Stoplights are always telling us to stop.
Or are they?
The basic math breaks down like this: no matter how busy the intersection, or how many streets feed into it, stoplights are always red more often than they’re green. While one stoplight, or one pair of stoplights, is red, the others switch from red, to green, to yellow, to red. That’s two little reds, a big green, and a little yellow for one pair, all in the time of one red even bigger than the green for the other pair. More red than green. You feel me?
But what if…they’re telling us to go?
Think about it this way. Red lights are only telling you to stop if turning right isn’t an option, or you’re in New York City, or there’s a sign that says “no right turn on red,” (@person who almost killed a pedestrian in front of me at 9th—I think it was 9th—and Congress the other day). Otherwise, they’re not telling you to stop. They’re just changing your course. Telling you not to go straight, or turn left, because you might cause quite a bit of trouble doing it at that moment. And even if the right turn isn’t an option, they aren’t telling us to stop forever. Just for a moment. Just to let some other people through.
No, stoplights aren’t telling us to stop. Stoplights are telling us to go. They’re telling us when to go. And where to go. And if they’ve got the countdown going on the pedestrian light, how soon we should go there.
And the sooner we start thinking about it this way, the sooner this country gets back on its feet.
