
Why the Dutch Wait Less at Traffic Lights - reddotX
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knbVWXzL4-4
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tonyedgecombe
Don’t watch this channel if you are a cyclist or pedestrian in North America.
You will only get depressed about how bad your infrastructure is for people
without cars.

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rob74
Just so the North American cyclists and pedestrians don't get too depressed:
it's also depressing to watch if you come from other European countries. I for
one am from Germany, where the cycling/pedestrian infrastructure is undeniably
better in most places, but car traffic still has _top priority_ no matter what
politicians may say. Small example: the busy S-Bahn (regional train) / U-Bahn
(subway) / bus interchange at Harras in Munich
([https://goo.gl/maps/doaJT4vq7viDyK9v5](https://goo.gl/maps/doaJT4vq7viDyK9v5)).
The western exit of the subway station, which is under the railway underpass,
had to be used also if you came from the train station and wanted to legally
cross the street to get a bus on the other side - you had to go from level +1
to -1 and then back to ground level. While remodeling the area, they wanted to
enable pedestrians to cross at street level too. So now you have traffic
lights where pedestrians have to push a button and wait for > 30 seconds to
get a green light. Which in most cases means that you have to choose between
crossing despite the red light or losing your bus. So a lot of money was
spent, but the stated goal of encouraging walking, cycling and using public
transit was still turned into a bad joke, because the "prime directive" is
still to make sure that pedestrians and cyclists inconvenience car traffic as
little a possible.

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teleforce
Does the Dutch utlizes some kind of AI for their intelligent traffic control?

I believe if only 10% of the effort that goes to research on level 5
autonomous vehicle, that we probably never achieve in our lifetime, is spent
instead on smart and connected traffic lights integration with vehicles it
will make 10x better driver, cyclist and pedestrian experience [1].

[1][https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22980931](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22980931)

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gibatronic
After a year of living in Amsterdam with zero close calls, I realized how
important segregated cycling lanes are.

Any other solution is purely palliative.

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greatgib
This is real great engineering!

Tldr key facts:

\- be smart and detect actual traffic for modifying the red light behavior in
real time

\- for example, switch to green immediately for walkers if there is no car
even if the displayed countdown is not yet finished.

\- operate independently each red light of a section to not need to have them
operate stupidly in symmetric/synchronized state machine cycles.

Don't just give a priority to car or bicycles, but try to ensure that everyone
get the less friction and maximum mobility possible.

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simion314
I think you should also add a point for public transport, a bus with 30 people
should not have the same priority like a car with 1 person in it. Trying to
keep public transport always moving will also have other benefits.

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mrandish
That's an interesting idea, however it _could_ lead to some unintended
consequences such as cars being incentivized to 'caravan' with busses.

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notjustbikes
Transit should always be in it own lane (as it is in most of the Netherlands)
so there's no downside to this.

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dmarinus
Lol this seems to contain footage from Amsterdam. My experience is that a lot
of people ignore red lights specifically in Amsterdam.

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mcv
They certainly do, but I also think it's been happening less since they
started introducing these smarter traffic light systems. People are more
likely to ignore a red light when they don't know why or for how long they'll
be waiting.

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seaghost
There is a same system in Antwerp, Belgium, not at every intersection though.

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rrll22
[Video] in the title

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bobwernstein
It's because we pay extremely high road taxes and purchase taxes on cars.
That's why.

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notjustbikes
Yes. In the Netherlands, drivers pay closer to the true cost of driving.
That's a good thing. It should be higher though, to help offset the
externalities that drivers cost society.

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bobwernstein
only when you need brand new roads and high tech traffic lights. I simply
don't value that stuff but I don't make the rules here. The belgium system
works far better for me. Less tax and bad roads. Works fine.

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Arnt
An additional car needs >100m additional road lane, except in unusual and
uninteresting cases. Try comparing the tax you pay with the cost of acquiring
>300m² of land in the areas where you want to drive and building road on it.

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bobwernstein
why would I when I can just look at my neighboring countries where taxes are
lower and quality of roads is therefor also lower?

