Traffic light retiming now complete
STAMFORD — For years, the traffic lights at the intersection of Tresser Boulevard and Elm Street were set up to prioritize cars on the seemingly busier Tresser. That’s now changed.
As part of the city’s traffic signal optimization effort, Elm Street motorists are now given longer green lights, as city engineers
discovered that car buildup on the road was outnumbering Tresser, or Route 1, drivers.
It’s one of many discoveries made by traffic engineers throughout the optimization process, which is intended to help traffic flow better and cut down commute time throughout the entire city.
The effort has resulted in dramatic improvements on some of the city’s bigger corridors such as High Ridge Road, Summer Street, and Stillwater Avenue, according to the city.
The project has just been completed, as all of the city’s downtown traffic lights were attached to the fiber optic network, creating an autonomous and adaptable citywide traffic system.
Getting there was no small task, as 127,000 feet of fiber optic cable — some underground, some hung on utility poles — were connected to all 209 traffic lights.
The city is still doing studies on travel times in downtown to see if the signalization has made a positive impact. Transportation Bureau Chief Jim Travers expects those numbers to be available in about two months.
So far, he’s been very encouraged by the results.
“People are starting to realize something is different,” he said. “People are sensing that it’s moving a little better.”
Some previously reported improvements include a 33 percent reduction in travel time on Summer Street between Bridge and Spring streets during the morning commute and a 21 percent decrease of drive time on Stillwater Avenue between Stillmeadow Elementary School and West Main Street during the early rush hour.
The project, which is funded by three federal grants worth nearly $10 million, involves installing fiber optic cables throughout the city to replace the old and problematic copper wires. The old system was vulnerable to the elements. For example, if a light went down due to a storm, it would disconnect from the network, pushing all other lights off schedule.
With the fiber optics and new hard drives installed in control boxes at intersections, the lights are better connected and can remain on schedule if disconnected from the system.
A citywide signal timing hasn’t been done since 1991.
Travers said the effort is not just meant to make for smoother drives in Stamford, but also to help all users of the roads, including cyclists and pedestrians.
The hope, he said, is that better timed lights will lead to less driver frustration.
“This is not simply a retiming for cars,” he said. “It is a retiming for all users.”
Less frustration from being stuck behind a series of red lights should lead to less aggressive drivers, Travers said, and less accidents.
Data from the UConn Crash Data Repository shows accidents in Stamford are on the decline in the last three years, as is the rate of severe injuries. The rate of pedestrian deaths is also declining. Those figures are not entirely attributable to the retiming of streets, but Travers believes signalization plays a major role.
Until last week, there were no pedestrian deaths in Stamford this year. On Wednesday, however, a 61yearold woman died after being struck by a car at the intersection of Washington and Tresser boulevards.
In comparison, pedestrian accidents hit a 30year high nationwide, according to a report from the Governors Highway Safety Association.
In terms of designing safer and better intersections, Travers said everything besides downtown was easier to implement, since there are well established corridors that needed to be prioritized over smaller connector streets.
Downtown was way more complex, in comparison, since there are several main thoroughfares that intersect. Therefore, it is not as easy as just prioritizing the street with more flow, since sometimes the number of cars is relatively the same for each.
“Downtown presented a significant challenge,” Travers said.
So far, response to the new timings has been positive from drivers, he said, as many people have said they’re noticed shorter drives.
Joe McGee, vice president of public policy and programs for the Business Council of Fairfield County, said he’s fully in support of the city’s traffic signal plan.
“I think it’s a very big plus, but it’s going to require coordination,” he said. “This is a real positive development and long overdue.”
Sandy Goldstein, president of the Stamford Downtown Special Services District, applauded the efforts of Travers and the transportation department.
“Its very, very important to have traffic flow easily but to have tons of respect for the pedestrian and for the pedestrian experience,” she said.
Travers said the new retimed system would put Stamford in better position as technology advances and driverless cars become a reality.
“We really positioned us to more rapidly respond to technology and impact on traffic than any other city in Connecticut,” he said.
“People are starting to realize something is different. People are sensing that (traffic is) moving a little better.”
Jim Travers, Transportation Bureau chief