[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9mzfN5i7ds[/video]

Interesting. Of course, this is one example of it working. If you did it all the lights up and down the country I think there would be quite a few accidents.

Maybe that set was just really badly designed?

well, there is nothing more to say. I can think of plenty of places where this would be beneficial!

Was that video done as a school project by 8 yr olds?

They need to add a few zebra crossing or a new type of pedtrian crossing (ie just a mark on the road). I know everyone is meant to have equal right of way but it would be nice if they could mark out suggested points.

Like Realman says, I guess it depends on location.
There’s a big roundabout near me that use to be a free for all, and is a lot safer on a bike since the installation of lights.

The traffic needs to be going slowly for this to work –

Used as a part of the dutch empty or naked roads idea – but that includes a 20 mph limit.

Its one of the ways a lower speed limit can increase3 traffic flows

If you did it all the lights up and down the country I think there would be quite a few accidents.

There already are accidents at traffic lights. The only way to eliminate road accidents entirely is to have nobody using the roads. (I’m making a point, not saying that we shouldn’t use roads.)

European Cities Do Away with Traffic Signs

Article

Are streets without traffic signs conceivable? Seven cities and regions in Europe are giving it a try — with good results.

“We reject every form of legislation,” the Russian aristocrat and “father of anarchism” Mikhail Bakunin once thundered. The czar banished him to Siberia. But now it seems his ideas are being rediscovered.

European traffic planners are dreaming of streets free of rules and directives. They want drivers and pedestrians to interact in a free and humane way, as brethren — by means of friendly gestures, nods of the head and eye contact, without the harassment of prohibitions, restrictions and warning signs.

A project implemented by the European Union is currently seeing seven cities and regions clear-cutting their forest of traffic signs. Ejby, in Denmark, is participating in the experiment, as are Ipswich in England and the Belgian town of Ostende.

The utopia has already become a reality in Makkinga, in the Dutch province of Western Frisia. A sign by the entrance to the small town (population 1,000) reads “Verkeersbordvrij” — “free of traffic signs.” Cars bumble unhurriedly over precision-trimmed granite cobblestones. Stop signs and direction signs are nowhere to be seen. There are neither parking meters nor stopping restrictions. There aren’t even any lines painted on the streets.

“The many rules strip us of the most important thing: the ability to be considerate. We’re losing our capacity for socially responsible behavior,” says Dutch traffic guru Hans Monderman, one of the project’s co-founders. “The greater the number of prescriptions, the more people’s sense of personal responsibility dwindles.”

Monderman could be on to something. Germany has 648 valid traffic symbols. The inner cities are crowded with a colorful thicket of metal signs. Don’t park over here, watch out for passing deer over there, make sure you don’t skid. The forest of signs is growing ever denser. Some 20 million traffic signs have already been set up all over the country.

Psychologists have long revealed the senselessness of such exaggerated regulation. About 70 percent of traffic signs are ignored by drivers. What’s more, the glut of prohibitions is tantamount to treating the driver like a child and it also foments resentment. He may stop in front of the crosswalk, but that only makes him feel justified in preventing pedestrians from crossing the street on every other occasion. Every traffic light baits him with the promise of making it over the crossing while the light is still yellow.

“Unsafe is safe”

The result is that drivers find themselves enclosed by a corset of prescriptions, so that they develop a kind of tunnel vision: They’re constantly in search of their own advantage, and their good manners go out the window.

The new traffic model’s advocates believe the only way out of this vicious circle is to give drivers more liberty and encourage them to take responsibility for themselves. They demand streets like those during the Middle Ages, when horse-drawn chariots, handcarts and people scurried about in a completely unregulated fashion. The new model’s proponents envision today’s drivers and pedestrians blending into a colorful and peaceful traffic stream.

It may sound like chaos, but it’s only the lesson drawn from one of the insights of traffic psychology: Drivers will force the accelerator down ruthlessly only in situations where everything has been fully regulated. Where the situation is unclear, they’re forced to drive more carefully and cautiously.

Indeed, “Unsafe is safe” was the motto of a conference where proponents of the new roadside philosophy met in Frankfurt in mid-October.

True, many of them aren’t convinced of the new approach. “German drivers are used to rules,” says Michael Schreckenberg of Duisburg University. If clear directives are abandoned, domestic rush-hour traffic will turn into an Oriental-style bazaar, he warns. He believes the new vision of drivers and pedestrians interacting in a cozy, relaxed way will work, at best, only for small towns.

But one German borough is already daring to take the step into lawlessness. The town of Bohmte in Lower Saxony has 13,500 inhabitants. It’s traversed by a country road and a main road. Cars approach speedily, delivery trucks stop to unload their cargo and pedestrians scurry by on elevated sidewalks.

The road will be re-furbished in early 2007, using EU funds. “The sidewalks are going to go, and the asphalt too. Everything will be covered in cobblestones,” Klaus Goedejohann, the mayor, explains. “We’re getting rid of the division between cars and pedestrians.”

The plans derive inspiration and motivation from a large-scale experiment in the town of Drachten in the Netherlands, which has 45,000 inhabitants. There, cars have already been driving over red natural stone for years. Cyclists dutifully raise their arm when they want to make a turn, and drivers communicate by hand signs, nods and waving.

“More than half of our signs have already been scrapped,” says traffic planner Koop Kerkstra. “Only two out of our original 18 traffic light crossings are left, and we’ve converted them to roundabouts.” Now traffic is regulated by only two rules in Drachten: “Yield to the right” and “Get in someone’s way and you’ll be towed.”

Strange as it may seem, the number of accidents has declined dramatically. Experts from Argentina and the United States have visited Drachten. Even London has expressed an interest in this new example of automobile anarchy. And the model is being tested in the British capital’s Kensington neighborhood.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLfasxqhBNU[/video]

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuxMuMrXUJk[/video]

I was amazed at the dutch empty or naked streets. No white lines and no traffic lights. On foot has tight of way, then bikes then cars. It just seemed to work.

The key point: “On foot has the right of way”.
If you hit a pedestrian or cyclist you’re assumed to be at fault unless there’s evidence to the contrary. IIRC last time it was mooted here the motoring lobby complained people would be throwing themselves under cars so they could claim compensation.

I was amazed at the dutch empty or naked streets. No white lines and no traffic lights. On foot has tight of way, then bikes then cars. It just seemed to work.

This works fine where traffic volumes are low, as they increase, you need to start looking at lights or roundabouts though and keeping peds separate.

On foot has right of way in the UK IIRC. Thats not key anyway – its about how people behave and its rather couterintuative but in the absence of signs people behave more cautiously so crashes decrease

rs – every single town centre has it just about now – even where there was a town centre on a main road. traffic flows increase.

The key point: “On foot has the right of way”.
If you hit a pedestrian or cyclist you’re assumed to be at fault unless there’s evidence to the contrary. IIRC last time it was mooted here the motoring lobby complained people would be throwing themselves under cars so they could claim compensation.

The idea that people will deliberately jump out infront of cars is something i can’t get my head round. Being hit by a car hurts, are there really enough people out there who think being hit by a car is a good career choice? Admittedly there seem to be a few people who have made being hit by cars whilst in cars a full time job so maybe?

I meant that pedestrians having the right of way is respected, regardless of what the law says.

rs – every single town centre has it just about now – even where there was a town centre on a main road. traffic flows increase.

every town centre has what? it may have been a couple of years since i was in the uk but i’m pretty sure town centres don’t have traffic and peds mixing freely.

This works fine where traffic volumes are low, as they increase, you need to start looking at lights or roundabouts though and keeping peds separate.

That’s the last thing you need – the whole point of the system is to encourage walking and cycling so it works by lowering traffic flow and the speed of the remaining traffic is lowered as well.
As TJ mentions, plenty of towns and cities have very small scale applications of it (usually town squares or shopping streets).

It does help of course if the city where you’re applying this logic has a decent public transport network. And for proof it works you only have to look at Piccadilly Gardens in Manchester where trams, buses, cyclists and pedestrians all use the same area, none of the tramlines or bus lanes are guarded by anything more than little sloped kerbs (if that). So far no-one has been daft enough to be deliberately run down by a bus or tram.

Every town centre in the netherlands has these empty or naked streets

Until you see it in action it is hard to explain and the netherlands has always had a slightly different road culture but it is amazing

They started off as an experiment in a few areas and accident rates dropped significantly. So they rolled it out over the whole country

Going along a road with a cycle lane. Enter the town. 30 kph limit and all road markigs stop.= including the cycle lane. Sometimes ther are pavements sometime there are not,

You lot seem not to have watched the clip if you’re suggesting it requires low traffic flow. There certainly seemed to be plenty of traffic there, with the lights apparently running at capacity, and the traffic flow actually increased after they got rid of the lights.