Amsterdam turns off traffic lights

[ncutler]

The Guardian today:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... fic-lights

Removing traffic lights at a busy intersection. '“It’s a bit scary, but you never have to stop and nobody is grumpy,” said a teenager. But no one could really explain more about why or how.'

[mjr]

I think it's this one if you want to look at it: https://www.instantstreetview.com/@52.3 ... h,-5.1p,1z

It looks like it should work because there's one through route with clear priority markings and more lanes out of the junction than into it, so there's no unavoidable flow constraint.

You couldn't do it as simply in many places in the UK because our engineers currently love putting more lanes into junctions than flow out of them, which I think is partly a wrongheaded attempt to keep some pollution away from kerbside monitoring and the back of the queue off the previous junction. In short, 5 entry lanes into 3 exit lanes is never going to work free-flowing, so we'd have to cone/bollard off some entry lanes (good! Recycle them into decent-width cycle lanes! Maybe let buses in too), at which point many motorists would lose their minds all over the tabloids and most politicians would lose their bottle.

[Si]

Today I'm speaking on behalf of the Cynical Party.

My experience of Amsterdam is limited but what I did notice in the few places where motorists and cyclists had to interact closely and mistakes were made is that no one got upset, both parties stopped, grinned, waved at each other and carried on.

My thought is that city travel in the Netherlands is much more relaxed and laid back...where as in the UK cities you might be forgiven for thinking that a good number of people just drive or cycle around looking for an excuse to get angry at someone. For this reason, removing controls on busy junctions will lead to a period of fear then a period of carnage before people learned that the "must get in front" mentality doesn't actually help them get anywhere.

[RickH]

Poynton south of Manchester seems to have done a good job (albeit on a bigger scale). If you didn't live there, It used to be a place to drive through. Its main feature was a 2 lanes in each direction set of traffic lights. Unpleasant for cycling, unpleasant to get across on foot. Then it was completely redesigned and it is quite pleasant to cycle there - there is still a lot of traffic but it is moving slowly & steadily. Everything on the road seems a whole lot calmer. There is more room for pedestrians too & there are now cafes with pavement seating. The church now has somewhere for wedding & funeral parties to stop. I've been back a few times since it has changed both by car and bike and found it a pleasant experience.

Here is the current setup on Streetview

Poynton 2016

Compared to the same view in 2009

Poynton 2009

You can explore both timeframes using the links.

There is also a Youtube video showing the transformation.

[LollyKat]

My experience of Amsterdam is limited but what I did notice in the few places where motorists and cyclists had to interact closely and mistakes were made is that no one got upset, both parties stopped, grinned, waved at each other and carried on.

I was in Amsterdam a couple of years ago and found that the cyclists were pretty aggressive towards pedestrians and ignored any crossing lights. When I remonstrated with one who nearly hit me I just received abuse...I thought I was going to miss my train to the airport as I couldn't get to the station, in spite of several phases of the 'green man'.

[Si]

My experience of Amsterdam is limited but what I did notice in the few places where motorists and cyclists had to interact closely and mistakes were made is that no one got upset, both parties stopped, grinned, waved at each other and carried on.

I was in Amsterdam a couple of years ago and found that the cyclists were pretty aggressive towards pedestrians and ignored any crossing lights. When I remonstrated with one who nearly hit me I just received abuse...I thought I was going to miss my train to the airport as I couldn't get to the station, in spite of several phases of the 'green man'.

I spent the whole time there continually pulling my wife out of the cycle lane.....no one seemed to get upset....may be we were just lucky, or we were just obviously dozy foreigners so they made allowances

[mjr]

Yes, I don't recall any problems in the Netherlands, unlike Germany where I almost developed a nervous twitch looking around for bicycles. Even there, no one got angry, but rule breaking does get quite some disapproval.

Worst abuse I've had from a cyclist when walking? Pembrokeshire. Someone decked out in all racing gear storming through a resort town

[kwackers]

The worst example of cycling I've ever seen was in Amsterdam.
Not that I'd take one example as being statistically significant especially in a city where there were vast numbers who were inconspicuous by virtue of their normality.

As for traffic lights; almost without fail whenever a junction I use regularly has a fault and the lights go out the traffic always flows better and has no or very short queues.
(Of course by allowing traffic to flow freely you could be creating a bigger problem further downstream.)

[squeaker]

You couldn't do it as simply in many places in the UK because our engineers currently love putting more lanes into junctions than flow out of them, which I think is partly a wrongheaded attempt to keep some pollution away from kerbside monitoring and the back of the queue off the previous junction. In short, 5 entry lanes into 3 exit lanes is never going to work free-flowing, so we'd have to cone/bollard off some entry lanes (good! Recycle them into decent-width cycle lanes! Maybe let buses in too), at which point many motorists would lose their minds all over the tabloids and most politicians would lose their bottle.

Presumed liability probably helps too?

[mjr]

You couldn't do it as simply in many places in the UK because our engineers currently love putting more lanes into junctions than flow out of them, which I think is partly a wrongheaded attempt to keep some pollution away from kerbside monitoring and the back of the queue off the previous junction. In short, 5 entry lanes into 3 exit lanes is never going to work free-flowing, so we'd have to cone/bollard off some entry lanes (good! Recycle them into decent-width cycle lanes! Maybe let buses in too), at which point many motorists would lose their minds all over the tabloids and most politicians would lose their bottle.

Presumed liability probably helps too?

It may make motorists look a bit more carefully when turning but I don't know what effect it had on collision numbers when presumed liability was introduced in the Netherlands in the 1990s, many years after what looked almost like the current cycleways. https://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2013 ... therlands/ doubts it's much of a factor.

[Stevek76]

There's a video of this junction operating somewhere, the dominant mode is, by far, the bicycle. And when dutch planners talk about reducing traffic delay, they're including delay to bikes in that

The way this story has been presented in some parts of UK media is that the same thing would suddenly remove motor vehicle congestion at UK junctions, it would not for most. This kind of thing works for predominantly cycled/pedestrian junctions because it's far easier to make eye contact and avoids the dehumanising effect of everyone being stuck in a metal box.