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NYC Crosswalk Buttons are Inoperative
cdneng2 writes "NY Times has an article that New
York crosswalk push buttons are actually ineffective.
Apparently, New York City deactivated most of the pedestrian
buttons long ago with the emergence of computer-controlled
traffic signals. From the article, 'More than 2,500 of the 3,250
walk buttons that still exist function essentially as mechanical
placebos, city figures show.' Well, apparently New York city isn't
the only city like this. I guess the answer lies in the same
reason why people press
the elevator button more than once."
Surprisingly enough, NY doesn't have any intersections listed in the top 10 most dangerous intersections list, compiled by State Farm.
However, you can find the 24 most dangerous intersections in NY, as compiled by the NYPD here.
Either way, crossing the street isn't the safest thing in the world.
...don't question it!!!
The buttons don't work
Everybody knows the more times you push it, the faster it goes. Geez.
- Sherman
It's like Ctrl-Alt-Delete for the general public! ;)
Ph-nglui mglw'nafh Gates M'dna wgah'nagl fhtagn.
This has to be a lie, the government would never waste our money and mislead us!
The answer is here finally!! Because the button doesn't work
If you lost your job today, don't despair. You may die tomorrow anyway.
I didn't know anyone in NY who waited for a the Walk Signal to turn before start walking. NewYorkers are best at finding the shortest possible route to their destination. And I dont blame them. It is pace of life they experience.
Consensus is good, but informed dictatorship is better
The Slashdot "Submit Story" button is also just a placebo. "We just post what we want, and we put some user's name on them, " says Malda.
Computer-controlled traffic lights work a lot better than the old-fashioned timed system. (well, unless the detector screws up, but that's rare) So allowing people to interrupt the sequence would do little good. At the same time, you don't want people standing on one of those 700 crosswalks which will never volunteer a "walk" sign for ages.
So, to make sure that the people use the button in the places they need to, it's easier to leave the buttons on all the intersections. Otherwise, people might not think to use the button when it's necessary, at least not without a lot of time and prompting.
Bush: He's Liberal in all the wrong ways.
Funny, then, that I was just reading this article on a placebo switch that inexplicably worked!
http://catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/magic-story.html
The only surefire protection against Microsoft infections is abstinence. - The Onion
Which is the point, of course. People do feel better if they think they've "done something" about any problem - even one as trivial as opening the currently-closed door. Passively waiting for something to happen doesn't come easily to many of us...
:-) In fact, it's more likely that the time-of-last-press is one of the inputs to the algorithm, with earlier presses having a priority. So the more you press, the less chance you have of getting a busy lift :-))
What I find odd are those who hit the 'summon elevator' button more than once - A lift algorithm isn't going to take into account the number of times you press, and I doubt the buttons are pressure-sensitive
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
Carrie: "Life... I started thinking about Paris, and how love AAHGHHHRGHH!!!"
-- taxi cab grinds Carrie into the asphalt, and the credits begin to roll ---
Yes, my girl friend made me watch that damn show for an entire year. The demise of that vile, high-priced sitcom has filled me with a joy not felt since childhood.
There was something like that in a Kurt Vonnegut novel whose title has slipped my mind. Something about an automated spaceship with only two controls: a START button, and a STOP button (the latter isn't connected to anything.) The point being that humans feel better when they think they have control over their fate.
Actually, it's probably a moot point - I've never met a New Yorker who actually waits for the light.
At some intersections in Toronto, not only does the walk button work, but unless it's pressed, the walk signal never lights up. (Kind of a pain when the button isn't right at the corner and has a lot of snow around it.) It would be nice if they'd mark the "Cars Prefered" crossings to let people know.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
I was once in a rather rocky relationship with a girl which ended when I told her not to bother pressing the button.
"It doesn't do anything, these juntions are automated."
"That is exactly the kind of cynical attitude I'm absolutely fed up with. You have no faith in anything."
She stomped off across the road like an enraged frogger, dodging the still flowing traffic.
A guy I know was in charge of a medium-sized office. He was forever plagued by the women asking him to turn the thermostat up during the winter (the guys saying "turn it down, we're dying in here"). When the office was remodeled, he had a new thermostat installed in a closet, and had the old one unconnected. He put the biggest complainer "in charge" of that thermostat, and never had a problem since. True story.
There is an intersection in the outskirts of Helsinki, Finland, where the push button works even worse. This is an intersection between two pretty big roads with major traffic, and there's a standard traffic light cycle going from "green for road A" to "green for road B", etc. If you are a pedestrian walking in the direction of either road, you need to push the button, and will eventually get a green light at the same time as the drivers on the same road. Now, guess what: the only way the button affects the lights is that you get a green light the next time it's possible -- if you don't push the button, the cycle is exactly the same except that the pedestrian light is red all the time. So the button does nothing but you need to push it to cross legally.
It's like Ctrl-Alt-Delete for the general public! ;)
...or voting...?
I would have to say that explosives are the most abused technology in all of history.
I think the reason that there is even a "Door Close" button on elevators is for the firefighters to gain full control of the elevator.
If you notice in elevators (at least in the U.S.) there is a keyslot where you can switch the elevator from Normal to Off or Fire mode. In Fire mode, the elevator doors don't open until you press the door-open button and they don't close until you press the door-close button.
So, the door close button doesn't normally work, but it's there for a reason.
I had for years misunderstood just what cross walk buttons do until I actually worked in traffic engineering. Pedestrian buttons essentially do the same thing for pedestrian cross-walks that the in-road detectors do for automobiles: they tell the local traffic light controller that there is a pedestrian waiting to use the cross walk and that the pedestrian phase in the traffic signals timing plan should be used during the next cycle.
If no pedestrian is present at the cross walk and the button is not hit, that plan will not be used and as a result the timing of the lights during the next cycle will be somewhat different than if a pedestrian were present.
There does seem to be an informal sense among pedestrians that pressing the button should cause the ped signal to activate sooner, since they are there and requesting service, but that is not the case. The only thing pressing the button changes is whether that special ped phase cycle is used or not.
The real need for the buttons in the first place is that, while most contemporary vehicle detection schemes are based on the electromagnetic properties of automobiles, most normal pedestrians are not constructed of massive chunks of ferrous metals and so have little effect on these devices. A car announces its presence simply by being there, a human being must make a little extra effort to push a button.
What I get from the headline (I'll read the article after I've submitted my uninformed opinion) is that there may really be no need for those buttons in the first place. A place like New York is likely to have such massive pedestrian activity in the first place, that the buttons themselves are redundant, since nearly every signal cycle is likely to require an active pedestrian phase to serve that volume. Ped crossing buttons may be as useful in NYC as they would be on an interstate highway in the middle of Nevada, but for opposite reasons.
in India and (?!) Quebec: countdown timers. It's not as psycho as it first sounds. People don't race to beat the timer. It just chills. everyone. out.
In India they're for the cars. No more edging through reds because you don't know when the frig it's gonna change and you wonder if you're hitting the sensor. No, right there in front of you, 15, 14, 13, 12. So also, you can get that thing out of your glove compartment, there's time. Or take a sip of that drink, bite of that sandwich. No surprises. Numbers in red for stops and in white or green for time till the next stop. You still get the yellow, so people don't race -- they have more time to gradually increase speed if they want to make it through.
In Quebec, it's for the pedestrians. Not nearly as useful IMHO. Cars can look crosswise to see how much time the pedestrians have left, but it's aimed at the pedestrians, to tell them how much time they've got. Doesn't stop people from wandering across with no time left, I've noticed.
The Indian version is the best thing I've seen. Cuts out all of the guesswork and most of the tension and cause for accidents at intersections. Genius. Of course, they're only at super busy intersections.
They also have the #2 best thing I've seen. Across the red lense of traffic lights at the busiest intersections is printed the capitals R E L A X. No foolin.
Most of the crosswalks in London have large block capitals on the road which say either:orWhose function is to inform you of the most probable direction of your impending doom.
Seriously, these things are very useful when everyone is driving on the wrong side of the road.
Nice try, coward.
Though to be fair, you're partially right... profession has "at least two meanings," though you conveniently omitted the one that contradicts your little rant. I quote from Websters:
1 a : of, relating to, or characteristic of a profession b : engaged in one of the learned professions c (1) : characterized by or conforming to the technical or ethical standards of a profession (2) : exhibiting a courteous, conscientious, and generally businesslike manner in the workplace
2 a : participating for gain or livelihood in an activity or field of endeavor often engaged in by amateurs b : having a particular profession as a permanent career c : engaged in by persons receiving financial return
3 : following a line of conduct as though it were a profession
- professionally adverb
As opposed to "job":
b : a specific duty, role, or function c : a regular remunerative position
I'll let you look up remunerative for yourself... but as you can see, you can get paid for either a profession or a job... but as you'll note in the first definition above, a profession often implies far more (specialized knowledge, ethics, etc) than simply getting paid.
But that's OK, I don't take it personally. If you want, you can keep calling your fast-food job a "profession" if it makes you feel better.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
So the Frogs play Frogger?