traffic before turning onto the main road.
(rep to OP) This all the way. Regular traffic lights already have enough signalling states to cover a pedestrian application. Just use a normal traffic light, with a normal pedestrian-button-triggered light cycle, and add a flashing amber state after the solid red to cover the "cross if clear" state. Using an unusual light configuration (red-red-yellow) and abusing the alternating red state is just stupid.
We have pelican lights in Australia, they work well, but I like how the Victorian Government addresses any possible confusion, they add: "As a driver, you must always give way to pedestrians who are entering or crossing the road you’re turning into. This rule applies whether the pedestrian lights are green or not."
This is the same in the United States. At least in all 9 states i've lived in. While occasionally people do disregard this rule, it's pretty rare. I think what this video shows me more than anything is that New Jersey has some terrible drivers lol. We have a few of the Pelican crossing things in pretty high traffic areas where i currently live and it works pretty darn well i'd say. I don't recall ever seeing anyone just blow through the red while someone is crossing. I'm positive it happens some times but certainly nowhere near as frequently as the one in this video.
@Cheepchipsable The point is most peds use the crossing as intended, but drivers shouldnt mow down elderly or disabled people who don't make it across while their light is green. You wouldn't think people would need to be told this but here we are.
@@adidab14 Except for the greater Boston, MA area in the 80s and 90s, it's rare but it happens. When I was in university in RI the people you saw causing the most problems had New Jersey plates.
What we're not talking about here is that pelican crossings (and zebra crossings) in the UK are installed AWAY from junctions (intersections). At junctions, the light phasing just includes a pedestrian phase. The ones with a push button and a flashing amber phase are installed between junctions at popular crossing points. Being well away from junctions, the chance of accidents is much reduced.
@lmaoroflcopter there are still plenty of pelican crossings around (the ones with flashing amber) Anecdotally I've heard that the "intelligent" feature on puffin crossings is often disabled, because the sensors become unreliable with age. This causes some extra delays to motorists, but it ensures that the crossing still provides pedestrian priority, which is ultimately what it's there for
It's actually fairly common to see pelican crossings located right on the exits of busy roundabouts, which always causes them to lock up on all approaches. The sensible thing to do would be to install them at least 30 metres away, so that there's capacity in the road to allow some cars to stop and not reach the roundabout. In every case I've seen this, thre has always been ample room to do this, but they never do.
French guy here. It's so much simpler in France. Three colors: red, orange, green. Red = STOP. Orange = It's gonna go red, STOP. Green = GO. If there are no lights, you have to slow down before any crosswalk, even empty, and if there's someone standing at either end, you have to stop until they finished crossing.
In Italy, crosswalks have traffic lights that are identical to all other intersection traffic lights. The pedestrian pushes the button and the cars see green, then orange, then red. The pedestrian light shows a red standing man until the cars see red, then switches to a green walking man. A lot of these crossings have cameras on the traffic lights to automatically fine cars that pass through with the red. It's a 100€ fine, and although most crossings don't have a camera, getting a fine or two is enough to teach the habit. I have no idea why in america they designed a completely different system for pedestrian crossings than for auto crossings, but I know why nobody stops at the red: no consequences.
Seeing so many cars just run red lights is WILD to me! I guess there isn't a big risk doing it if there isn't a cop around to fine you? We have a lot of traffic cameras installed on traffic lights that take pictures if you run red lights and you get fined. It's not everywhere in Germany, but enough that most people don't usually risk it.
I literally forgot what all the phases mean five minutes after watching how on earth is anyone who doesn't watch RUclips video about traffic control systems supposed to understand this.
Even in the UK where there's 4 phases which are fairly obvious most drivers don't follow them. Green = go Amber = stop if it's safe to do so(most ignored signal IMO) Red = stop Red+amber = proceed if the way is completely clear(second most ignored because a lot of drivers don't care about people still crossing) Every driver knows these to pass their test, but it appears they just instantly forget once they no longer need to prove they know what the signals mean.
@@scragar I didn't even know that last one existed! Never come across it, then again I live in the middle of nowhere in the north of Scotland so maybe that's more of a city thing?
And just to be more confusing, in most places when you see a non-functional signal, you are supposed to note that it is broken and not controlling traffic properly, and default to treating it as a stop sign. So you see a "beacon" in the off phase, and are supposed to immediately know that it is a "beacon" and not a "signal" and should be treated differently.
@@scragar In Austria (and some other countries) they expanded that. From green to amber you have 4 times a blinking green, so that you know exactly when amber will come. That also means that driving at amber will be punished (a friend of mine had to pay once). IMO it is much better than just amber and then the question: can I brake or is it too late ? And that should be answered in milliseconds.
@@scragar Red and amber does not at all mean proceed. It means stop. The amber light comes on to indicate the lights are about to change, but you must not pass through the lights at this stage. Flashing amber is what you described though.
Your examples about blinking red lights are spot on, as school buses are parked _across_ the road in some towns to allow the childres to get off the bus safely, and people getting what they deserve from a train happens often enough to clearly indicate that people are not just ignoring the red ligths that will make them liable for manslaughter, but also those designed to warn them of imminent danger to their own lives.
People always think they can beat the train after the crossing gates start to go down. This is a little more understandable with one crossing freight tracks in the midwest where the 100 car freight train can take about half an hour to go past. In the Northeast there is not excuse.
@@57thorns I misread "getting what they deserve" the first time as the people stopped by a bus blocking a crossing. That makes sense. Telling someone they deserve death for whatever stress in their life makes them feel the need to rush everywhere is not okay. The problem with impatience in driving is a culture problem with making people feel they need to hurry.
You don't need a different kind of signal to solve this problem. You just need a pedestrian controlled regular stop light that stays green until someone pushes the walk button. This is not a hard problem to solve. We just don't have smart people involved in local politics.
I'm only 6 mins in and extremely confused why that can't just be a normal traffic light at that pedestrian crossing. Cars know Red, Yellow, Green. Pedestrians have to push a button before crossing anyway. Why make this more complicated than it has to be?!?!?! Edit: Oh god, 11 mins in and _seriously?!_ What's _wrong_ with you, America?!?!?!
For me, a continental European, the most confusing part is the fact, that there're seems to not be a federal level regulation for trafic. Or more precisely, here seems to be a lot of regional variation in what red light mean or who yields on crossing.
It's a consequence of the US style of governance. Remember the US functions more like the EU than any particular nation. Unless the Federal government has rules, It's left up to the States to decide. And while there is a federal highway code, its only mandated to be used on the Interstate system. For State Highways down to the subdivision streets it's "optional" Certain things have broad acceptance. Road lane markings, Sign colors and "mostly" shapes. Otherwise, as the enforcement goes. An old saying is its not illegal until you get caught. While ignoring traffic control signals can be just a ticket. In my state its a 90$ fine and 3 points on your license. 12 points and you loose it for 30 days. If that corvette had hit someone running the light. Big trouble. Depending on the state, hitting a person in a cross walk, your talking criminal reckless driving at the least, that's up to 6 months in jail and 1,000 fine + court costs. Any injuries mean your liable for there medical bills, lost wages. If it was an SUV or large pickup and you kill the person. Now its Felony Vehicular Manslaughter. Were talking minimum 1 year prison. If its because of negligent driving now its 10 years. If a DUI was involved 15 years and 20k fines. If the person killed had children, my state will mandate child support payments until the child is 18.
There is a Federal Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices that defines the design and meaning of traffic controls, but States retain the authority to set their own traffic rules.
Correct, each state makes its own traffic laws. Canada is the same with each province having its own laws. For example a green arrow in Ontario means that you have priority in the direction indicated, but a green arrow in Québec means that you can turn but you need to yield to other traffic such as pedestrians and cyclists. Which is especially problematic here in Ottawa where the city is partly in Ontario and partly in Québec.
They hate to admit other countries sometimes have some better proven methods that work well and even improve traffic flow - like roundabouts - (which do not help pedestrians, but it proves the point about rejecting proven ideas from abroad - with all sorts of excuses).
Yes flashing amber does seem smarter, amber clearly indicates a caution condition, solid already means plan to stop so flashing it for proceed with caution if the hazard has passed makes sense. Although having said that I think the UK and other European countries are phasing that out in favour of sensor based designs that will check whether pedestrians are clear and change the light accordingly instead. Prevents the risk of an oversized car or a large high vehicle like a truck or even a bus failing to see a pedestrian directly in front of the vehicle by observing the crossing from a much better vantage point on the side of the road which is far less likely to be obstructed by vehicles or other obstructions. In fact I believe if they are obstructed will assume that the crossing remains occupied (because *something* is present) a vehicle fouling the crossing will do that for example. But then showing a danger signal here where someone is already doing something they should not be doing is probably a good idea warns drivers to look out for the danger.
@@MrZoomZone roundabouts can help pedestrians if the pedestrian crossing is placed far enough back from the intersections. The reason being that cars can run red lights at similar 4-way intersections, but if they try to go high speed over the middle of a roundabout, they'll become airborne or slam into whatever shrubbery is growing in there. Roundabouts force cars to slow down and pay more attention to the area around them, which passively helps pedestrians. The crossings do need to be set quite a way back from the roundabout, though, or they just become more dangerous for the pedestrians *and* the cars.
@biosparkles9442 I have never found a roundabout easy to cross as a pedestrian but they definitely improve traffic flow. (And 4 way junctions between big roads are just as annoying for pedestrians so might as well help the traffic with roundabouts). But I see your point they could be designed for pedestrians, they're just not in the part of the UK where I am
As a daily commute cyclist, I’m so sick of people being ignorant to laws and safety. It’s gotten to the point where I may be at an intersection through multiple green lights for me (white walking man symbol) because people in the right turn lane just don’t give a F about letting pedestrians go first like they’re supposed to. Most times I’m stuck sprinting my bike across the road any chance I can get and I feel like I’m going to get hit eventually Edit: kept watching the video and saw he brought up that exact scenario lmao now multiply that by 4 intersections and that’s me every day
I'm pretty sure the only reason why studies on HAWK signals show they are "safe" are because they confuse drivers. I'm sure if you did a study where a dancing clown in the middle of an intersection whenever pedestrians wanted to cross would also improve the safety of the crosswalk because the drivers would be confused.
Several US states have banned or heavily restricted the use of "red light" cameras to catch such people. These include at least Arizona, Arkansas, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, and Wisconsin from what I've found and I think the list has lengthened since then. It seems to me to be a crazy set of priorities given the dire road safety situation in the USA over recent years.
The problem is, after a judge gets the first batch of 50 tickets, it is more likely the judge decrees the HAWK crossing be removed as defendants rightly argue that it is a poorly designed, poorly implemented, and poorly explained solution and just a money making scheme for the city. Add in if one of them catches the cop violating it as in this video, and that is an easy decision for the judge.
See it for the first time, and yeah, I thought that the flashing red is like on the railway crossing, and it's "the most red" there is. There is a joke: Heaven is where the cooks are French, the police are British, the mechanics are German, the lovers are Italian and everything is organized by the Swiss. Hell is where the cooks are British, the police are German, the mechanics are French, the lovers are Swiss, and everything is organized by the Italians. We could add in the hell "and urban planners are American" and for heaven "urban planners are Dutch".
When I learned to drive in NJ: Flashing red meant stop, then proceed only if safe (stop sign equivalent). Flashing yellow meant slow down, and be prepared to stop (yield sign equivalent). The cross street of a flashing yellow was flashing red. All lights off meant "power is out in the area. Default to all way stop sign rules" so, when approaching a hawk beacon, the lights being out means stop, then proceed if you have the right of way. The flashing and solid yellow are OK. ('Slow down but continue if safe' and 'stop if possible') The solid and flashing red are OK. ('Stop no matter what' and 'stop, check around, and continue if safe') Simply adding a green replacing the lights off would make it much better. As far as pickup truck forwards blind spot, thst should be regulated by law. The hoods should be mandated to slant down, and any truck found with the front lifted should be impounded, unlifted to regulation setting, then returned. If a truck violating blind spot regulations hits a pedestrian, intent is demonstrated by the act of raising the front. Yes, that would turn involuntary manslaughter into murder.
I learned the same as you (TX). However, the solution is to make it into a 3 phase signal: flashing yellow (yield sign) as default state, transitioning into a solid yellow (prepare to stop) and then solid red (stop always) when a pedestrian is there. When the pedestrian is gone, go back to flashing yellow again. That's it. And all lights out meaning remains the same as for a standard signal (treat as stop sign). Every driver in the US would understand exactly what to do with a signal like that.
@@robertmarder126 We have exactly the kind of signal you described at [some] fire stations in Pennsylvania. The signal flashes yellow at all times. When fire apparatus is responding to an emergency, before exiting the building a firefighter presses a button just like a pedestrian pressing a button to request a pedestrian crossing stage. As far as I know, all our drivers seem to intuitively understand this signal. On these signals, the flashing yellow lamp is at the bottom of a stack where the green lamp would be on a traffic light at an intersection. The steady yellow is in its normal middle position and the red is at the top. I can see why having a completely different signal design for pedestrian crossings confuses drivers in NJ, particularly if they are from out of state.
The research you have done on this topic is so good. Like someone else said, you are becoming an expert in urban planning for the UK and US. This report is so important. As a pedestrian, I am grateful to you for this work.
Almost every single thing about driving in the US is mortifying to me: * % of unneccecary giant vehicles. * Shared brake and indicator lights on many US vehicle models. * Right turns on red. * Stroads. * Suicide lanes. * Prevelance of deadlocked 4-way stop sign / yield intersections. * Complete lack of any lane discipline on highways. * Drivers' general disregard for the rules of the road and pedestrians in particular. * Zero police enforcement of the two points above.
@@lloydcollins6337 That is just speeding, easy to measure and quick to write a ticket for. Not for driving recklessly (which is both of the points on the list above).
In Washington DC I saw a street which had 2 lanes one way and 4 lanes the other way - but the middle two lanes changed direction depending on the time of day. There weren't any barriers separating the directions of travel. I was horrified.
@@AdrianColleythose are in lots of cities in the EU. There are supposed to be signals over the lanes to indicate whether you have the right to use the lane.
I've often seen Americans amazed that Jaywalking is legal in the UK. It isn't legal, or even illegal, because it simply isn't even a concept. Jaywalking only exists in the US because car manufacturers spent a lot of money lobbying for a law change.
I recall a story of an English professor (as in a professor who was English) who was arrested and violently wrestled to the ground by a police officer for crossing the road in the "wrong" place. As a child I was in awe of America, and as an adult I still am! But for very different reasons. I'm glad I don't live there.
Because of US media, many Canadians think that jaywalking is illegal, which it is not. There is no such thing as jaywalking in Canada, it's just the United States.
Huh. In New Zealand there are proper places to cross and improper places to cross... but the only actual difference (at least in practice) is how much trouble a driver does or does not get into if they happen to hit you as a result. Basically, if you're too close to an intersection/marked pedestrian crossing (within 20 metres, I believe?), but not AT the intersection/marked pedestrian crossing, you're not suposed to cross there. Other than that, you can cross where ever you like. Also, you're supposed to take the shortest possible route to clear the road, so basically crossing at 90 degrees to the traffic, ideally. Which, given that this is not just the rules but also the safest way to do things, and also Usually the fastest unless the road is very empty, it's hardly an imposition most of the time.
The first HAWK beacon I saw was the one in New Brunswick, NJ. I drove up on it and through, "OK. What the hell am I supposed to do?" And the wig-wag red flash is probably what tripped me up. To go from a solid red to a wig-wag flashing red that mimics a railroad crossing is beyond counterintuitive. Go with a flashing yellow in the green position all the time. When the pedestrian activates the crosswalk, go solid yellow in the middle section, then red. Then back to flashing yellow when the timer times out. Or better yet, as you eluded, the sensor sees a clear crosswalk.
The irony is that in New Jersey law, flashing red is not what means stop at a railroad crossing. See NJ Rev Stat § 39:4-127.1 , which doesn't say flashing red lights. The warning system is not specified as flashing, as red, or even as lights. Flashing red lights are by contrast explicitly in NJ Rev Stat § 39:4-118 and mean what they mean on HAWK crossings. The problem is that HAWK beacons are in agreement with NJ law, but people don't actually know what NJ law is and make an incorrect generalization from the lights that happen to be used at railroad crossings.
Or just do what SANE places do and use regular traffic lights. Of course, that does somewhat require that drivers can be at least mostly relied on to Actually Obey Regular Traffic Lights...
Stick to: Solid Red: Stop, and treat as a Stop sign for right turn if not disallowed. Blinking Red: Treat as a Stop sign. Blinking Yellow: Treat as a Yield sign. Yellow: Prepare to stop if possible before the line. Green light should be required. Adding a dashed line for the yellow light would be an improvement.
I don't know why they needed to invent these things instead of just using a regular old traffic light. Here in Australia we have regular old traffic lights where you have cars passing through normally but if someone wants to cross, they walk up and press the button and the lights turn red for cars to let the pedestrians cross.
It's not _just_ mere wanton U.S.A. Exceptionalism. The problems they have are (1) that because of "right on red", red doesn't mean stop to people; (2) that flashing amber is so overused its meaning is diluted; and (3) that using a full red-amber-green system increases the legal hurdles that have to be overcome in order to get authorization for a set of lights. They're self-imposed problems, but they are nonetheless problems.
@@JdeBP the 'right on red' thing is a problem. New Zealand only permits that (well, equivalent, inverted) at intersections that are specifically marked with specific lanes for it (and does a variety of things to make those less dangerous to pedestrians than they usally are in the USA). It gets around the flashing amber issue by way of having that mean only one thing: The lights are not functioning (thus treat the intersection as uncontrolled). Issue 3 is kind of the easiest to fix, in some respects, but also the hardest to just work around in any sensible way if you can't fix it...
Some UK crossings have a flashing orange phase following the red for motorists which means you can proceed if there are no pedestrians on the crossing (pedestrians will have a flashing green during that phase). Some pedestrian advocates argue against these as they feel it can be intimidating too slower pedestrians, especially the elderly. Instead, they favour longer red phases for pedestrians.
They were better in my opinion, where I live they recently removed all the pelican crossings and replaced them with puffin crossings which waste more time as you still legally have to wait even if there is no one there or they crossed quickly and they seem to take longer when walking as well, Im saying this as somone who encounters boath everyday walking and driving
Puffins go green once the pedestrians clear the crossing, they both extend and shorten the pedestrian cycle based on detecting pedestrians. If you pay attention, you’ll notice they often have shorter cycle times than pelican crossings, which have to always use a worst case scenario cycle time. Watch for when the green man goes dark, which ends the “start-to-cross” part of the pedestrian cycle (equivalent to the flashing green on pelicans), the lights for cars will go green about 10secs after all the pedestrians clear the crossing.
Try driving on the bloody things, the world fell out of my bottom! Plus bashing my hand on the door when trying to change gear, and pickup bigger than a tranny van plus on the wrong side of the road
@@antikommunistischaktion No, because you need to rely on cars for everything. People in developed countries have the option between many transport modes but most of the U.S. only provides one reasonable option.
@antikommunistischaktion - pal, every single “developed” country outside North America has a functioning train, bus, and usually tram/metro system. It’s the undeveloped countries that America’s transport system compares with. I’m about to travel 9 miles to work without getting into a vehicle one time and it will take me half the time it would take in a car, at a fraction of the cost.
That's why this design is a triangle of lights. Unique. If anyone looked at these with the regular row of three, they might mentally treat it like a powered down stop and... wrecks would ensue. As when these come alive, they are a flurry of lights. Not just on the pole, but the 'crossing ahead' signs that are down the road.
its like some insane person saw a level crossing and thought "but what if we do this for people?" instead of just importing the crossing they were inspired by to begin with.
I think one of the biggest problems in my area (suburb of OKC) is that pedestrians are rare. Mainly due to no public transit, everyone just drives everywhere. Drivers forget what to do when they see someone crossing the road. They forget that the vehicle yields to the pedestrian while making a right hand tun, even on green. As well as during unprotected left-hand turns.
For a country that is so car focused, it always amazes me just how idiotic a lot of things around cars and roads in the US are. It all starts with how easy their driving tests are, especially compared to those we have in the UK. Then there's the obvious stuff like trying to reinvent the wheel by coming up with new 'solutions' to problems that other countries solved ages ago. Then making them overly complicated and trying to fix the symptom instead of the underlying problem... Those flags being a prime example. This is a common thing with the US. Just look at things like bulletproof backpacks for kids in school.
The driving tests have to be easy because not being able to drive is akin to not being able to participate in society. Since walking, cycling, and public transit are all borderline unavailable.
@@theuncalledfor I don't think that's a valid reason. You can have fairly low intelligence and still pass the driving test in the EU. And yes, people fail. But mostly out of anxiety. And they may retake the test.
Like this Cybertruck, it can't be sold in Europe as it does not meet safety requirements. That turning right on red rule is the most dangerous, especially combined with the type of vehicles in use.
@@theuncalledfor There's some aspect to that but they really are still *too* easy in many locations. My motorcycle test (other than the multi-choice computer thing) was literally riding my motorcycle around the parking lot.
So, an idea I've had for years is just have a small tunnel under the street for crossing. Short staircase brings you below street level, you cross the street, another set of stairs brings you back up to the sidewalk.
The fact that I was genuinely surprised to find that the thumbnail of this video is an actual image from the video in real time rather than some super photoshopped green screen thumbnail. Says a lot about the current state of RUclips, honestly.
It is interesting to see experiences being brought across borders. It is not always easy to find the best solution, if the whole situatuion is so different and many factors have influence. Someone who knows both sides can probably help.
In British Columbia, Canada, a common pedestrian crossing system is a conventional, three-aspect traffic signal which flashes green most of the time. It is placed either mid-block or at minor intersections. When a pedestrian wishes to cross at the crosswalk, they push the button, whereupon the light goes solid green, then yellow and finally red, allowing the pedestrian to cross. After a period of time, the light returns to flashing green. Simple, and easy to understand.
The flashing green is not easy to understand. Even most British Columbians don't understand why it's flashing green. The reason it flashes is that it's not a normal green light so cars could cross in front of you even though you have a green light. I have yet to encounter a single BC resident who has correctly responded when I asked them what it meant. They should have just used flashing yellow on those signals like everywhere else in North America. So it would be exactly the same as the way they work in BC currently but with the bottom signal aspect being yellow instead of green.
@@OntarioTrafficManI mean, they're no different from a normal solid green light, it's more so to differentiate at a distance. If you see a flashing green and it goes solid you can prepare for it to go yellow then red like any other light. Flashing yellow here is treated as a yield (slow down and be prepared to stop) our driving manual isn't some kind of regionally locked thing anyone can look at it
@@OntarioTrafficMan While it does fail to communicate that, it still works a hell of a lot better than the HAWK signals since both cars and pedestrians tend to just treat it like a standard green light.
The problem with these lights over the standard yellow flashing lights is that they take a long time to change for the pedestrian. I find the best use of them is to stop vehicles on the main road, so you can do a left hand turn onto the main road with a vehicle.
In Australia they use standard-looking traffic lights. Green = go, yellow = prepare to stop, red = stop. But then flashing yellow = you may start to move unless there's a pedestrian who hasn't finished crossing yet. Using standard-looking lights removes the need for education to use the lights. Those double red light things look like a "slow down" warning. Dumb!
NZ just doesn't bother with the flashing yellow. Why introduce an unnecessary conflict point? The light just stays red until the pedestrian lights have finished their cycle (traffic lights without pedestrian lights as part of the cycle don't really exist anymore, that I've seen). And of course the pedestrian lights go red, green, flashing red (wait, cross, finish (do not start) crossing). You usually have to push a button to get the pedestrian lights to be included in the cycle, but some intersections that see a lot of foot traffic just run the pedestrian light cycle regardless (and the busiest actually simplify the whole process by having a phase that is 'all cars stop, all pedestrians go, regardless of direction', which is also the only stituation where you can cross intersections Diagonally safely (and legally)).
I find this quite shocking... Where I live, in Canada, when we come to a crosswalk with lights, we press a button to activate the lights (they flash yellow). Then we step up to the curb to show coming cars that we intend to cross. If there are cars approaching we wait for them to stop, and they almost always do, then we cross. As a driver coming up to one of these, it is well understood that if the lights are blinking I need to slow way down as I inspect both the crosswalk and the adjacent sidewalks. If it looks at all like someone might want to cross I stop. I would never even consider crossing if I wasn't completely sure that it was safe. Why is everyone in your country so intensely focused on themselves over others? It seems like every time Americans are given a chance to slightly inconvenience themselves for the large benefit of others they cry out "Hell no!"
The crossing you're describing is called a Pedestrian Crossover, and is basically the same as a Zebra Crossing in Europe. Drivers don't need to inspect the crosswalk and sidewalks if the lights are blinking, they ALWAYS need to do that as per the sign, regardless of whether the lights are blinking or if there are even lights at all. Pedestrians always have priority, regardless of whether they press the button to activate the lights (if present).
In New Zealand, the older style zebra crossings work/ed basically like that (no pushing a button, the lights are just always a steady amber sphere on top of a black and white striped pole. There was/is a marking on the road (hollow white diamond), if a vehicle has passsed it when a pedestrian steps up to the crossing, the vehicle doesn't have time to safely stop so the pedestrians are to wait for the vehicle to clear the crossing before they cross, if not past it the vehicle has time to safely stop and is required to do so, and Once It Has Stopped the pedestrians cross. Amber lights at intersections work very simlarly, 'stop if it is safe to do so, continue through if it is not', in addition to warning that the light will go red soon). On the other hand, our New model of crossing just... straight up uses the traffic lights you find at regular intersections. The cars have a green light until a pedestrian pushes the button, then it runs a regular traffic light cycle, with one phase being the cars and the other being the standard pedestrian lights used at intersections controlled by traffic lights. Once the pedestrian cycle finishes and the car light goes green again, it stays green until the button is pressed once more. Also, there is generally a fairly large island between the traffic lanes in one direction and the traffic lanes in the other, and the lights only stop traffic in one direction at a time (usually), though whether you have to hit the button seperately for each or they're linked together in some fashion varies (there'll always be buttons on the island in case of issues, but you don't always need to press them).
In Aus we don't even have lights.... cars just stop at zebra crossings if you look like you're waiting to cross. The idea of running a Red light at a pedestrian crossing is wildly alien!
As you outlined, this all boils down to two major design problems: 1. It's confusing for drivers. Just turn it into a regular traffic light that stays green unless a pedestrian wants to cross 2. It's confusing for pedestrians. I mean, look at that huge set of instructions. NOBODY is going to read all that. Just one button that works the same as on any regular intersection Whoever designed these should be fired. Or better, whoever approved this design.
I recently came across one of these in California. It was on the exit of a 5 way intersection. My light was green and as I was leaving the intersection (around sort of a Y that made the 5th exit, there’s a red light and a pedestrian. 5 cars with screeching brakes and a scared and pissed pedestrian…. So the pedestrian crossing light didn’t seem to be tied to the intersection light meaning I entered an intersection on green only to find a red light on the exit around a semi-blind corner. Super sketch setup. Someone is going to get killed and someone at the city thought this installation was perfectly logical.
I wonder why they have another pedestrian light so close to a regular intersection. Pedestrians should be able to cross at the regular intersection if it's so close. There's a similar issue where I am in LA. There is an assisted living facility across the street from a grocery store with a pedestrian crossing light. The problem is that the parking lot exit is so close to the crosswalk, that you can't see the lights when turning out of the lot. So you turn right and can easily blow through it if you don't know it's there.
That would never happen. Too many Americans want the federal government to literally do nothing except maintain the huge military. They want individual states to control everything else.
It would literally cost billions and be hard to pass. The only reason signage is semi standardized is because the federal government won’t provide funding without the guarantee the signage will follow the DOT regulations. Besides not funding projects the federal government has no control over state regulations.
@@catislandteam You realise this doesn't have to be done all at once? Signs get replaced all the time, replace them by the new version. The real difficulty is the mess that US politics are.
They need a normal light with red, yellow, and green phases. Almost everyone knows red means stop, yellow means the light is about to be red, and green means go. As a result of poor driver's education, only some people understand a flashing red (treated like a stop sign) means to come to a complete stop then preceded when it is clear to do so, and they don't know a flashing yellow (treated like a yield sign) means to preceded with caution then yield to traffic with right-of-way. If you add any rules, you're asking for trouble.
@@JeanPierreWhite I don't know about the USA, but around here Officially yellow/amber means 'stop if it is safe to do so, otherwise continue. Also, the light will go red soon'. Helped by the fact that the lane markings generally go from dashed to solid at roughly the point past which a regular car does not have time to safely stop before the intersection (though that's a 'deliberately helpful hint' rather than a hard fact or lawful indicator... unlike the hollow diamonds before zebra crossings which explicitly DO indicate the point past which you can't be expected to safely stop, and thus pedestrians are supposed to give way to you (if they approach the crossing before you cross that marker you're supposed to give way to them instead)). Unfortunatley, yes, some drivers do behave as you describe anyway... though it's less of a problem than you'd expect at regualar intersections given the tendency to have deliberately overlapping red phases meaning drivers (and pedestrians!) can see if a car is still in the intersection and wait for it to get out of the way before they start moving when the light goes green (or navigate around it, if need be). They'll still get in trouble for running a red light if that happens and law enforcement is paying attention to that intersection at that time though.
@@laurencefraser Amber officially means the same in the US. However what I described in my last post is how drivers actually treat the color amber, they typically speed up. Once I stopped at a traffic light and the passenger asked me why I stopped. Because it turned yellow I said. The passenger said that I have three seconds after it turns red to get through the light. Most Americans don't even treat red as a sure reason to stop if they think they can sneak through before other traffic gets green. It is little wonder that a lot of serious accidents at high speed occur at US traffic lights.
In the US, solid yellow means "prepare to stop," and comes after green and before red. Flashing yellow means "yield," which does not require you to stop unless another vehicle or person has the right of way.
Pelican crossing: Exists and works since traffic lights adopted computers and became popular America: We need to invent something new that nobody understands or cares about.
@@antikommunistischaktion That is literally a pelican crossing, as used in europe. The problem is with America trying to invent new solutions to self-inflicted problems when working solutions already exist. It's the opposite of trying to be like europe. Not saying they should try to be like europe, just look around and take a cue here and there from decades proven solutions from around the world every now and again.
@@antikommunistischaktion In case you can't see the video link I posted, type "pelican crossing" into youtube and click on the one showing a random pelican crossing in derby. It is EXACTLY what you described (down to the flashing amber because an extra amber phase is normal in the UK anyway). Please do the most basic research available to you next time.
Blinking red is STOP and proceed if clear. It actually says this on the sign, but blinking red always means stop and then proceed when clear in the US.
30 years ago, I was visiting at Amherst College and noticed that if I pressed the button to indicate I wanted to walk across the street, when it was time for me to walk, EVERY direction received a red light. I appreciated that.
Some UK crossings have very similar phases, but instead of flashing red it's a flashing yellow. Everyone here understands what that means, motorists know flashing yellow means "wait until people have crossed, then go" and pedestrians know flashing green means "do not start to cross". Similar structure but without lights that are quite as confusing
The difference of course is that British drivers already know what yellow/amber on a traffic light means. Especially since a simple zebra crossing just has beacons which flash amber all the time.
Huh. Around here the pedestrian lights are solid red: waiting for everything else to get sorted so it's safe to cross. Solid green: cross. Flashing red: clear the crossing if you're already on it, do not begin crossing. The red and green lights also have the stick figure in different poses. The idea that Green can mean Stop is just... why? That's an extra bit of pointless confusion.
I didn’t know I had an interest in traffic laws of the US before today. You can tell that this one took a lot of work and thought, and it was well worth it!
If you want another example of sacrificing pedestrian safety on the altar of vehicular convenience, the stop lights in my town allow unprotected lefts across a crosswalk while the walk light is on.
I've seen one of these with a regular traffic light and it works just fine. Those drivers shouldn't have run the red lights, but the city shouldn't have put up signals that aren't taught or tested when getting a drivers license. There's a good reason for standardized signals.
A flashing red light in any other circumstance indicates that there's a problem with the light (and thus it should be treated as a stop sign. Which is where these clearly have a problem because almost no one respects those as much as they should, either.) If these had a normal red light instead of two flashing ones, I don't think there would be half as many problems with them.
The flashlight lights do mean to stop like a stop sign. It does not mean proceed with caution. But maybe NJ doesn't understand hawknlights like they don't understand round abouts.
I fear at least part of the problem is that the US is so driver-centric that tests are comparatively cursory for the most part and thus they can get away with little knowledge or respect for many rules, signs and signals. Meanwhile in the UK, tests tend to be made nightmarish as combined quality control and general deterrance from driving. Added to this, the general desire for 'exceptionalism' rather than doing what foreigners do that has a proven track record seems culturally consistent over there. (Plus if the US had traffic cameras everywhere that were set up to automatically fine and otherwise punish bad drivers - they might be a little more restrained in breaking traffic laws. Deeply unpopular perhaps, but effective as people seem to care more there about losing money rather than killing pedestrians.)
I think that the possibility of losing their license for a while would be an even bigger deterrent than just a fine. But that's probably reserved for drivers that actually drive over someone, not ones that merely risk it multiple times..
It's true about the testing. I got my first driver's licence - sorry, license - in Massachusetts, and afterwards I was a little scared to go out driving because I knew that the roads were filled with drivers who had been through the same easy test that I had just passed.
@@durabelle For some even losing their license is not a great threat. They just drive without it. But some countries have rules which confiscate the car in that case. That is especially useful for those "Tuning"freaks who really love their cars. In Austria it's only for really hefty speeding and I don't know if they really took a car for longer (it's not so easy legally).
What’s really effective to your point is the withholding of explanation as to what the hawk beacon signals mean. I spent the first bit of the video staring at the signals realizing I would have no idea what to do if I was driving.
@@phoenix-xu9xj I think every country has a written exam and a practical one. Here in Ontario you have a written exam to get a G1 permit, then a practical exam to get at G2 permit, and then a second practical exam to get a full license.
My point was that in most places (and as I understand in Ontario and in the UK as well) you'll be allowed to start driving on public roads whenever you've passed a theory test under some sort of a provisional license. In the Netherlands you can only drive with a certified instructor in a car with double controls until you've passed a theory and a practical test.
Just to name a few german solutions. 1) a zebra crossing 2) a traffic light without a green light (just yellow and red), that gets activated by pushing a button 3) mind blowing i know ... a NORMAL traffic light just for pedestrians crossing, that gets activated by a button and is otherwise always green for cars. Usually either of this solution is combined with some kind of traffic calming (mostly a pedestrian refuge island), but it differs a lot between the German states. It was a nice video. Please continue on american urban planning
All 3 apply to the UK you mentioned, especially in major cities, I’m surprised that people supposedly living in the UK, argue over it and seem to be so dumbfounded by the concept of some other crossings, either never hear of them or don’t believe it. 🤦♀️
@@falsemcnuggethope 3 is straight up what we use all the time in cities in New Zealand with no problems at all in places where it would be difficult to cross otherwise (tend to have an island in the middle of the road and only stop traffic in one direction at a time). It causes no problems at all due to being functionally identical to a regular intersection that everyone understands (the pedestrians get the same lights they would get at an intersection too). 1 is what we use in smaller towns/on roads where traffic is always either non-existent or barely moving for various reasons/on slipways that allow left turning (we drive on the left) traffic to proceed even if the light is red (well, I'm not sure if they're actually slipways, there's enough going on with them that they might have a different name). 2 is very much a 'why would you bother when 3 exists?' solution.
Not Just Bikes did a video on Dutch traffic lights a few years ago. It's amazing what you can get done when you don't treat pedestrians, cyclists, and even trams like the enemy.
Watching this, the one thing that stands out to me is how high up the lights are. I get that in the US that's common for all signs, and so it's better to be consistent. But them being so high up takes your eyes off the road, which is where the pedestrians are. I can just imagine it being like you're driving along, see that it's clear, and you look up to the signal to see it's flashing red. While your eyes are on that, a pedestrian moves in front of you on the crosswalk. Because it's flashing red, you don't stop, and now you look down to suddenly see a person there.
We might contrast this with the situation in the UK in the latter part of the 19th century with the so-called "red flag act" requiring somebody to walk in front of motor vehicles carrying a red flag. In parts of the USA it appears to be the pedestrian that has to warn the motorists of their presence with a red flag...
Maybe you should try comparing to Scandinavia..mostly there are no crossing lights and motorists have to stop if pedestrians even look like they may cross. In some cities in Sweden in (university ones) the priority is drunk student on cycle, pedestrians, normal cyclist, buses, trams and at the bottom is cars !
@@timunerman3808 Whereas I'm originally from Finland but now living in the UK. And I agree with you, the Nordic way is great! In the UK I have no problems with any of the light controlled crossings either, and zebra crossings work too, but it annoys me how rare they are for no obvious reason. In Finland you have zebra crossings everywhere (without the flashing orange lights though, just the painted white stripes plus crossing signs) where people might want to cross. I don't get the point of the common UK pedestrian crossings that have just the dropped curb to mark the spot (and obviously help those with prams or other wheeled equipment), but have no requirements for drivers to yield. I've spent way too much time waiting on the curb at those places on roads that should clearly have a zebra or puffin crossing due to traffic not having enough natural breaks for pedestrians.
@@durabelle I think some of it is that cross some roads in the UK pedestrians have right of way but there are no markings. For example across side roads. However it would be very brave just to walk out and I would not just walk out until a car has really stopped at any UK crossing.
@@timunerman3808 for side roads the Dutch style is the best. The sidewalk continues normally over the side road and cars have to drive over it. This is even better than the zebra crossings here in Finland. We have some catching up to do.
I'm from Tucson AZ, and my most common method of transportation is cycling (although I walk/drive/take public transit also), so I have used HAWK crossings basically every day for many years. Since they've been here so long, the locals know how they work (that doesn't stop the odd asshole from running a solid red light, but I would say this happens somewhere between 0.5 and 1% of the time at least on my routes). However, from an outside perspective, I definitely get how they are unintuitive and cause unnecessary confusion for those who are not as familiar with them. Most of the HAWK crossings I use are when the bike boulevards I travel on (think residential street with decent pavement and traffic calming measures) intersect an arterial road/stroad. Since a lot of people will use the same few bike boulevards, drivers generally know where to expect pedestrians and cyclists --- it's on the less popular crossings further away from the city center that it gets increasingly dangerous, as now drivers are so used to zooming through the crosswalks that they might not pay attention to the present conditions. The past 10-15 years have seen a remarkable increase in infrastructure for cyclists and pedestrians, but as mentioned in the video, we still have A LOT of problems and a very long way to go. I don't feel comfortable using >95% of regular crosswalks, so as more have been converted into HAWK crossings, the more I have been able to do by foot or by bike in Tucson (waiting for my route to the grocery store to get a HAWK instead of the median-separated but no aids/lights crosswalk that is there currently).
man, it should be pretty easy, no light or flashing red lights should be treated like a stop sign where everyone stops and takes their turn, flashing yellow caution, and green for go. This is what most people understand. As for as right on red, you should have to come to a stop before proceeding so you can at least pretend to look for pedestrians before you run them over.
In my city they just changed traffic light timing which has had the unintended consequence of increasing the prevalence of red light runners. They have prioritized the main street more and have shortened the side street green timing. Now backups occur on side streets and often only one or two vehicles get through a light cycle because the timing is very tight and the person at the front of the line is all too often on their phone when it turns green. Once enough people have died and the city realizes what they did it'll be changed back.
It's wild America has a jay walking law they take super seriously, but then no safe ways to cross a road? And even if you wait for what should be a safe way to cross a road, cars can still drive through that way and make it unsafe? Given all the vehicle casualties and the fact drivers can't see out of their cars, you would think finding safer ways for people to cross roads would be a priority? But then again, this is the same country that has issues with shootings and does nothing about its gun control, so what do I know 🤷
@@antikommunistischaktion Cartels funnel illegal guns *out* by the ton, or rather guns that are illegal in their destination countries, precisely because they can be legally bought so easily and cheaply in the US. It's drugs they bring *in*, again almost exclusively through legal ports of entry hidden in bulk cargo.
I don't think the jaywalking law is taken seriously. It is extremely rare for anyone to ever get a ticket for merely crossing the street. It's definitely absurd that many U.S. states made it illegal to walk across the street, but let's not pretend like it's something anyone takes seriously.
@@OntarioTrafficMan But many of my American friends, as well as posts/comments I've seen from tourists and Americans online have always repeatedly stressed that law and how much you shouldn't do it? To the point, yeah, it's one of the few laws I remember because of how much I see people talk about it and urge you not to do it. It is good if to cops it isn't a huge deal, especially if you can't safely cross streets anyway, but yeah that's just now how it's came across online in my experience
What if something like the train arm system was implemented as a new standard for crosswalks for safety? Then drivers must absolutely stop during the crosswalk stop
:( my local campus briefly seen in this video always had issues with vehicles hitting students. They even slowed the speed limit down and added crosswalks but the problem persisted
Sadly, this is just a report on the way Americans value human life, and it's terrifying. Thanks for sharing this, Evan. It is so important. I hesitate to go even around cars that are fully stopped. There really just needs to be huge fines/consequences to running the lights, or a crosswalk when the light is red. That would be the only thing to really change things, sad that even police don't adhear to this. How can you expect anybody else to if they don't? That horse stealing the show made me smile though. Thanks for keeping that in, they're my favorite.
An old saying is its not illegal until you get caught. While ignoring traffic control signals can be just a ticket. In my state its a 90$ fine and 3 points on your license. 12 points and you loose it for 30 days. If that corvette had hit someone running the light. Big trouble. Depending on the state, hitting a person in a cross walk, your talking criminal reckless driving at the least, that's up to 6 months in jail and 1,000 fine + court costs. Any injuries mean your liable for there medical bills, lost wages. If it was an SUV or large pickup and you kill the person. Now its Felony Vehicular Manslaughter. Were talking minimum 1 year prison. If its because of negligent driving now its 10 years. If a DUI was involved 15 years and 20k fines. If the person killed had children, my state will mandate child support payments until the child is 18. So the consequences are there. But as with all things American. So much space so few resources. Be that Personnel, or Monetary.
In the U.S. driving and owning guns are considered rights, but healthcare and education are considered privileges. In every other developed country it's the other way around.
@@OntarioTrafficMan That's not entirely correct. In the US you have the right to free speech, own any firearm created, free public elementary and secondary schools. Among the other's in the Bill of Rights. Driving is a privilege. Mind you it's easier and cheaper in the US than European countries. Emergency healthcare is right under the EMTALA of 1986. Basically states that any hospital emergency department that accepts Medicare must provide appropriate medical screening and care regardless of citizenship, legal status, or the ability to pay. And cannot transfer or discharge patients needing said care except with either informed consent or when the condition requires transfer to a hospital better equipped to administer treatment. They must provide transportation to said center. Now the costs are still there and will still be billed, but you cannot be sued for past bills. And if your diligent even if you don't have insurance or Medicare or Medicaid nearly all states have some sort of indigency clause. To the point now according to the Center for Medicaid services. That 55% of all US emergency care goes uncompensated. This shifts the costs onto those who do pay, like insurance companies and the US government. But they don't pay the whole bill, instead keep a cost list of what they will pay for said procedure, etc. So hospitals end up writing off those costs to the tune or nearly 40 Billion dollars a year. There is no easy way to fix healthcare in the States.
Imagine Evan at British Customs: "Purpose of your visit sir?" Evan: "I want to play around with your pedestrian crossings." Customs: "Is that right? Seems a long way to go just to cross the street."
@@UsernameIncoming There's one near me in Denver on a side street, but the main street has a HAWK crossing. Ironically, the side street crossing get's used way more because it actually connects a school to a public park and community center whereas the other connects... two sidewalks?
This is the major problem in America: people overthink the simplest solutions. Just put in a regular traffic light. Everyone knows how they work. Everyone understands what to do. just put in a regular traffic light problem solved.
The fact this intersection reduces pedestrian accidents while also being almost completely ignored by pedestrians (and cars) is just the kind of validation that I needed not to bother at all with the buttons when crossing the street.
As a Canadian traffic engineer, HAWK beacons have always seemed like an overcomplicated solution to a trivial problem. (HAWK beacons are not permitted in Canada - they were studied but were never adopted by any province since there are other better solutions to the same problem). The two advantages that a HAWK signal has over a conventional midblock pedestrian signal are that: 1. When there is no pedestrian, the signal doesn't show green. That's good because the side street (if present) does NOT have a traffic signal, it has a stop sign or yield sign. If a green light were shown, drivers could be caught off-guard by cars crossing ahead of them while they also see a green light. 2. After the light has been on for a few seconds, drivers have the option to start proceeding once the pedestrians have passed their part of the road. But both of these benefits are already provided by other more conventional traffic signal designs that actually follow the U.S. traffic signal conventions that drivers have been taught for a century. 1. A flashing yellow light can be used instead of green, to indicate that the side street isn't signalized, like Evan mentioned at 6:43. This is exactly what they do in Massachussetts and some other northeastern States. 2. If you want to provide an interval after solid red that allows people to start when possible, you can just flash the ordinary red light on an ordinary signal. This should be a _simultaneous_ flash, not an alternating flash for exactly the reasons Evan states at 9:00. An even better solution is to just not do that at all and instead end the red light on one half of the street when the pedestrians have finished crossing that half. A great example of this in Madison, WI can be seen in the video "Two Stage Crossing at University & Ridge St." by Jerry Schippa.
@@la-go-xyno, that point only applies if the signalized pedestrian crossing is next to an unsignalized intersection. If it's midblock you could just use an ordinary green light.
@@OntarioTrafficMan Canada is no signatory of the the Vienna Convention on Road Signs and Signals? So, your signalling is similar to that in the USA? Do you also prefer to have so much texts on the signs? To me (European), it seems that while driving past it's impossible to read all that... Do you have a concept to keep it simple and intuitive?
@@la-go-xy Canada is somewhat better in the USA when it comes to symbols vs text. The "narrow bridge", "paved road ends", and "no turn on red" signs are an example of this. Canada uses pictorials that are easy to understand, while the USA just uses text. However, on the other hand, some parts of Canada require a "left turn signal" or "right turn signal" sign to be placed whenever there is a traffic light that applies only to turns. That's one thing we're behind the rest of the world (even the US) on.
Or... given that you're installing lights Anyway... you signalize the side street as well for an intergrated cycle using standard traffic light signals without any of this overly complicated mucking about...
Since you mentioned them, I have to get on my soapbox and point out that the UKs "puffin" crossings are not a step forward at all . They're solidly anti-pedestrian for a couple of reasons. First - cancelling a signal if you don't stand in the correct location is horribly inconvenient for people trying to cross. We already have to beg for a pause in the flow of traffic, now a sensor can just cancel that? Second - putting the walk signal on the same side as the people waiting to cross confuses people who expect it to be where all other signals are, and it's an attempt to solve the problem of cars disobeying traffic lights by changing pedestrian behaviour- the idea is to make people look right before crossing, but it just obscures the signals and blames the victim.
Wow, that first point sounds crazy. The point of sensors is that the light turns green without you having to push a button and, ideally, without you having to slow down.
Maybe the implementation needs work in terms of the sensors, but puffin crossing at least try to be convenient for pedestrians and when activated they display a normal solid red light. HAWK signals are imo worse because they look less even less like normal signals from the perspective of drivers. (Also, as an american I would honestly gladly accept even hawk signals in a lot of places because unfortunately RRFBs are way more common, and those get ignored by drivers virtually 100% of the time.)
The UK system makes more sense. Solid red means stop, flashing amber means go if there are no pedestrians, and green means the drivers have right of way.
New Zealand's system makes even more sense: Solid red means stop. Solid amber means 'stop if you can safely do so, otherwise contiue, the light will go red shortly', solid green means go... That's it. Flashing Amber means the lights are non-functional. Meanwhile the Pedestrians get a light: Solid red means stop. Solid green means go. Flashing red means 'do not start crossing, but if you're alredy crossing you still have priority' ('off' means 'press the button').
@@laurencefraser We have the same thing, flashing amber is only at pedestrian crossings, not intersections, only some of them not all of them, and the flashing indicates that pedestrians have right of way whereas solid amber indicates that it is about to turn red and drivers should slow down and be prepared. If the lights aren't on, that's how you know that it isn't working.
Important note! I accidentally cut a really important point out of this video about the first phase that makes it extra confusing, and I only just realised.
Can anyone tell me what the established rules of the road are when a motorist comes up to a stoplight that doesn't have any lights on?
Well the usual assumption is that there must have been a power cut, so I would personally approach this type of intersection with extreme caution. Weirdly enough with the HAWK beacon... it's the exact OPPOSITE. Madness.
Well if they didn't put up big signs that say crosswalk signal. I have normal crosswalk signals and emergency signals where I live in North Carolina with just the yellow and red stoplights. They are turned off unless someone using them and they have signs, so you just get use to them being turned off.
At a regular Intersection signal, if they are off, you stop like a 4-way stop sign. But at a railroad crossing there is no green, they are just off. Same as the HAWK. So you just need to know what situation you are in. Problem is lack of situational awareness by both drivers and pedestrians.
The Ontario Driver's Handbook instructs drivers to treat a blank signal as a stop sign, but there doesn't seem to be any actual law supporting this. Many US states have similar guidelines which is why the lights on a HAWK signal are arranged in a triangle instead of a line, to avoid counting as a traffic signal.
For reference the Ontario Highway Traffic Act defines a flashing yellow as "proceed with caution" and flashing red as stop, yield, then proceed
Was thinking that, would treat no lights with a lot of suspicion and expect danger. It's still ok to drive through but you have to expect that everyone else also doesn't have guidance. Unless stated otherwise, in the UK there's often deactivated traffic lights on some roundabouts connecting to A roads/motorways that are only used at certain times to deal with congestion, and otherwise use it as a normal roundabout, but that's fine because the failsafe is an already safe junction, just not necessarily optimised for the traffic level at peak times
In California the law says to treat non-working traffic signals as if they were flashing red, which requires "Stop, then proceed only when safe to do so."
There's a 90% reduction in delays because the drivers just ignore them and continue to drive through the junction!!
Hahahahah true
Roads that wide and/or that busy should have pedestrian refuges (islands) in the centre to enable pedestrians to cross each traffic lane separately.
hell. roads should not be that wide before becoming dual carridgeway.
yes, omg, roads here (AZ) are so wide! You practically have to plan an expedition every time you want to cross the street!
Also, what are the elderly or physically infirm (walk with a stick) supposed to do. It seems to me that American drivers are in dire need of education as to the presence of OTHER road users.
looks like they have plenty of wasted space that can be used for bike paths
Yes and when that happens at a signalized pedestrian crossing you can stagger each half so pedestrians have a green wave in whichever direction they're going and drivers don't need to wait while the pedestrian is on the opposite side of the intersection. For a great example of this from Madison Wisconsin, search for the video "Two Stage Crossing at University & Ridge St." by Jerry Schippa.
2:14 - as a Brit, I find the idea that our crossings might be 'Too inconvenient for drivers' to be a frankly bizarre concept. Never once have I thought that stopping to allow pedestrians to cross is inconvenient - it's just not how we learn to drive. I get that there are impatient drivers in Britain - including many who will jump red lights. But ignoring a pedestrian at a crossing is like pushing in front in a queue - it's just not the done thing here and you will get frowned at.
We walk so little here. Most people never think of themselves as pedestrians. Drivers always see being a pedestrian as some other poor saps problem.
@@ec8107 so I guess you wouldn’t do what we have to do here in the UK and that is giveaway and priority to any horse that might be on the road. I mean with the rider on it. Obvious The horse won’t be galloping and I’m not talking about the motorway.
Depends, It's certainly expected to stop but it's never convenient.
Traffic is about flow, and the less you stop between destinations the better.
@@Cheepchipsable but not at any cost to surely. It’s not even negotiable here. If it slows down traffic then that’s ok. We have extremely narrow country roads where you sometimes have to try and find somewhere to pull in to allow other cars to pass, so we just accept the lack of speed.
@@Cheepchipsable I guess that's the cultural difference. Most motorists in the UK (not all, but most) are not inconvenienced by having to stop. We just don't have the car culture that deeply ingrained (in most places, I make an exception for Aberdeen).
Being from the UK, a lot of the problem with crossings in the US is that they are kind-of just there and kind-of disappear into the other noise around you. UK crossings typically have zig-zags and sometimes other things (like barriers and traffic islands) that make you very aware that this is different from the rest of the road.
Most crosswalks in the US do have things like zig-zags and islands and things but they're often not lit or marked well enough. As a driver, it is difficult to even SEE a crosswalk before you get to it. Where I live there is a variant of the light shown in this video that is a bit simpler and better marked and I think it's a lot better than just having the zig-zag pattern on the street that you can't even see when you're going 40.
Evan starting his urban planning arc is awesome and I’m so here for it!
Me too!!!
Same! I never knew I'm in any way interested in things like urban planning until I found well made videos about it. (That applies to many other subjects too, almost anything can become interesting when presented in the right way.)
@@durabelle I know, I lost count of the number of rabbit holes I have fell into.
Starting it?! He alr had one this is just a second wind lol
I've never seen this channel before, and youtube suggested this to me a few hours after it was released, because I subscribe to dozens of urbanist channels. Now I am a new subscriber.
I guess sometimes the algorithm works?
9:06 As a Train Conductor in the USA, i'm glad Evan talked about the contrast between the flashing lights of the crosswalk compared to a railroad crossing. It's something that other channels miss when talking about these new crosswalks.
Yeah, they should get rid of one of the alternating red lights so the cycle follows: flashing yellow (caution), solid yellow (light change), solid red (stop), flashing red (stop-and-proceed). If they wanted to distinguish the light fixture, they could combine it with a white reflective triangular yield-sign shape as the backplate for the signal-light.
@@weatherupstairs4814 Or they could...and stay with me here...throw out the whole idiotic ideal and actually go with a sensible, simple solution instead.
It would make more sense to have flashing red as "stop" and solid red as "you can go if crossing clear".
That would be closer to existing practices in the US where "right on red" is a thing.
I completely agree. I never even considered railway crossing lights.
@@weatherupstairs4814 I agree. Stop-and-proceed makes more sense. That being said, slowing the traffic down with calming is better.
I moved from Scotland to upstate NY about 3 years ago, and you are spot on about it being scary for pedestrians. I had never driven before moving here, and so I spent the first 9 months in Utica unable to drive, it was horrific trying to get most every day things done. People drive like they have free healthcare here and it's genuinely frightening as a pedestrian. My parents gave me grief for driving a mile up the road to get groceries or do errands and I can't explain to them how the 5 lane stroad between myself and the strip mall is a literal deathtrap. The carcentric design of American spaces is one of the most culture shocky thing I have found about it.
"People drive like they have free healthcare" is going to be my summary of the US from now on.
Ok but this is a very city centered take. We need cars in suburban and rural areas. America is huge. The car helps with that. In cities it makes more sense to make it pedestrian friendly, but also unlike Scotland, our winters are not usually mild in most of the country. The humidity added to the cold can be deadly. Yeah public transport is great, but some of us have irregular schedules and wouldn't dream of biking in very cold weather.
@@amicableenmity9820 I don't think they were suggesting getting rid of cars; just altering the laws and systems that make it dangerous to be a pedestrian when surrounded by so many cars.
It depends where you are. Around here there are no stroads of that type, but, I remember staying at a hotel in the midwest and wanting to go to a restaurant that was like 300 feet away and getting in the car because most of that was a massive stroad with no sidewalks and no pedestrian crossing signals either and I was not going to get myself killed before getting my Culvers. (And preferably not after either)
@@amicableenmity9820 Nothing you've said is relevant to the what the original post said.
Flag crossings are such a gaslight victim-blaming non-solution.
yup
What do you expect from a braindead car-centric country?
I prefer the "brick" crossings
I can imagine a courtroom scene where a driver’s lawyer asks witnesses if the pedestrian/victim was carrying a “See Me” flag when hit, to deflect blame from the driver.
@@nsnopper yeah, it's the same approach that's taken with cyclists. Unless I'm dressed in neon clown paint, it's my fault for not being "visible enough" despite the fact that the law clearly states the onus is on the driver to, err, not drive into anyone or anything else.
as a note, here in sweden at least, blinking yellow light means "there is an issue with the crossing, disregard light signals and proceed with caution"
Similar in New Zealand, though I've usually heard 'proceed with caution' expressed as 'treat as an uncontrolled intersection'... Which is basically just 'proceed with cation' with a hint of added 'remember the default priority rules'.
Because we actually have uncontrolled intersections (though they're getting ever less common) and Don't have 4-way-stop/yield/give way equivalents. (after all, a four way 'give way' and an uncontrolled intersection are identical, save that one costs more to build and maintain, so why bother? And we're generally pretty conservative with stop signs. They are only used where there's an Actual specific Reason why give way signs aren't suitable. Usually obstructed sightlines, but sometimes other weirdness. Which means people know to pay attention to them when they show up (even if people who go through the same one a Lot are prone to performing 'rolling stops', which is technically a violation but isn't actually the same as just not stopping at all either.)
@@laurencefraser agreed as a kiwi flashing or none going is proceed with caution and sue your own judgement
Similar here in NSW, Aus flashing light means proceed with caution.
Usually it's a turned on for maintenance on the control unit rather than a malfunction though.
Indeed this is how it's taught in Europe. Blinking yellow = disabled/non functional light/maintenance, proceed with caution. Most often seen on traffic lights that are set on a program so they turn off at night when there is little to no traffic.
Here in the U.S., blinking red at intersections can typically mean, "there is an issue with the equipment. Treat like a full stop sign, look and cross when safe and/or other stop sign rules."
I'm a fan of the "see me" flag, but I like the "see me" Brick better.
😂
I've never seen anything more ridiculous. If they don't care about hitting a person, which is objectively larger and more visible, why would they care about a flag?? Maybe they should make it an American flag? 🇺🇸 People in America seem to love this thing, so maybe they'd care about not ruffling that?
@@beccasalt8960 Its more about passing the blame on the pedestrians for not being visible enough- instead of the oversized cars with limited visibility.
I was a little disappointed to discover that the Vancouver bricks are foam rubber, but it's a great idea.
That whole idea shows what’s wrong with the US. People can see but they care so little for anyone else.
A "see me nail carpet" would be effective too. Thinking about it... that could be integrated into signaled crosswalks, as long as there's a system that automatically lowers it for emergency vehicles.
We're getting ever closer to an Evan/Not Just Bikes crossover. I can feel it.
They are only a week or two out of sync lol. NJB did a video on hawk crossing within the last two weeks or maybe 3 at most.
Thats exactly what I was thinking lol
@@the_wretched_frost They both like a collab.
The weird thing to me about American crossings is right on red, and jaywalking. Can I cross when there is a red man? No, wait until it is green. OK, so when it is green it is safe to cross then? Maybe, just look out for the cars turning right. But aren't they supposed to stop at the red light? Yes, but they can still cross it, oh and there is a decent chance they can't see you in their pickup truck, good luck :D
What we should do for right-on-red, is have it only allowed when there's a flashing yellow right arrow beneath it. This way, right turners can proceed when there's no conflicting traffic, treating it as a normal stop sign, and pedestrian crossings can hold traffic in place, when the walk signal is active. You pretty much have to slow to a stop anyway, to take a right turn.
As for crossing on an orange walk signal, it isn't really something that is enforced. If you can judge the traffic for yourself, and know that no one will conflict with you, you can cross parallel to traffic with a green light, even if the walk signal is orange.
Not just the pickup trucks, the artic tractor units are the bonnet type rather than the cabover type so they also have huge blind spots.
Similar in Germany. The green man doesn’t mean it’s totally safe like in the UK, it just means most traffic has stopped.
@@maxbooth8611 I am from the UK, and here it does generally mean safe, but still make sure traffic is stopped. The thought of traffic going through a red it weird, because that's the whole point of a red light, to stop traffic.
@@carultch This is technically how right-on-red is supposed to operate in Georgia (USA). By law, people are supposed to come to a complete stop and then yield to oncoming traffic and/or pedestrians, but you're lucky if they even yield to cars.
When I first saw a hawk beacon I had no idea what to do, I had to look it up but it still confused me. There's no reason why they can't just use a normal red yellow green traffic light at a crosswalk.
Perhaps one reason is for colour-blind people? I honestly don't get it either, I am just thinking of a reason why they didn't want to use different colours. Although in the whole rest of the world that has green and red lights, colour-blind people are just taught what icon to look out for instead of what colour. Another problem is that it is just the flashing of the light that changes. In Europe, the pedestrian crossings also have different icons, so you know that if you see an icon walking 🚶♂️ that means that you can cross.
I can't tell if it's hilarious or horrifying that the success of this crossing was measured by DRIVERS TIME SAVED rather than... PEDESTRIAN LIVES SAVED
holy...
Quite so...
Always need to convince drivers how they benefit
I think you missed the even crazier part: They compared crashes to not having a stoplight at all, but motorist delay was compared to a regular stoplight. In other words: Instead of showing how these are inferior to a stoplight, they only used the "better than nothing" data for crashes, and then showed "saves time" with a stoplight. Extremely misleading - it's designed to encourage putting these where stoplights should be.
I. Do. Not. Understand. Why. This. Is. Not. Just. A. Normal. FUCKING STOPLIGHT
Traffic engineers, if a five year old cannot intuitively understand the signal you're making, the average driver won't either.
Just make it an always green light that goes red when a pedestrian presses the beg button
They don't want to show a green light because the side street vehicles do not have signals, they just have a stop sign. If they displayed green, people would be caught off guard by drivers entering the main street while the main street has a green light.
The better solution to this problem, which Evan almost references around 6:43, it to just use a normal traffic signal but have flashing yellow instead of green. This is exactly what is done in some States such as Massachusetts. In British Columbia they use flashing green instead of flashing yellow but the function is the same. If they really want an interval where drivers can proceed once pedestrians finish crossing they can just use an ordinary signal with ordinary flashing red (not alternating!)
@@OntarioTrafficMan also, with a green light the drivers would not need to stop for pedestrians who did not press the beg button. Now pedestrians always have priority regardless of what the lights show.
Hey, wait a minute, that's not even true since the pedestrian has a red light. So if a pedestrian waits for the red light but forgets to press the button, the driver must still let him cross. It's a deadlock situation.
The traffic logic typically follows a pattern where blinking lights are used to get your attention for a situation which may deviate from expected practice....
So where I am in the US, one blinking yellow light warns of a potential intersection use (like a fire station dispatch or other possible traffic).
Two alternating yellows (on the same fixture) warns to be cautious of traffic movement into a street (such as a low-visibility / low-use intersection).
One blinking red indicates a stop-and-proceed treated as a stop sign (frequently paired with a blinking yellow facing cross-traffic to indicate right-of-way).
Two alternating reds (on the same fixture) indicates you must stop and wait for movement into the street (for railroad crossings and school bus stops).
@@OntarioTrafficMan Side roads feeding onto main roads through a stop sign are already a thing; whether or not there's a signal on the main road, pedestrian or otherwise, is irrelevant; the side road vehicles are governed by the sign, and therefore responsible for checking traffic before turning onto the main road.
(rep to OP) This all the way. Regular traffic lights already have enough signalling states to cover a pedestrian application.
Just use a normal traffic light, with a normal pedestrian-button-triggered light cycle, and add a flashing amber state after the solid red to cover the "cross if clear" state. Using an unusual light configuration (red-red-yellow) and abusing the alternating red state is just stupid.
We have pelican lights in Australia, they work well, but I like how the Victorian Government addresses any possible confusion, they add:
"As a driver, you must always give way to pedestrians who are entering or crossing the road you’re turning into. This rule applies whether the pedestrian lights are green or not."
Then what's the point of the pedestrian light?
Turning vehicles have to give way to pedestrians, except where there are pedestrian lights.
This is the same in the United States. At least in all 9 states i've lived in. While occasionally people do disregard this rule, it's pretty rare. I think what this video shows me more than anything is that New Jersey has some terrible drivers lol. We have a few of the Pelican crossing things in pretty high traffic areas where i currently live and it works pretty darn well i'd say. I don't recall ever seeing anyone just blow through the red while someone is crossing. I'm positive it happens some times but certainly nowhere near as frequently as the one in this video.
@Cheepchipsable The point is most peds use the crossing as intended, but drivers shouldnt mow down elderly or disabled people who don't make it across while their light is green. You wouldn't think people would need to be told this but here we are.
@@Cheepchipsable the point is - you are not allowed to run over pedestrians, no matter what the lights say
@@adidab14 Except for the greater Boston, MA area in the 80s and 90s, it's rare but it happens. When I was in university in RI the people you saw causing the most problems had New Jersey plates.
What we're not talking about here is that pelican crossings (and zebra crossings) in the UK are installed AWAY from junctions (intersections). At junctions, the light phasing just includes a pedestrian phase. The ones with a push button and a flashing amber phase are installed between junctions at popular crossing points. Being well away from junctions, the chance of accidents is much reduced.
They're not though. Not withstanding pelican crossings no longer exist in the UK but toucan and puffin crossings are indeed installed at junctions.
@lmaoroflcopter there are still plenty of pelican crossings around (the ones with flashing amber)
Anecdotally I've heard that the "intelligent" feature on puffin crossings is often disabled, because the sensors become unreliable with age. This causes some extra delays to motorists, but it ensures that the crossing still provides pedestrian priority, which is ultimately what it's there for
@CyclicPilot there are very few if any remaining. Having been phased out in 2016, 8 years ago.
@@lmaoroflcopter new ones may have been phased out, but there are still loads around!
It's actually fairly common to see pelican crossings located right on the exits of busy roundabouts, which always causes them to lock up on all approaches. The sensible thing to do would be to install them at least 30 metres away, so that there's capacity in the road to allow some cars to stop and not reach the roundabout. In every case I've seen this, thre has always been ample room to do this, but they never do.
French guy here. It's so much simpler in France. Three colors: red, orange, green. Red = STOP. Orange = It's gonna go red, STOP. Green = GO.
If there are no lights, you have to slow down before any crosswalk, even empty, and if there's someone standing at either end, you have to stop until they finished crossing.
Just add "flashing = disregard signal, proceed with caution"
Your food serving sizes are too small.
In Italy, crosswalks have traffic lights that are identical to all other intersection traffic lights. The pedestrian pushes the button and the cars see green, then orange, then red. The pedestrian light shows a red standing man until the cars see red, then switches to a green walking man.
A lot of these crossings have cameras on the traffic lights to automatically fine cars that pass through with the red. It's a 100€ fine, and although most crossings don't have a camera, getting a fine or two is enough to teach the habit.
I have no idea why in america they designed a completely different system for pedestrian crossings than for auto crossings, but I know why nobody stops at the red: no consequences.
Seeing so many cars just run red lights is WILD to me! I guess there isn't a big risk doing it if there isn't a cop around to fine you? We have a lot of traffic cameras installed on traffic lights that take pictures if you run red lights and you get fined. It's not everywhere in Germany, but enough that most people don't usually risk it.
a cop ran a red light... that's wild
yeah except the cops RUN the red light @7:46
Ur correcting me aren't you... god damn it
@@Maike68 and isn't it ran, sense it's past tense
@@nathanialwashere2404I was not! Just emphasising to the OP
I literally forgot what all the phases mean five minutes after watching how on earth is anyone who doesn't watch RUclips video about traffic control systems supposed to understand this.
Even in the UK where there's 4 phases which are fairly obvious most drivers don't follow them.
Green = go
Amber = stop if it's safe to do so(most ignored signal IMO)
Red = stop
Red+amber = proceed if the way is completely clear(second most ignored because a lot of drivers don't care about people still crossing)
Every driver knows these to pass their test, but it appears they just instantly forget once they no longer need to prove they know what the signals mean.
@@scragar I didn't even know that last one existed! Never come across it, then again I live in the middle of nowhere in the north of Scotland so maybe that's more of a city thing?
And just to be more confusing, in most places when you see a non-functional signal, you are supposed to note that it is broken and not controlling traffic properly, and default to treating it as a stop sign. So you see a "beacon" in the off phase, and are supposed to immediately know that it is a "beacon" and not a "signal" and should be treated differently.
@@scragar In Austria (and some other countries) they expanded that. From green to amber you have 4 times a blinking green, so that you know exactly when amber will come. That also means that driving at amber will be punished (a friend of mine had to pay once). IMO it is much better than just amber and then the question: can I brake or is it too late ? And that should be answered in milliseconds.
@@scragar Red and amber does not at all mean proceed. It means stop. The amber light comes on to indicate the lights are about to change, but you must not pass through the lights at this stage. Flashing amber is what you described though.
Your examples about blinking red lights are spot on, as school buses are parked _across_ the road in some towns to allow the childres to get off the bus safely, and people getting what they deserve from a train happens often enough to clearly indicate that people are not just ignoring the red ligths that will make them liable for manslaughter, but also those designed to warn them of imminent danger to their own lives.
"Getting what they deserve"? What's wrong with you?
@@msjkramey Glad you noticed my rhetorical hyperbole.
People always think they can beat the train after the crossing gates start to go down. This is a little more understandable with one crossing freight tracks in the midwest where the 100 car freight train can take about half an hour to go past. In the Northeast there is not excuse.
@57thorns what in that comment indicated that it was a hyperbole?
@@57thorns I misread "getting what they deserve" the first time as the people stopped by a bus blocking a crossing. That makes sense. Telling someone they deserve death for whatever stress in their life makes them feel the need to rush everywhere is not okay. The problem with impatience in driving is a culture problem with making people feel they need to hurry.
You don't need a different kind of signal to solve this problem. You just need a pedestrian controlled regular stop light that stays green until someone pushes the walk button. This is not a hard problem to solve. We just don't have smart people involved in local politics.
I'm only 6 mins in and extremely confused why that can't just be a normal traffic light at that pedestrian crossing. Cars know Red, Yellow, Green. Pedestrians have to push a button before crossing anyway. Why make this more complicated than it has to be?!?!?!
Edit: Oh god, 11 mins in and _seriously?!_ What's _wrong_ with you, America?!?!?!
When he said "You sir are stealing the show" I had legit stopped listening and was just looking at the horse lol.
The horse was better looking, too... :)
For me, a continental European, the most confusing part is the fact, that there're seems to not be a federal level regulation for trafic. Or more precisely, here seems to be a lot of regional variation in what red light mean or who yields on crossing.
That kind of amazed me too. And not in a good way.
I feel like it should have surprised me more, but it does not.
It's a consequence of the US style of governance. Remember the US functions more like the EU than any particular nation. Unless the Federal government has rules, It's left up to the States to decide. And while there is a federal highway code, its only mandated to be used on the Interstate system. For State Highways down to the subdivision streets it's "optional"
Certain things have broad acceptance. Road lane markings, Sign colors and "mostly" shapes.
Otherwise, as the enforcement goes. An old saying is its not illegal until you get caught.
While ignoring traffic control signals can be just a ticket. In my state its a 90$ fine and 3 points on your license. 12 points and you loose it for 30 days.
If that corvette had hit someone running the light. Big trouble. Depending on the state, hitting a person in a cross walk, your talking criminal reckless driving at the least, that's up to 6 months in jail and 1,000 fine + court costs. Any injuries mean your liable for there medical bills, lost wages.
If it was an SUV or large pickup and you kill the person. Now its Felony Vehicular Manslaughter. Were talking minimum 1 year prison. If its because of negligent driving now its 10 years. If a DUI was involved 15 years and 20k fines. If the person killed had children, my state will mandate child support payments until the child is 18.
There is a Federal Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices that defines the design and meaning of traffic controls, but States retain the authority to set their own traffic rules.
Correct, each state makes its own traffic laws. Canada is the same with each province having its own laws. For example a green arrow in Ontario means that you have priority in the direction indicated, but a green arrow in Québec means that you can turn but you need to yield to other traffic such as pedestrians and cyclists. Which is especially problematic here in Ottawa where the city is partly in Ontario and partly in Québec.
Simple why can you use this?
Green - Go
Amber - Prepare to Stop
Red - Stop
Flashing Amber - Go if clear.
Green - Go
They hate to admit other countries sometimes have some better proven methods that work well and even improve traffic flow - like roundabouts - (which do not help pedestrians, but it proves the point about rejecting proven ideas from abroad - with all sorts of excuses).
That would only work in other parts of the world. America is much too free and great of a country for it to work here!
Yes flashing amber does seem smarter, amber clearly indicates a caution condition, solid already means plan to stop so flashing it for proceed with caution if the hazard has passed makes sense. Although having said that I think the UK and other European countries are phasing that out in favour of sensor based designs that will check whether pedestrians are clear and change the light accordingly instead. Prevents the risk of an oversized car or a large high vehicle like a truck or even a bus failing to see a pedestrian directly in front of the vehicle by observing the crossing from a much better vantage point on the side of the road which is far less likely to be obstructed by vehicles or other obstructions. In fact I believe if they are obstructed will assume that the crossing remains occupied (because *something* is present) a vehicle fouling the crossing will do that for example. But then showing a danger signal here where someone is already doing something they should not be doing is probably a good idea warns drivers to look out for the danger.
@@MrZoomZone roundabouts can help pedestrians if the pedestrian crossing is placed far enough back from the intersections. The reason being that cars can run red lights at similar 4-way intersections, but if they try to go high speed over the middle of a roundabout, they'll become airborne or slam into whatever shrubbery is growing in there. Roundabouts force cars to slow down and pay more attention to the area around them, which passively helps pedestrians. The crossings do need to be set quite a way back from the roundabout, though, or they just become more dangerous for the pedestrians *and* the cars.
@biosparkles9442 I have never found a roundabout easy to cross as a pedestrian but they definitely improve traffic flow. (And 4 way junctions between big roads are just as annoying for pedestrians so might as well help the traffic with roundabouts). But I see your point they could be designed for pedestrians, they're just not in the part of the UK where I am
As a daily commute cyclist, I’m so sick of people being ignorant to laws and safety. It’s gotten to the point where I may be at an intersection through multiple green lights for me (white walking man symbol) because people in the right turn lane just don’t give a F about letting pedestrians go first like they’re supposed to. Most times I’m stuck sprinting my bike across the road any chance I can get and I feel like I’m going to get hit eventually
Edit: kept watching the video and saw he brought up that exact scenario lmao now multiply that by 4 intersections and that’s me every day
I'm pretty sure the only reason why studies on HAWK signals show they are "safe" are because they confuse drivers. I'm sure if you did a study where a dancing clown in the middle of an intersection whenever pedestrians wanted to cross would also improve the safety of the crosswalk because the drivers would be confused.
Isn't this an easy $350 every five minutes for the local police? I think I see a solution to the problem of people running the red light.
Several US states have banned or heavily restricted the use of "red light" cameras to catch such people. These include at least Arizona, Arkansas, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, and Wisconsin from what I've found and I think the list has lengthened since then.
It seems to me to be a crazy set of priorities given the dire road safety situation in the USA over recent years.
The problem is, after a judge gets the first batch of 50 tickets, it is more likely the judge decrees the HAWK crossing be removed as defendants rightly argue that it is a poorly designed, poorly implemented, and poorly explained solution and just a money making scheme for the city. Add in if one of them catches the cop violating it as in this video, and that is an easy decision for the judge.
@@trumpetbob15 I fail to see how _that_ is a problem? Maybe they'll replace it with a more sensible crossing (who am I kidding…).
See it for the first time, and yeah, I thought that the flashing red is like on the railway crossing, and it's "the most red" there is.
There is a joke:
Heaven is where the cooks are French, the police are British, the mechanics are German, the lovers are Italian and everything is organized by the Swiss. Hell is where the cooks are British, the police are German, the mechanics are French, the lovers are Swiss, and everything is organized by the Italians. We could add in the hell "and urban planners are American" and for heaven "urban planners are Dutch".
The police isn Germany are nowhere near as bad as the cops in the USA.
What do you do when you pull up to a standard traffic light that is in error mode and all lanes are getting a flashing red light?
@@cheeto4493 Every time I see traffic lights turned off during night or something, they always flash yellow.
@@syriuszb8611 hmm, maybe it's a location thing. I'm in Oklahoma.
This is no joke:
Dutch road safety statistics are worse than Britain's
One in three Dutch road deaths, is a cyclist
That horse made the video ooze with cuteness!
I love how he gave me a lil kiss that stayed on my shirt haha
...came for the pegasus crossing
When I learned to drive in NJ:
Flashing red meant stop, then proceed only if safe (stop sign equivalent).
Flashing yellow meant slow down, and be prepared to stop (yield sign equivalent).
The cross street of a flashing yellow was flashing red.
All lights off meant "power is out in the area. Default to all way stop sign rules"
so, when approaching a hawk beacon, the lights being out means stop, then proceed if you have the right of way.
The flashing and solid yellow are OK. ('Slow down but continue if safe' and 'stop if possible')
The solid and flashing red are OK. ('Stop no matter what' and 'stop, check around, and continue if safe')
Simply adding a green replacing the lights off would make it much better.
As far as pickup truck forwards blind spot, thst should be regulated by law. The hoods should be mandated to slant down, and any truck found with the front lifted should be impounded, unlifted to regulation setting, then returned. If a truck violating blind spot regulations hits a pedestrian, intent is demonstrated by the act of raising the front. Yes, that would turn involuntary manslaughter into murder.
I learned the same as you (TX). However, the solution is to make it into a 3 phase signal: flashing yellow (yield sign) as default state, transitioning into a solid yellow (prepare to stop) and then solid red (stop always) when a pedestrian is there. When the pedestrian is gone, go back to flashing yellow again. That's it.
And all lights out meaning remains the same as for a standard signal (treat as stop sign).
Every driver in the US would understand exactly what to do with a signal like that.
@@robertmarder126 We have exactly the kind of signal you described at [some] fire stations in Pennsylvania. The signal flashes yellow at all times. When fire apparatus is responding to an emergency, before exiting the building a firefighter presses a button just like a pedestrian pressing a button to request a pedestrian crossing stage. As far as I know, all our drivers seem to intuitively understand this signal. On these signals, the flashing yellow lamp is at the bottom of a stack where the green lamp would be on a traffic light at an intersection. The steady yellow is in its normal middle position and the red is at the top. I can see why having a completely different signal design for pedestrian crossings confuses drivers in NJ, particularly if they are from out of state.
The research you have done on this topic is so good. Like someone else said, you are becoming an expert in urban planning for the UK and US. This report is so important. As a pedestrian, I am grateful to you for this work.
Almost every single thing about driving in the US is mortifying to me:
* % of unneccecary giant vehicles.
* Shared brake and indicator lights on many US vehicle models.
* Right turns on red.
* Stroads.
* Suicide lanes.
* Prevelance of deadlocked 4-way stop sign / yield intersections.
* Complete lack of any lane discipline on highways.
* Drivers' general disregard for the rules of the road and pedestrians in particular.
* Zero police enforcement of the two points above.
Unless the police want to make money by writing traffic tickets of course
@@lloydcollins6337 That is just speeding, easy to measure and quick to write a ticket for. Not for driving recklessly (which is both of the points on the list above).
In Washington DC I saw a street which had 2 lanes one way and 4 lanes the other way - but the middle two lanes changed direction depending on the time of day. There weren't any barriers separating the directions of travel. I was horrified.
@@AdrianColleythose are in lots of cities in the EU. There are supposed to be signals over the lanes to indicate whether you have the right to use the lane.
@@NotThatOneThisOne And they are generally not found on roads with pedestrian crossings.
I've often seen Americans amazed that Jaywalking is legal in the UK.
It isn't legal, or even illegal, because it simply isn't even a concept.
Jaywalking only exists in the US because car manufacturers spent a lot of money lobbying for a law change.
I recall a story of an English professor (as in a professor who was English) who was arrested and violently wrestled to the ground by a police officer for crossing the road in the "wrong" place. As a child I was in awe of America, and as an adult I still am! But for very different reasons. I'm glad I don't live there.
Because of US media, many Canadians think that jaywalking is illegal, which it is not. There is no such thing as jaywalking in Canada, it's just the United States.
Yeah, everywhere else we just call it "crossing the road"...
Huh. In New Zealand there are proper places to cross and improper places to cross... but the only actual difference (at least in practice) is how much trouble a driver does or does not get into if they happen to hit you as a result.
Basically, if you're too close to an intersection/marked pedestrian crossing (within 20 metres, I believe?), but not AT the intersection/marked pedestrian crossing, you're not suposed to cross there.
Other than that, you can cross where ever you like.
Also, you're supposed to take the shortest possible route to clear the road, so basically crossing at 90 degrees to the traffic, ideally. Which, given that this is not just the rules but also the safest way to do things, and also Usually the fastest unless the road is very empty, it's hardly an imposition most of the time.
"Jaywalking" is a made up term by insurance company lawyers.
The first HAWK beacon I saw was the one in New Brunswick, NJ. I drove up on it and through, "OK. What the hell am I supposed to do?" And the wig-wag red flash is probably what tripped me up. To go from a solid red to a wig-wag flashing red that mimics a railroad crossing is beyond counterintuitive. Go with a flashing yellow in the green position all the time. When the pedestrian activates the crosswalk, go solid yellow in the middle section, then red. Then back to flashing yellow when the timer times out. Or better yet, as you eluded, the sensor sees a clear crosswalk.
The irony is that in New Jersey law, flashing red is not what means stop at a railroad crossing. See NJ Rev Stat § 39:4-127.1 , which doesn't say flashing red lights. The warning system is not specified as flashing, as red, or even as lights. Flashing red lights are by contrast explicitly in NJ Rev Stat § 39:4-118 and mean what they mean on HAWK crossings. The problem is that HAWK beacons are in agreement with NJ law, but people don't actually know what NJ law is and make an incorrect generalization from the lights that happen to be used at railroad crossings.
@@JdeBP , another outdated and misrepresented statue then?
Or just do what SANE places do and use regular traffic lights.
Of course, that does somewhat require that drivers can be at least mostly relied on to Actually Obey Regular Traffic Lights...
Stick to:
Solid Red: Stop, and treat as a Stop sign for right turn if not disallowed.
Blinking Red: Treat as a Stop sign.
Blinking Yellow: Treat as a Yield sign.
Yellow: Prepare to stop if possible before the line.
Green light should be required.
Adding a dashed line for the yellow light would be an improvement.
I don't know why they needed to invent these things instead of just using a regular old traffic light. Here in Australia we have regular old traffic lights where you have cars passing through normally but if someone wants to cross, they walk up and press the button and the lights turn red for cars to let the pedestrians cross.
It's not _just_ mere wanton U.S.A. Exceptionalism. The problems they have are (1) that because of "right on red", red doesn't mean stop to people; (2) that flashing amber is so overused its meaning is diluted; and (3) that using a full red-amber-green system increases the legal hurdles that have to be overcome in order to get authorization for a set of lights. They're self-imposed problems, but they are nonetheless problems.
@@JdeBP the 'right on red' thing is a problem. New Zealand only permits that (well, equivalent, inverted) at intersections that are specifically marked with specific lanes for it (and does a variety of things to make those less dangerous to pedestrians than they usally are in the USA). It gets around the flashing amber issue by way of having that mean only one thing: The lights are not functioning (thus treat the intersection as uncontrolled).
Issue 3 is kind of the easiest to fix, in some respects, but also the hardest to just work around in any sensible way if you can't fix it...
Not-invented-here syndrome
@@JdeBP still us exceptionalism. Otherwise the obvious solution would be to federally ban right on red across the entire USA
Some UK crossings have a flashing orange phase following the red for motorists which means you can proceed if there are no pedestrians on the crossing (pedestrians will have a flashing green during that phase). Some pedestrian advocates argue against these as they feel it can be intimidating too slower pedestrians, especially the elderly. Instead, they favour longer red phases for pedestrians.
Those are Pelican crossings. They haven't been allowed to be installed since 2016.
They were better in my opinion, where I live they recently removed all the pelican crossings and replaced them with puffin crossings which waste more time as you still legally have to wait even if there is no one there or they crossed quickly and they seem to take longer when walking as well, Im saying this as somone who encounters boath everyday walking and driving
Puffins go green once the pedestrians clear the crossing, they both extend and shorten the pedestrian cycle based on detecting pedestrians. If you pay attention, you’ll notice they often have shorter cycle times than pelican crossings, which have to always use a worst case scenario cycle time. Watch for when the green man goes dark, which ends the “start-to-cross” part of the pedestrian cycle (equivalent to the flashing green on pelicans), the lights for cars will go green about 10secs after all the pedestrians clear the crossing.
AvianLyric@@AvianLyricis not the sort I am talking about. Have you never seen one with a flashing amber stage?
Weird, I love the crossings with flashing amber.
Holy shit just the sight of American roads make me want to cry. It's just horrifically depressing to look at...
Try driving on the bloody things, the world fell out of my bottom! Plus bashing my hand on the door when trying to change gear, and pickup bigger than a tranny van plus on the wrong side of the road
@@tallthinkev And you can't fit as much in a pick up as a Transit either lol.
@@antikommunistischaktion No, because you need to rely on cars for everything. People in developed countries have the option between many transport modes but most of the U.S. only provides one reasonable option.
@antikommunistischaktion - pal, every single “developed” country outside North America has a functioning train, bus, and usually tram/metro system. It’s the undeveloped countries that America’s transport system compares with. I’m about to travel 9 miles to work without getting into a vehicle one time and it will take me half the time it would take in a car, at a fraction of the cost.
I've never had to walk across a road that wide. In UK there would probably be a footbridge.
Also ignores all of us taught to treat dark signals as a stop. Trains people to ignore dark lights, making power outages more fun
Yes! I’d said this but it accidentally got cut from the video
That's why this design is a triangle of lights. Unique. If anyone looked at these with the regular row of three, they might mentally treat it like a powered down stop and... wrecks would ensue. As when these come alive, they are a flurry of lights. Not just on the pole, but the 'crossing ahead' signs that are down the road.
its like some insane person saw a level crossing and thought "but what if we do this for people?" instead of just importing the crossing they were inspired by to begin with.
I think one of the biggest problems in my area (suburb of OKC) is that pedestrians are rare. Mainly due to no public transit, everyone just drives everywhere. Drivers forget what to do when they see someone crossing the road. They forget that the vehicle yields to the pedestrian while making a right hand tun, even on green. As well as during unprotected left-hand turns.
1. This is so well-researched, thought out, filmed, and presented.
2. Petition to have a horse guest-star in all your videos!
14:00 Lets have some shots with some horses in the background.
The horses: This is our show now :D
Hahaha yeah I threw some extra hay for them back there but Spirit wanted to be on camera
Such beautiful creatures and gorgeous colourings🥰 thanks for another thought provoking (for me) video Evan
For a country that is so car focused, it always amazes me just how idiotic a lot of things around cars and roads in the US are.
It all starts with how easy their driving tests are, especially compared to those we have in the UK.
Then there's the obvious stuff like trying to reinvent the wheel by coming up with new 'solutions' to problems that other countries solved ages ago. Then making them overly complicated and trying to fix the symptom instead of the underlying problem... Those flags being a prime example. This is a common thing with the US. Just look at things like bulletproof backpacks for kids in school.
The driving tests have to be easy because not being able to drive is akin to not being able to participate in society. Since walking, cycling, and public transit are all borderline unavailable.
@@theuncalledfor I guess it's a catch-22 situation then really.
@@theuncalledfor I don't think that's a valid reason. You can have fairly low intelligence and still pass the driving test in the EU. And yes, people fail. But mostly out of anxiety. And they may retake the test.
Like this Cybertruck, it can't be sold in Europe as it does not meet safety requirements. That turning right on red rule is the most dangerous, especially combined with the type of vehicles in use.
@@theuncalledfor There's some aspect to that but they really are still *too* easy in many locations. My motorcycle test (other than the multi-choice computer thing) was literally riding my motorcycle around the parking lot.
So, an idea I've had for years is just have a small tunnel under the street for crossing. Short staircase brings you below street level, you cross the street, another set of stairs brings you back up to the sidewalk.
The fact that I was genuinely surprised to find that the thumbnail of this video is an actual image from the video in real time rather than some super photoshopped green screen thumbnail. Says a lot about the current state of RUclips, honestly.
Yeah I try to make all my thumbnails actual screen grabs from a point in the video
Cant believe that cop went through the red, at this point the cop should be familiar with the crossing.
He did but ran it anyway which is tragic
In "civilized" countries he should loose his license and maybe his job (if it needs a license).
@@evan This also proves the lack of enforcement then and not just people not caring.
Yes, they should be setting an example.
If he saw a normal person going through the red, he would probably give them a ticket.
This channel turning into urbanism channel is a huge surprise bonus since I subscribed. Keep it up!
Well it’s more a variety channel so there’s content of lots of different niches I have an interest in :) thanks!
The US immigrant in Europe to outspoken angry urbanist pipeline is real
It is interesting to see experiences being brought across borders.
It is not always easy to find the best solution, if the whole situatuion is so different and many factors have influence.
Someone who knows both sides can probably help.
In British Columbia, Canada, a common pedestrian crossing system is a conventional, three-aspect traffic signal which flashes green most of the time. It is placed either mid-block or at minor intersections. When a pedestrian wishes to cross at the crosswalk, they push the button, whereupon the light goes solid green, then yellow and finally red, allowing the pedestrian to cross. After a period of time, the light returns to flashing green. Simple, and easy to understand.
They have one of these in Downtown Minneapolis and it works great. Genuinely don't understand why we needed to reinvent the wheel.
The flashing green is not easy to understand. Even most British Columbians don't understand why it's flashing green. The reason it flashes is that it's not a normal green light so cars could cross in front of you even though you have a green light. I have yet to encounter a single BC resident who has correctly responded when I asked them what it meant.
They should have just used flashing yellow on those signals like everywhere else in North America. So it would be exactly the same as the way they work in BC currently but with the bottom signal aspect being yellow instead of green.
@@OntarioTrafficManI mean, they're no different from a normal solid green light, it's more so to differentiate at a distance. If you see a flashing green and it goes solid you can prepare for it to go yellow then red like any other light. Flashing yellow here is treated as a yield (slow down and be prepared to stop) our driving manual isn't some kind of regionally locked thing anyone can look at it
@@OntarioTrafficMan While it does fail to communicate that, it still works a hell of a lot better than the HAWK signals since both cars and pedestrians tend to just treat it like a standard green light.
The problem with these lights over the standard yellow flashing lights is that they take a long time to change for the pedestrian. I find the best use of them is to stop vehicles on the main road, so you can do a left hand turn onto the main road with a vehicle.
As someone from the UK... Im baffled.
The original title I had made for this one was "Why Americans are BAFFLED by this new traffic light" so I guess that clocks for everyone
In Australia they use standard-looking traffic lights. Green = go, yellow = prepare to stop, red = stop. But then flashing yellow = you may start to move unless there's a pedestrian who hasn't finished crossing yet.
Using standard-looking lights removes the need for education to use the lights. Those double red light things look like a "slow down" warning. Dumb!
NZ just doesn't bother with the flashing yellow. Why introduce an unnecessary conflict point? The light just stays red until the pedestrian lights have finished their cycle (traffic lights without pedestrian lights as part of the cycle don't really exist anymore, that I've seen). And of course the pedestrian lights go red, green, flashing red (wait, cross, finish (do not start) crossing). You usually have to push a button to get the pedestrian lights to be included in the cycle, but some intersections that see a lot of foot traffic just run the pedestrian light cycle regardless (and the busiest actually simplify the whole process by having a phase that is 'all cars stop, all pedestrians go, regardless of direction', which is also the only stituation where you can cross intersections Diagonally safely (and legally)).
I find this quite shocking... Where I live, in Canada, when we come to a crosswalk with lights, we press a button to activate the lights (they flash yellow). Then we step up to the curb to show coming cars that we intend to cross. If there are cars approaching we wait for them to stop, and they almost always do, then we cross. As a driver coming up to one of these, it is well understood that if the lights are blinking I need to slow way down as I inspect both the crosswalk and the adjacent sidewalks. If it looks at all like someone might want to cross I stop.
I would never even consider crossing if I wasn't completely sure that it was safe.
Why is everyone in your country so intensely focused on themselves over others? It seems like every time Americans are given a chance to slightly inconvenience themselves for the large benefit of others they cry out "Hell no!"
The crossing you're describing is called a Pedestrian Crossover, and is basically the same as a Zebra Crossing in Europe. Drivers don't need to inspect the crosswalk and sidewalks if the lights are blinking, they ALWAYS need to do that as per the sign, regardless of whether the lights are blinking or if there are even lights at all. Pedestrians always have priority, regardless of whether they press the button to activate the lights (if present).
In New Zealand, the older style zebra crossings work/ed basically like that (no pushing a button, the lights are just always a steady amber sphere on top of a black and white striped pole. There was/is a marking on the road (hollow white diamond), if a vehicle has passsed it when a pedestrian steps up to the crossing, the vehicle doesn't have time to safely stop so the pedestrians are to wait for the vehicle to clear the crossing before they cross, if not past it the vehicle has time to safely stop and is required to do so, and Once It Has Stopped the pedestrians cross. Amber lights at intersections work very simlarly, 'stop if it is safe to do so, continue through if it is not', in addition to warning that the light will go red soon).
On the other hand, our New model of crossing just... straight up uses the traffic lights you find at regular intersections. The cars have a green light until a pedestrian pushes the button, then it runs a regular traffic light cycle, with one phase being the cars and the other being the standard pedestrian lights used at intersections controlled by traffic lights. Once the pedestrian cycle finishes and the car light goes green again, it stays green until the button is pressed once more. Also, there is generally a fairly large island between the traffic lanes in one direction and the traffic lanes in the other, and the lights only stop traffic in one direction at a time (usually), though whether you have to hit the button seperately for each or they're linked together in some fashion varies (there'll always be buttons on the island in case of issues, but you don't always need to press them).
In Aus we don't even have lights.... cars just stop at zebra crossings if you look like you're waiting to cross.
The idea of running a Red light at a pedestrian crossing is wildly alien!
5:10 it caught me so off guard with just how British your accent sounded there.
It made me chuckle!
Going native
I love how as you cross and pray you don't get squished, a batesville casket truck stops by you.
As you outlined, this all boils down to two major design problems:
1. It's confusing for drivers. Just turn it into a regular traffic light that stays green unless a pedestrian wants to cross
2. It's confusing for pedestrians. I mean, look at that huge set of instructions. NOBODY is going to read all that. Just one button that works the same as on any regular intersection
Whoever designed these should be fired. Or better, whoever approved this design.
I recently came across one of these in California. It was on the exit of a 5 way intersection. My light was green and as I was leaving the intersection (around sort of a Y that made the 5th exit, there’s a red light and a pedestrian. 5 cars with screeching brakes and a scared and pissed pedestrian…. So the pedestrian crossing light didn’t seem to be tied to the intersection light meaning I entered an intersection on green only to find a red light on the exit around a semi-blind corner. Super sketch setup. Someone is going to get killed and someone at the city thought this installation was perfectly logical.
I wonder why they have another pedestrian light so close to a regular intersection. Pedestrians should be able to cross at the regular intersection if it's so close.
There's a similar issue where I am in LA. There is an assisted living facility across the street from a grocery store with a pedestrian crossing light. The problem is that the parking lot exit is so close to the crosswalk, that you can't see the lights when turning out of the lot. So you turn right and can easily blow through it if you don't know it's there.
I have a crazy idea: Unified, national traffic rules!
That would never happen. Too many Americans want the federal government to literally do nothing except maintain the huge military. They want individual states to control everything else.
Even crazier: just copy the rules from EU
It would literally cost billions and be hard to pass. The only reason signage is semi standardized is because the federal government won’t provide funding without the guarantee the signage will follow the DOT regulations. Besides not funding projects the federal government has no control over state regulations.
@@catislandteam You realise this doesn't have to be done all at once? Signs get replaced all the time, replace them by the new version. The real difficulty is the mess that US politics are.
They need a normal light with red, yellow, and green phases. Almost everyone knows red means stop, yellow means the light is about to be red, and green means go.
As a result of poor driver's education, only some people understand a flashing red (treated like a stop sign) means to come to a complete stop then preceded when it is clear to do so, and they don't know a flashing yellow (treated like a yield sign) means to preceded with caution then yield to traffic with right-of-way. If you add any rules, you're asking for trouble.
A small adjustment.
Red means stop
Yellow means go faster.
Green means keep going fast.
Not official, not OK, just reality.
@@JeanPierreWhite I don't know about the USA, but around here Officially yellow/amber means 'stop if it is safe to do so, otherwise continue. Also, the light will go red soon'. Helped by the fact that the lane markings generally go from dashed to solid at roughly the point past which a regular car does not have time to safely stop before the intersection (though that's a 'deliberately helpful hint' rather than a hard fact or lawful indicator... unlike the hollow diamonds before zebra crossings which explicitly DO indicate the point past which you can't be expected to safely stop, and thus pedestrians are supposed to give way to you (if they approach the crossing before you cross that marker you're supposed to give way to them instead)).
Unfortunatley, yes, some drivers do behave as you describe anyway... though it's less of a problem than you'd expect at regualar intersections given the tendency to have deliberately overlapping red phases meaning drivers (and pedestrians!) can see if a car is still in the intersection and wait for it to get out of the way before they start moving when the light goes green (or navigate around it, if need be). They'll still get in trouble for running a red light if that happens and law enforcement is paying attention to that intersection at that time though.
@@laurencefraser Amber officially means the same in the US. However what I described in my last post is how drivers actually treat the color amber, they typically speed up. Once I stopped at a traffic light and the passenger asked me why I stopped. Because it turned yellow I said. The passenger said that I have three seconds after it turns red to get through the light. Most Americans don't even treat red as a sure reason to stop if they think they can sneak through before other traffic gets green. It is little wonder that a lot of serious accidents at high speed occur at US traffic lights.
In the US, solid yellow means "prepare to stop," and comes after green and before red. Flashing yellow means "yield," which does not require you to stop unless another vehicle or person has the right of way.
@@jasons5916 That is true. But tt's not how people treat the lights..
Pelican crossing: Exists and works since traffic lights adopted computers and became popular
America: We need to invent something new that nobody understands or cares about.
@@antikommunistischaktion That is literally a pelican crossing, as used in europe. The problem is with America trying to invent new solutions to self-inflicted problems when working solutions already exist. It's the opposite of trying to be like europe.
Not saying they should try to be like europe, just look around and take a cue here and there from decades proven solutions from around the world every now and again.
@@antikommunistischaktion In case you can't see the video link I posted, type "pelican crossing" into youtube and click on the one showing a random pelican crossing in derby. It is EXACTLY what you described (down to the flashing amber because an extra amber phase is normal in the UK anyway). Please do the most basic research available to you next time.
@@antikommunistischaktion No Pelian crossing ever has a flashing red light. I think you have your crossings in a twist!
Blinking red is STOP and proceed if clear. It actually says this on the sign, but blinking red always means stop and then proceed when clear in the US.
As a European this all seems absolutely nuts. From Not Just Bikes I already got some glimpses of how bad it is, but story shows it is even worse.
30 years ago, I was visiting at Amherst College and noticed that if I pressed the button to indicate I wanted to walk across the street, when it was time for me to walk, EVERY direction received a red light. I appreciated that.
Some UK crossings have very similar phases, but instead of flashing red it's a flashing yellow. Everyone here understands what that means, motorists know flashing yellow means "wait until people have crossed, then go" and pedestrians know flashing green means "do not start to cross". Similar structure but without lights that are quite as confusing
Indeed red means stop, yellow means caution so it does make more sense for a flashing yellow in that case.
The difference of course is that British drivers already know what yellow/amber on a traffic light means. Especially since a simple zebra crossing just has beacons which flash amber all the time.
Huh. Around here the pedestrian lights are solid red: waiting for everything else to get sorted so it's safe to cross. Solid green: cross. Flashing red: clear the crossing if you're already on it, do not begin crossing.
The red and green lights also have the stick figure in different poses.
The idea that Green can mean Stop is just... why? That's an extra bit of pointless confusion.
I didn’t know I had an interest in traffic laws of the US before today. You can tell that this one took a lot of work and thought, and it was well worth it!
If you want another example of sacrificing pedestrian safety on the altar of vehicular convenience, the stop lights in my town allow unprotected lefts across a crosswalk while the walk light is on.
I've seen one of these with a regular traffic light and it works just fine. Those drivers shouldn't have run the red lights, but the city shouldn't have put up signals that aren't taught or tested when getting a drivers license. There's a good reason for standardized signals.
I’ve never seen a crossing like this! It’s definitely not intuitive to understand
A flashing red light in any other circumstance indicates that there's a problem with the light (and thus it should be treated as a stop sign. Which is where these clearly have a problem because almost no one respects those as much as they should, either.) If these had a normal red light instead of two flashing ones, I don't think there would be half as many problems with them.
IMO there should be no red flashing(or not) which means anything else but a complete hold - no further driving.
The flashlight lights do mean to stop like a stop sign. It does not mean proceed with caution. But maybe NJ doesn't understand hawknlights like they don't understand round abouts.
I fear at least part of the problem is that the US is so driver-centric that tests are comparatively cursory for the most part and thus they can get away with little knowledge or respect for many rules, signs and signals. Meanwhile in the UK, tests tend to be made nightmarish as combined quality control and general deterrance from driving. Added to this, the general desire for 'exceptionalism' rather than doing what foreigners do that has a proven track record seems culturally consistent over there. (Plus if the US had traffic cameras everywhere that were set up to automatically fine and otherwise punish bad drivers - they might be a little more restrained in breaking traffic laws. Deeply unpopular perhaps, but effective as people seem to care more there about losing money rather than killing pedestrians.)
I think that the possibility of losing their license for a while would be an even bigger deterrent than just a fine. But that's probably reserved for drivers that actually drive over someone, not ones that merely risk it multiple times..
It's true about the testing. I got my first driver's licence - sorry, license - in Massachusetts, and afterwards I was a little scared to go out driving because I knew that the roads were filled with drivers who had been through the same easy test that I had just passed.
@@AdrianColley You'd be surprised how many people fail the written and driving tests then.
@@durabelle For some even losing their license is not a great threat. They just drive without it. But some countries have rules which confiscate the car in that case. That is especially useful for those "Tuning"freaks who really love their cars. In Austria it's only for really hefty speeding and I don't know if they really took a car for longer (it's not so easy legally).
@@jwb52z9 I guess that's mostly test anxiety or overconfidence.
7:45 a cop going through it shows just how bad this is
What’s really effective to your point is the withholding of explanation as to what the hawk beacon signals mean. I spent the first bit of the video staring at the signals realizing I would have no idea what to do if I was driving.
Thanks! That was intentional. They’re confusing
Lol, come to the Netherlands, we've got this covered. Also, while you're at it, maybe take a look at driving education too.
Here in the UK, we have a written exam and a practical one.
@@phoenix-xu9xj I think every country has a written exam and a practical one. Here in Ontario you have a written exam to get a G1 permit, then a practical exam to get at G2 permit, and then a second practical exam to get a full license.
@@OntarioTrafficMan we don’t have so many types here. You just have one test (2 parts) for a car.
My point was that in most places (and as I understand in Ontario and in the UK as well) you'll be allowed to start driving on public roads whenever you've passed a theory test under some sort of a provisional license. In the Netherlands you can only drive with a certified instructor in a car with double controls until you've passed a theory and a practical test.
Just to name a few german solutions.
1) a zebra crossing
2) a traffic light without a green light (just yellow and red), that gets activated by pushing a button
3) mind blowing i know ... a NORMAL traffic light just for pedestrians crossing, that gets activated by a button and is otherwise always green for cars.
Usually either of this solution is combined with some kind of traffic calming (mostly a pedestrian refuge island), but it differs a lot between the German states.
It was a nice video. Please continue on american urban planning
3) is not fit for cities. It's fine for rural areas on main intercity roads though.
All 3 apply to the UK you mentioned, especially in major cities, I’m surprised that people supposedly living in the UK, argue over it and seem to be so dumbfounded by the concept of some other crossings, either never hear of them or don’t believe it. 🤦♀️
@@falsemcnuggethope 3 is straight up what we use all the time in cities in New Zealand with no problems at all in places where it would be difficult to cross otherwise (tend to have an island in the middle of the road and only stop traffic in one direction at a time). It causes no problems at all due to being functionally identical to a regular intersection that everyone understands (the pedestrians get the same lights they would get at an intersection too).
1 is what we use in smaller towns/on roads where traffic is always either non-existent or barely moving for various reasons/on slipways that allow left turning (we drive on the left) traffic to proceed even if the light is red (well, I'm not sure if they're actually slipways, there's enough going on with them that they might have a different name).
2 is very much a 'why would you bother when 3 exists?' solution.
@@falsemcnuggethopeperfectly fit for everywhere but the most crazy roads in Australia.....
I can't get my head around this. It makes absolutely no sense
Not Just Bikes did a video on Dutch traffic lights a few years ago. It's amazing what you can get done when you don't treat pedestrians, cyclists, and even trams like the enemy.
Watching this, the one thing that stands out to me is how high up the lights are. I get that in the US that's common for all signs, and so it's better to be consistent.
But them being so high up takes your eyes off the road, which is where the pedestrians are.
I can just imagine it being like you're driving along, see that it's clear, and you look up to the signal to see it's flashing red.
While your eyes are on that, a pedestrian moves in front of you on the crosswalk.
Because it's flashing red, you don't stop, and now you look down to suddenly see a person there.
0:10 that in general it seems, I see plenty of people that run regular red lights and stop signs, it nothing really special to a hawk beacon.
That flag thing is tragic!!
We might contrast this with the situation in the UK in the latter part of the 19th century with the so-called "red flag act" requiring somebody to walk in front of motor vehicles carrying a red flag. In parts of the USA it appears to be the pedestrian that has to warn the motorists of their presence with a red flag...
Maybe you should try comparing to Scandinavia..mostly there are no crossing lights and motorists have to stop if pedestrians even look like they may cross. In some cities in Sweden in (university ones) the priority is drunk student on cycle, pedestrians, normal cyclist, buses, trams and at the bottom is cars !
Same in Finland. Your driving test will be failed if you don't slow down on a pedestrian crossing that has anyone waiting or even just approaching.
@@durabelle I am orginally from the UK, it is so different here. I feel this approach is the way it should be!
@@timunerman3808 Whereas I'm originally from Finland but now living in the UK. And I agree with you, the Nordic way is great! In the UK I have no problems with any of the light controlled crossings either, and zebra crossings work too, but it annoys me how rare they are for no obvious reason. In Finland you have zebra crossings everywhere (without the flashing orange lights though, just the painted white stripes plus crossing signs) where people might want to cross. I don't get the point of the common UK pedestrian crossings that have just the dropped curb to mark the spot (and obviously help those with prams or other wheeled equipment), but have no requirements for drivers to yield. I've spent way too much time waiting on the curb at those places on roads that should clearly have a zebra or puffin crossing due to traffic not having enough natural breaks for pedestrians.
@@durabelle I think some of it is that cross some roads in the UK pedestrians have right of way but there are no markings. For example across side roads. However it would be very brave just to walk out and I would not just walk out until a car has really stopped at any UK crossing.
@@timunerman3808 for side roads the Dutch style is the best. The sidewalk continues normally over the side road and cars have to drive over it. This is even better than the zebra crossings here in Finland. We have some catching up to do.
I'm from Tucson AZ, and my most common method of transportation is cycling (although I walk/drive/take public transit also), so I have used HAWK crossings basically every day for many years. Since they've been here so long, the locals know how they work (that doesn't stop the odd asshole from running a solid red light, but I would say this happens somewhere between 0.5 and 1% of the time at least on my routes). However, from an outside perspective, I definitely get how they are unintuitive and cause unnecessary confusion for those who are not as familiar with them.
Most of the HAWK crossings I use are when the bike boulevards I travel on (think residential street with decent pavement and traffic calming measures) intersect an arterial road/stroad. Since a lot of people will use the same few bike boulevards, drivers generally know where to expect pedestrians and cyclists --- it's on the less popular crossings further away from the city center that it gets increasingly dangerous, as now drivers are so used to zooming through the crosswalks that they might not pay attention to the present conditions.
The past 10-15 years have seen a remarkable increase in infrastructure for cyclists and pedestrians, but as mentioned in the video, we still have A LOT of problems and a very long way to go. I don't feel comfortable using >95% of regular crosswalks, so as more have been converted into HAWK crossings, the more I have been able to do by foot or by bike in Tucson (waiting for my route to the grocery store to get a HAWK instead of the median-separated but no aids/lights crosswalk that is there currently).
man, it should be pretty easy, no light or flashing red lights should be treated like a stop sign where everyone stops and takes their turn, flashing yellow caution, and green for go. This is what most people understand. As for as right on red, you should have to come to a stop before proceeding so you can at least pretend to look for pedestrians before you run them over.
One of the biggest problems seems to be the U.S. addiction for running red lights.
In my city they just changed traffic light timing which has had the unintended consequence of increasing the prevalence of red light runners.
They have prioritized the main street more and have shortened the side street green timing. Now backups occur on side streets and often only one or two vehicles get through a light cycle because the timing is very tight and the person at the front of the line is all too often on their phone when it turns green.
Once enough people have died and the city realizes what they did it'll be changed back.
@@JeanPierreWhite if you have red light cameras with fines attached, that may not actually be unintentional at all.
@@laurencefraser No red light cameras in our city.
They need to have a block arm, like train tracks. That or just use a regular traffic light that's green all the time unless pressed.
Those arms are so expensive a lot of train tracks don’t even have them.
It's wild America has a jay walking law they take super seriously, but then no safe ways to cross a road? And even if you wait for what should be a safe way to cross a road, cars can still drive through that way and make it unsafe? Given all the vehicle casualties and the fact drivers can't see out of their cars, you would think finding safer ways for people to cross roads would be a priority? But then again, this is the same country that has issues with shootings and does nothing about its gun control, so what do I know 🤷
Bullying is bigger problem than gun control. Both are problems, but why would people shoot up a school if they haven't been bullied into insanity?
@@antikommunistischaktion Cartels funnel illegal guns *out* by the ton, or rather guns that are illegal in their destination countries, precisely because they can be legally bought so easily and cheaply in the US. It's drugs they bring *in*, again almost exclusively through legal ports of entry hidden in bulk cargo.
I don't think the jaywalking law is taken seriously. It is extremely rare for anyone to ever get a ticket for merely crossing the street. It's definitely absurd that many U.S. states made it illegal to walk across the street, but let's not pretend like it's something anyone takes seriously.
@@OntarioTrafficMan But many of my American friends, as well as posts/comments I've seen from tourists and Americans online have always repeatedly stressed that law and how much you shouldn't do it? To the point, yeah, it's one of the few laws I remember because of how much I see people talk about it and urge you not to do it. It is good if to cops it isn't a huge deal, especially if you can't safely cross streets anyway, but yeah that's just now how it's came across online in my experience
It's weird that something British kids learn at an early age (how to cross the street) is so complicated that Americans have made it illegal!
What if something like the train arm system was implemented as a new standard for crosswalks for safety? Then drivers must absolutely stop during the crosswalk stop
A freshman at my college was killed 3 weeks ago. She was in a crosswalk. It was the first day of school. He was riding a motorcycle.
:( my local campus briefly seen in this video always had issues with vehicles hitting students. They even slowed the speed limit down and added crosswalks but the problem persisted
Sadly, this is just a report on the way Americans value human life, and it's terrifying. Thanks for sharing this, Evan. It is so important. I hesitate to go even around cars that are fully stopped. There really just needs to be huge fines/consequences to running the lights, or a crosswalk when the light is red. That would be the only thing to really change things, sad that even police don't adhear to this. How can you expect anybody else to if they don't?
That horse stealing the show made me smile though. Thanks for keeping that in, they're my favorite.
a mouse trap for drivers that attempt to move on red lol
An old saying is its not illegal until you get caught.
While ignoring traffic control signals can be just a ticket. In my state its a 90$ fine and 3 points on your license. 12 points and you loose it for 30 days.
If that corvette had hit someone running the light. Big trouble. Depending on the state, hitting a person in a cross walk, your talking criminal reckless driving at the least, that's up to 6 months in jail and 1,000 fine + court costs. Any injuries mean your liable for there medical bills, lost wages.
If it was an SUV or large pickup and you kill the person. Now its Felony Vehicular Manslaughter. Were talking minimum 1 year prison. If its because of negligent driving now its 10 years. If a DUI was involved 15 years and 20k fines. If the person killed had children, my state will mandate child support payments until the child is 18.
So the consequences are there. But as with all things American. So much space so few resources. Be that Personnel, or Monetary.
In the U.S. driving and owning guns are considered rights, but healthcare and education are considered privileges. In every other developed country it's the other way around.
@@OntarioTrafficMan That's not entirely correct. In the US you have the right to free speech, own any firearm created, free public elementary and secondary schools. Among the other's in the Bill of Rights.
Driving is a privilege. Mind you it's easier and cheaper in the US than European countries.
Emergency healthcare is right under the EMTALA of 1986. Basically states that any hospital emergency department that accepts Medicare must provide appropriate medical screening and care regardless of citizenship, legal status, or the ability to pay. And cannot transfer or discharge patients needing said care except with either informed consent or when the condition requires transfer to a hospital better equipped to administer treatment. They must provide transportation to said center.
Now the costs are still there and will still be billed, but you cannot be sued for past bills. And if your diligent even if you don't have insurance or Medicare or Medicaid
nearly all states have some sort of indigency clause. To the point now according to the Center for Medicaid services. That 55% of all US emergency care goes uncompensated. This shifts the costs onto those who do pay, like insurance companies and the US government. But they don't pay the whole bill, instead keep a cost list of what they will pay for said procedure, etc.
So hospitals end up writing off those costs to the tune or nearly 40 Billion dollars a year.
There is no easy way to fix healthcare in the States.
Imagine Evan at British Customs: "Purpose of your visit sir?"
Evan: "I want to play around with your pedestrian crossings."
Customs: "Is that right? Seems a long way to go just to cross the street."
Well, he's a British citizen now.
@@to_loww - Oh, wasn't aware of that. Thx.
Europe: "Couldn't you just put regular intersection lights there?"
America: *screeching*
The US does use regular red-yellow-green traffic signals at some crosswalks. Depends on jurisdiction, I guess.
@@UsernameIncoming There's one near me in Denver on a side street, but the main street has a HAWK crossing. Ironically, the side street crossing get's used way more because it actually connects a school to a public park and community center whereas the other connects... two sidewalks?
This is the major problem in America: people overthink the simplest solutions. Just put in a regular traffic light. Everyone knows how they work. Everyone understands what to do. just put in a regular traffic light problem solved.
The fact this intersection reduces pedestrian accidents while also being almost completely ignored by pedestrians (and cars) is just the kind of validation that I needed not to bother at all with the buttons when crossing the street.
As a Canadian traffic engineer, HAWK beacons have always seemed like an overcomplicated solution to a trivial problem. (HAWK beacons are not permitted in Canada - they were studied but were never adopted by any province since there are other better solutions to the same problem).
The two advantages that a HAWK signal has over a conventional midblock pedestrian signal are that:
1. When there is no pedestrian, the signal doesn't show green. That's good because the side street (if present) does NOT have a traffic signal, it has a stop sign or yield sign. If a green light were shown, drivers could be caught off-guard by cars crossing ahead of them while they also see a green light.
2. After the light has been on for a few seconds, drivers have the option to start proceeding once the pedestrians have passed their part of the road.
But both of these benefits are already provided by other more conventional traffic signal designs that actually follow the U.S. traffic signal conventions that drivers have been taught for a century.
1. A flashing yellow light can be used instead of green, to indicate that the side street isn't signalized, like Evan mentioned at 6:43. This is exactly what they do in Massachussetts and some other northeastern States.
2. If you want to provide an interval after solid red that allows people to start when possible, you can just flash the ordinary red light on an ordinary signal. This should be a _simultaneous_ flash, not an alternating flash for exactly the reasons Evan states at 9:00. An even better solution is to just not do that at all and instead end the red light on one half of the street when the pedestrians have finished crossing that half. A great example of this in Madison, WI can be seen in the video "Two Stage Crossing at University & Ridge St." by Jerry Schippa.
@@OntarioTrafficMan
Is the advantage 1 (with side street) still for a mid-block crossing?
@@la-go-xyno, that point only applies if the signalized pedestrian crossing is next to an unsignalized intersection. If it's midblock you could just use an ordinary green light.
@@OntarioTrafficMan
Canada is no signatory of the the Vienna Convention on Road Signs and Signals?
So, your signalling is similar to that in the USA?
Do you also prefer to have so much texts on the signs? To me (European), it seems that while driving past it's impossible to read all that...
Do you have a concept to keep it simple and intuitive?
@@la-go-xy Canada is somewhat better in the USA when it comes to symbols vs text. The "narrow bridge", "paved road ends", and "no turn on red" signs are an example of this. Canada uses pictorials that are easy to understand, while the USA just uses text.
However, on the other hand, some parts of Canada require a "left turn signal" or "right turn signal" sign to be placed whenever there is a traffic light that applies only to turns. That's one thing we're behind the rest of the world (even the US) on.
Or... given that you're installing lights Anyway... you signalize the side street as well for an intergrated cycle using standard traffic light signals without any of this overly complicated mucking about...
ah yes, the ole stand and splatter crossing. nothing better to put in a massive multilane road with few other regular stops
Since you mentioned them, I have to get on my soapbox and point out that the UKs "puffin" crossings are not a step forward at all . They're solidly anti-pedestrian for a couple of reasons.
First - cancelling a signal if you don't stand in the correct location is horribly inconvenient for people trying to cross. We already have to beg for a pause in the flow of traffic, now a sensor can just cancel that?
Second - putting the walk signal on the same side as the people waiting to cross confuses people who expect it to be where all other signals are, and it's an attempt to solve the problem of cars disobeying traffic lights by changing pedestrian behaviour- the idea is to make people look right before crossing, but it just obscures the signals and blames the victim.
I've only ever seen those crossings in London and maybe Cardiff? If there are any around Manchester where I live I've not noticed them.
Wow, that first point sounds crazy. The point of sensors is that the light turns green without you having to push a button and, ideally, without you having to slow down.
Maybe the implementation needs work in terms of the sensors, but puffin crossing at least try to be convenient for pedestrians and when activated they display a normal solid red light.
HAWK signals are imo worse because they look less even less like normal signals from the perspective of drivers.
(Also, as an american I would honestly gladly accept even hawk signals in a lot of places because unfortunately RRFBs are way more common, and those get ignored by drivers virtually 100% of the time.)
I just want to walk to my nearby grocery store and not die.
The UK system makes more sense. Solid red means stop, flashing amber means go if there are no pedestrians, and green means the drivers have right of way.
New Zealand's system makes even more sense: Solid red means stop. Solid amber means 'stop if you can safely do so, otherwise contiue, the light will go red shortly', solid green means go... That's it. Flashing Amber means the lights are non-functional.
Meanwhile the Pedestrians get a light: Solid red means stop. Solid green means go. Flashing red means 'do not start crossing, but if you're alredy crossing you still have priority' ('off' means 'press the button').
@@laurencefraser
We have the same thing, flashing amber is only at pedestrian crossings, not intersections, only some of them not all of them, and the flashing indicates that pedestrians have right of way whereas solid amber indicates that it is about to turn red and drivers should slow down and be prepared. If the lights aren't on, that's how you know that it isn't working.