carsexploring the science behind traffic lights - solar traffic light system

Jack Gillon can't wait to show me his work.
The intersection of Granite Street and Hancock Street in downtown Quincy is our starting line;
The Ocean Street public works department, about a mile away, is the finish line.
"So we're going to go back to your office from here and turn on all the green lights?
"I asked without saying anything.
"Yes, it's almost the same," Giron said . ".
For more than an hour, Quincy's traffic engineer, Geelong, has been talking about the glory of modern traffic lights.
Because of the semi-Drive intersection, the difficult zone, the loop-
He said, detector amplifiers, etc, traffic can be compressed through a city as before.
But really appreciate the science of traffic planning
Synchronize long traffic lights-
We have to drive.
I started counting when our lights went out.
A green light.
Two green lights
At the third crossing, we hardly walked by the yellow crossing.
"I knew it would be like this," Gilon said without hesitation.
We slow down on the crosswalk, and I'm sure it will kill our chances.
This is not the case: Four green lights. Then five!
However, jaywalker in the next block did let us in, so the count was over there.
But I was impressed.
"So if people get all the green lights at the same time, is this designed?
I asked, it's not, 'Oh, I guess I'm just lucky. '. Gilon smiled.
"Interesting things, don't you?
"Most modern traffic signals do not operate blindly;
They actually responded in different directions to the number of cars entering the intersection.
Traffic lights can "see" cars in many ways: moving objects can be detected by reflecting radio waves or microwaves;
The camera can perceive changes;
The car can pass the pressure-
Sensitive board.
But because of the sensors strategically placed under the sidewalk, traffic lights usually know how many cars are at the intersection.
It works like this: imagine the first car queuing at a red light.
About 1 inch below the sidewalk where the car is idling, a live wire is already 6-by-6-
A footring forming a magnetic field.
Whenever a car passes through the loop, it will disrupt the scene.
Records of each interrupt are sent to a control box, a metal cabinet located about 4 feet high nearby.
You may have never noticed these boxes, but Gilon assured me that they exist at almost every signal intersection here.
A small computer in the control box analyzes the interruption.
If they continue to happen, it means that the car still enters the intersection from that direction, so the lights should remain green.
If the break stops, it means there are no more cars and the lights should turn red.
Traffic lights cannot remain green forever, so the maximum number of seconds is usually allowed before the computer switches the lights to red.
It could take 30 to 40 seconds on a main street, Giron said.
However, if there is no vehicle coming, the light may turn red in half the time.
If this is an abnormal long-term interruption
For a few minutes, not a few seconds.
Then Giron knows that there may have been an accident or a fault in this place.
He knows that if the red light is stuck on it, it is likely to be a device failure.
With this technology, he was able to synchronize traffic signals at a crossroads with further intersections in the street, allowing a whole bunch of carsa platoon —
Move from green to green as a whole.
"When I was in Brooklyn, I had a car to go to Boston in the morning and a car to come out of Boston in the evening.
"The system probe shows which platform program I should play with: the outbound program or the inbound program," he said . ".
This could also change during the flight, Gillen said: After the Red Sox match on Sunday afternoon, the system automatically adjusts to allow more cars to flow out of Fenway.
By grouping cars, the number of vehicles parked in front of a red light has decreased, and idling emissions have decreased by 20%, Mr. Gillon said.
Extended Green Light allowed 18-
The wheels cross the intersection-
Quincy did it with a surveillance camera-
It also helps the environment.
Reduced number of vehicles parked at intersections also means reduced number of vehicles behind
When a driver sits at a red light, attention tends to drift, ending the accident, Giron said.
In the future, Gilon wants to adjust his system to keep the green light for MBTA buses that are behind schedule.
Most importantly, with efficient traffic lights, everyone can reach their destination faster.
"You may have 35,000 or 45,000 cars passing by here a day," Giron said . " He stopped at a crossroads near the end of our journey.
"If you save 6 seconds for all of them, that's too much, right?
Demarc'' Peter demarcó can reach @. com.
He also updated a Facebook page, "who taught you to drive?