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How does one synchronize every light? Imagining a grid, I can think of how every 1-way northbound and southbound street can be individually synchronized, but t
by thrownaway2424 14y ago
How does one synchronize every light? Imagining a grid, I can think of how every 1-way northbound and southbound street can be individually synchronized, but then in my imagination the east and west streets are befucked. So how does it actually work? And how do you synchronize a 2-way street?
- moocow01 14y agoId imagine that you are attempting to move cars down every street in "waves". It almost might be more helpful to think of it as a series of trains on each street. You likely can stagger the trains going north to south as well as the trains going east to west so that they miss each other. Its probably more complex than this but I'd imagine this is the basic concept.
- lobster_johnson 14y agoI suspect that by "synchronized" they simply mean "coordinated" -- that they are automatically controlled by a computer that attempts to optimize for flow. So for example, an intersection will be kept open in one direction as long as there are no crossing traffic. And if the same is the true about the next intersection, the light will be green there too; based on the sensors, the system can gauge the amount of traffic going towards the next intersection, and prioritize the flow. So if there are a lot of cars going towards an intersection, and a single car arrives that needs to cross their lane, the system may favour the group and prolong the green light. In that sense it's synchronization, as "adjacent" lights will be considered by the algorithm.
- vacri 14y agoIt's bad terminology. The lights aren't synchronised, they're centrally managed or centrally co-ordinated.