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| Green Lights For Everyone! |
by Scott Raulinaitis, Editor - 10/27/2003 - 2:56pm EST
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| And then Scott said, "Let there be green light." |
The other day while driving to church, my wife and I got to discussing what one is supposed to do when approaching a yellow light. Her opinion is cut and dry: slow down and stop. In my opinion, like a traffic light, there are many shades and every situation is unique. Then today I come across this story about a $300 gadget for your car that can change traffic lights from red to green. The technology has apparently been in use by fire trucks for a while now, though only busier intersections seem to have the necessary wiring, and even then it's unclear just how widespread the technology is deployed.
You probably won't find the $300 gadget at your local Wal-Mart anytime soon. It's being sold online by companies who, wink wink, are really just interested in selling them to small town fire departments for legitimate use. As you can imagine, law enforcement personnel are concerned. Because the technology uses infrared, it would be difficult, if not impossible, for a police car right next to you to detect if you were using one. To some degree, that's a moot point right now since using the technology is not currently illegal, something which will no doubt change soon.
It would indeed be a nightmare if everyone had one of these things installed. But here's an idea which could even help state budgets: What if you could change the traffic light for $1 per use? Most days when you're not in a hurry, you can sit at the red lights. But if you're in a huge hurry one day, you pay a few bucks to get through a few lights, and the money gets used to support your local infrastructure. This is America, after all.
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