FOCUS: TRAFFIC LIGHTS
Out of sync traffic lights keep Buffalo at a crawl
System of 650 signals has little rhyme or reason
Some might call it the crawl . . . the traffic signal crawl.
They grumble about traffic lights that cause delays and waste gas. Too many lights, signals in areas that don’t need them. Signals not coordinated.
“I’m tired of spending 15 minutes to travel two miles,” lamented Doug Miller of North Buffalo, who has been on a crusade for an extreme makeover of Buffalo’s system of traffic signals.
Wayne Scaperotta feels Miller’s pain. “It’s an absolutely ridiculous situation right now,” said Scaperotta, who lives in the Delaware-Hertel section. “You get continuous red lights in some areas. It leads to real frustration.”
Even road rage, Scaperotta added. When drivers are forced to make such frequent stops, he said, it’s easy to lose patience.
“You’re sitting at these lights getting zero miles to the gallon,” he said. “You’re not only wasting fuel; you’re also hurting the environment.”
City officials say they get it. They’ve fielded many complaints, and they’re stepping up a year-old effort to redesign Buffalo’s system of signals. By next spring — sooner on some stretches — motorists should find easier drives on many routes, city officials promise.
Mayor Byron W. Brown said he has heard from many disgruntled motorists and knows firsthand about the hassles of stop-and-go driving. He recently met with public works officials and engineers to discuss upcoming improvements.
There are about 650 traffic signals in Buffalo, and the city controls about 95 percent of them. The state handles the other 5 percent, including signals at several major downtown arterials. Neither the number of signals nor their locations has changed much over the decades, city officials said.
But crews have been working on a long-term plan aimed at making it easier for motorists to drive through Buffalo with greater efficiency. Last year, traffic synchronization work was done on South Park Avenue and William and Niagara streets to better coordinate traffic signals so drivers didn’t feel as if they were stopping at almost every intersection.
Work is starting on a stretch of Delaware Avenue between West Mohawk Street and West Delavan Avenue. And the state is performing traffic signal synchronization on Delaware north of Nottingham Court, city officials said.
City crews will soon be working on signals on a downtown stretch of Elmwood Avenue. More signal synchronization work will be done later this year and in 2010 on other parts of Elmwood, as well as Bailey Avenue, and Clinton and Seneca streets.
“You’ll never have a perfect situation, but I think [drivers] will experience a lot less frustration,” said Eric D. Schmarder, the city’s assistant engineer, who oversees traffic signals.
The city says that it is taking numerous steps to improve operations. For one thing, wiring is being upgraded that will allow the city to better coordinate signals so drivers on some routes won’t hit so many red lights.
“When the signals can talk to each other, you can develop a better pattern,” Schmarder said.
Here are some other steps the city is planning to ease traffic signal traumas:
• Computer software upgrades that will coordinate signals in a way that would allow motorists to make more green lights while traveling at the speed limit. Currently, at least two-thirds of all city lights are “free operation” signals, meaning they’re not timed to coordinate with other lights.
• Programming more lights to better respond to traffic situations. For example, if no vehicles are waiting to make a left turn, no arrow would appear. The plan comes as welcome news to Scaperotta, who considers unnecessary left-turn arrows a major annoyance.
• More “loop detection” signals that would stay green until vehicles approach the intersection. Wiring installed in the pavement would trigger a change in the light when ongoing traffic arrives.
• The removal of some traffic signals that are deemed unnecessary.
The Public Works Department has created a Traffic Control Center in a tiny office on the fifth floor of City Hall. With the push of a few buttons, Schmarder can view a map of all signals in the city, zooming in on certain intersections to check whether lights are cycling in a coordinated manner.
“We have an infrastructure that was designed decades ago, when we had a larger population,” said Public Works Commissioner Steven J. Stepniak. “With fewer people, there’s less of a need for some signals in some areas.”
Stepniak and Schmarder said such removals will be made only after review.
Experts would consider traffic and pedestrian volumes, accident histories at intersections and the proximity of schools or community centers to the signals. The city already has removed several signals on Michigan and Masten avenues and Genesee Street. Any removal of traffic signals also requires Common Council approval.
Buffalo is being proactive in dealing with signals, said an official from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority. Joseph F. Tario, a senior project manager, praised the city for converting many of its older signals to LEDs, a change that has lowered energy consumption and reduced maintenance costs.
Tario said the city’s steps to improve signal timing also will produce tangible benefits. He cited a study completed last spring by Rochester-based Bergmann Associates indicating that a dramatic improvement in traffic signal coordination would save Buffalo and its motorists $56 million a year. The figure includes more than 5,540 hours in lost productivity that occurs when drivers sit at red lights, as well as $3.1 million in reduced fuel consumption.
The study also concluded that better synchronization of lights would reduce the number of accidents, saving local residents an estimated $8.6 million annually. “You get a lot of bang for your buck by investing in these kind of improvements,” Tario said.
Buffalo already has money reserved for traffic signal improvements. It also hopes to use state efficiency funds and possibly even federal stimulus money to finance later phases.
“Green technology is a big part of the federal stimulus package,” Stepniak said, “and work on traffic signals is pretty easy to make shovel-ready on short notice.”
Slave to the Traffic Light
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