I was in Istanbul a few months ago and the traffic was the craziest I've ever seen. It didn't really seem like anyone paid attention to the traffic signals anyway. I don't see how a new design would help fix that.
Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
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Re: Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
#12Quite a beautiful design but I would question the durability of the wood-veneer model. That finish is generally more suited to interior use and would start to look pretty tatty in a couple of years I expect. That said, I want them for my city immediately.
Also, from a design standpoint, the idea of using LEDs is being challenged - while the designer mentions a lack of snow build-up, the traditional lights do a good job of emitting enough heat to melt snow drift: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34436730/ns/us_news-life/t/energ... It's not an entirely obvious problem, but one that is being dealt with often in colder climates. Unintended consequences of design.
In Soviet^w Russia in recent years nearly all the traffic lights were replaced by LED ones. And they perform really well, and there is no such problem like snow obscuring them.
In most of them bottom wall is absent or tilted in such direction that snow or dust does not build-up there.
Re: Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
#13It's too bad that traffic signals don't make their state available via some sort of radio link. Then we could have cars that provide the driver with an optimal target speed to get through a series of intersections without stopping.
Re: Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
#14never liked anything from that studio. but then, i don't like Dyson too...
but this proves my point about art lebedev. they got an assignment to redo traffic lights, and just made then square. ...oh, and use the newest led tech buzzword! don't forget the latest led tech buzzword.
Re: Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
#15Wow, as an Istanbul native, I'm surprised that the city govt is doing it right by handing design to a design shop. I like how it looks, it's odd and quirky, but I think it somehow fits with the city. For the record, Isik + lar means "lights" (the suffix is a pluralizer), and I'm guessing the "us" is the generic latin name suffix?!
Yes, Artlebedev studio ends most of its products with generic latin name sufix.
Re: Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
#16It's too bad that traffic signals don't make their state available via some sort of radio link. Then we could have cars that provide the driver with an optimal target speed to get through a series of intersections without stopping.
That wouldn't fly with the many cities that depend on traffic tickets for revenue.
Re: Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
#17It's too bad that traffic signals don't make their state available via some sort of radio link. Then we could have cars that provide the driver with an optimal target speed to get through a series of intersections without stopping.
Ingolstadt (city of Audi HQ) had (still has?) this experiment.
Cars were getting signal from traffic ligjts and you as a driver got a warning sign like: "drive 30 km/h" to hit green light without stopping.
Re: Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
Also, from a design standpoint, the idea of using LEDs is being challenged - while the designer mentions a lack of snow build-up, the traditional lights do a good job of emitting enough heat to melt snow drift: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34436730/ns/us_news-life/t/energ... It's not an entirely obvious problem, but one that is being dealt with often in colder climates. Unintended consequences of design.
Stockholm has had LED traffic lights for over 20 years and no problem with snow buildup whatsoever. We get a wee bit more snow than Istanbul...
Actually, Istanbul can get a fair amount of snow precipitation during short periods of time, which is the main concern for obscuring traffic lights.
Re: Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
#19wow some Turkish stuff on HN. nice to see.
Re: Istanbul Isiklarius traffic lights
#20I was in Istanbul a few months ago and the traffic was the craziest I've ever seen. It didn't really seem like anyone paid attention to the traffic signals anyway. I don't see how a new design would help fix that.
I just wanted to post exactly the same. I haven't yet seen any other city with a traffic as bad as in Istanbul: Drivers typically don't care about traffic lights and drive without braking and just honking over pedestrian crossings, even though they have a red light and there are pedestrians on the street. In case of traffic jams drivers just continue driving on the sidewalk. I saw deadlock situations on crossings multiple times a day, because drivers just continued to drive into crossings, even though they had a red light and/or the crossing was blocked. Police does not seem to care at all.
I don't see how new traffic lights would change this.