In my recent post about Melbourne oddities I somehow missed the Swanston/ La Trobe Traffic Light Of Death:
The Abominable Traffic Signal, right in the heart of the city, attempts to give due consideration to cyclists, pedestrians (1,000,000,000 approx.) and trams (on both streets) as well as cars. Not to mention that Swanston St is closed to most traffic between 7am and 7pm, but only on one side of this intersection.
If your city features anything similar or worse, we’d love to hear about it.
Speaking of oddities, Benjamin at Hello Internet has a YouTube post up about weird and wonderful things in Perth that is worth your viewing. This is, of course, due to me tagging him earlier. Go memes!
(Photo from here.)
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August 17, 2007 at 11:27 pm
Robert Hruzek
I guess the real question is, do people on the street really know what the signals mean?
Yeesh!
August 18, 2007 at 8:06 pm
Jon newton
Amazing! Never seen anything quite like it. But I used to like signals in Yangon (Burma) that counted down to green, so you knew exactly how long you had to wait. However, on my first trip there, the car we were travelling in broke down in the middle of the intersection and we had to get out and push. Great introduction to a new land.
August 19, 2007 at 12:07 am
markk
I’ve driven through said intersection a few times, and it’s always a bit puzzling. I never did figure out exactly who was and who wasn’t allowed to drive on Swanston St during the day. The road signs are bizarrely unhelpful.
Jon, I’ve heard that Australian traffic lights used to be like that once, way back. Can you confirm this?
August 20, 2007 at 3:37 pm
- Spaceman Spiff -
OMG!!! if I had to rely on something like this to tell me if I can go or not, I would go into a seizure…and i’m not epilptic. Just seeing it online makes me shudder infear.
August 21, 2007 at 11:08 am
Pete Aldin
This is why that area of the city is full of crazies. They were normal people when they got there…
August 21, 2007 at 10:58 pm
markk
Pete, perhaps those crazies are people like Spaceman Spiff going into seizures?
August 22, 2007 at 12:50 am
Carson
Oh my gosh! That is freaking crazy. If that were in America, people would get in wrecks or worse every day. Good picture. I’ve driven in Brazil before and it’s kind of the same thing except without the light. Amazing, they just go.
August 23, 2007 at 3:04 pm
Columbus Ohio SEO Consulting
Thats freaking insane. I thought Australian was better than the US at stuff like that.
I wish we had more bike signals here… I’ve almost died on rieds around town a dozen times.
August 27, 2007 at 9:08 am
Tay - Make Money Blogging
That’s insane. How do people even keep up with it?
August 29, 2007 at 7:06 am
markk
So noone else has seen anything like this, apparently. Does this mean that Melbourne has the most complicated set of traffic lights in the whole world?
Thankfully it is only this intersection that is like this. If there were more of them there’d be no end of accidents methinks.
September 17, 2007 at 12:52 am
Blogging Mix
I don’t think that traffic signals are useful. It confuses me. I doubt if its helpful.