Have you ever sat at a red traffic light behind someone who is too far back from the stop line? And, the light stays red and stays red and stays red….?
According to Instructables.com, “At most traffic lights and turn signals, you will notice a loop of wire buried in the pavement of the road near the stop line. … Most motorcycles, scooters, bicycles and small cars don’t have enough conductive material to trigger these loops and change the traffic light.”
Or, if you are too far back to trigger the loop, IT WON’T CHANGE!
This drives me insane!!!
(FYI…This typically occurs in the suburbs more so than in cities. In cities, light timers are often the norm.)
Automate Systems says that, “…in the suburbs and up county roads, traffic signal sensors (detectors) are usually preferred because they not only manage the inconsistent traffic flow effectively, but also detect when cars arrive at intersections, when several cars are stacked at an intersection and when cars have entered turn lanes.
“These sensors use different technologies, from induction loops, microwave radar, cameras, lasers to rubber hoses filled with air.”
This video has a super cool hack to getting lights to change to green for motorcycles, scooters, bikes and small cars:
But here’s where you hang-backers should pay attention: WikiHow.com brilliantly shows you how to properly position your car to get the light to change:
“Pull up to the stop line in a car. Drive your car up to the stop bar or line, which is a line perpendicular to your car painted just in front of the crosswalk markings at most intersections.
-If you see grooves in the road that indicate the presence of inductive loops, make sure your car is positioned directly over those loops so it gets detected.
-If you see no signs of inductive loops, or you see a camera control system, just make sure that you are positioned in the middle of the street lane, not further forward than the stop line and not too far back from it.
-[OFFENDERS, PLEASE NOTE THIS>] It’s especially important to position your car not too far forward or backward when in a left turning lane, as these often will have their own detector that signals a protected left turn signal.”
So, please, do us all (me) a favor, and don’t be one of those people that for some inexplicable reason sits too far back from the stop line thus preventing the light from changing to green and holding us all up.
We’ve all got places to be, people!
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