News Removal of road signals reduces number of accidents

[thomas]

A positive side-effect of dropping demographics: the declining number of cars in Japan's rural areas results in the dismantling of road signals. In Shiga, this step reduced road accidents by 10 per cent.

Photo credit: Shiga Prefectural Police

Above: uncontrolled crossroads are a rare sight in Japan. As are roundabouts. I hope to see more of both.

Since fiscal 2018, more than 100 traffic lights have been removed, which has had the effect of cutting accidents by approximately 10% in a year-to-year comparison before and after the lights were taken away. According to the prefectural police, if traffic lights remain installed on roads where the volume of car and pedestrian traffic has decreased due to the closing of schools or the completion of new bypasses, they may cause congestion and lead to people ignoring lights, which could result in accidents. The prefectural police began removing traffic lights on roads with fewer than 300 vehicles per hour after explaining the situation to local residents. A total of 128 lights were removed between fiscal 2015 and 2021, and in their place stop signs were installed. The number of accidents involving the 93 lights that could be surveyed decreased from 81 in the year prior to removal to 71 in the year after they were taken away.

Accidents decline after west Japan police remove traffic lights on quiet roads - The Mainichi

OTSU -- Shiga Prefectural Police are working to remove traffic lights that are no longer needed due to changes in the local traffic environment, such

mainichi.jp

 

[Petaris]

I think traffic lights are the only sane solution when you have a large volume of traffic, but when you have less "smart" traffic lights or stop signs are better. I dislike roundabouts though, too many people don't understand the rules or just ignore them (in the US).

 

[Grandpa Frank]

Wonder if drivers there still do what they did when I was there in the 70's. When the light turned red they didn't hit the brakes till about 10 feet away from it and then slammed them on. We called taxi drivers Kamikazes , they drove so fast and reckless. We had snow a few times when I was there and almost every intersection with a red light had accidents from the last minute braking on slippery road surfaces.

 

[thomas]

Wonder if drivers there still do what they did when I was there in the 70's. When the light turned red they didn't hit the brakes till about 10 feet away from it and then slammed them on. We called taxi drivers Kamikazes , they drove so fast and reckless. We had snow a few times when I was there and almost every intersection with a red light had accidents from the last minute braking on slippery road surfaces.

What I notice a lot in traffic here is that drivers view turning lights as an incentive to hit the accelerator rather than the brake. As a pedestrian and cyclist, I'm always on the lookout for these 'crossroads scramblers' when the signals turn green.