Automated metering lights don’t match real-time traffic

QAs I return from my essential job every afternoon, the metering lights are mindlessly operating on the High Street and the 23rd Avenue entrances to Interstate 880. It is annoying to sit there with half a dozen of my fellow citizens, waiting for metering lights to enter a sparsely populated freeway. So the automation doesn’t work. — Paul Millner, Berkeley

A Let’s stay on 880.

Q

I read your response that metering lights are traffic based. That can’t be on Interstate 880. I have run into them several times and there was no traffic at Thornton Avenue and DeCoto Road. Freeway traffic was bombing.

— Sheryl Peterson, Walnut Creek

A

And over to Interstate 680.

Q

The pointless metering light at the entrance to north 680 from Calaveras Boulevard in Milpitas has not been operating for months. I’d been hoping someone had finally gotten a clue

that there was no chance for traffic to ever get congested and that the light was unnecessary and dangerous.

Traffic on pre-virus mornings was blasting along well above the limit. Trying to get 70 mph plus freeway speeds and avoiding people slowpoking across to Jacklin made merging a challenge.

Unfortunately, the light was working the other morning (another sign of the apocalypse). Since there is no reason for this light to work during normal traffic mornings, there is absolutely no reason for it to be on during a time of no traffic.

Can you get this light turned off forever, please? I’ll happily contribute my road taxes to send the light into orbit. — Bryan Eacret

A And …

Q

I was surprised to see the metering light on at about 3 or 4 in the afternoon from El Camino Real near Highway 237 to Highway 85, even though the freeway was practically desolate, instead of the parking lot it typically becomes.

— Lisa H.

A Caltrans says when there’s no congestion along an entire freeway corridor, ramp meters are supposed to be on solid green. However, while some freeways are experiencing minor congestion, their ramp meters are still cycling to manage congestion, even though it’s significantly less than normal.

Also, the adaptability ramp meters make it unnecessary to spend the time reprogramming the over 650 Bay Area ramp meters back to their original settings once the shelter-in-place is over.

Q Your contacts don’t have to imagine any more about traffic being heavy enough to trigger the metering lights. I experienced it on Tuesday. About 3 p.m., I waited for the red to turn green while getting onto 880 off Powell Street in Emeryville before it splits, going to 880, 580 and San Francisco. That was always a terrible traffic area before the pandemic and is still pretty busy. — Roger Ecker, Alameda

A Busy enough to make you see red.