Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Green wave

I was a missionary in Switzerland and while driving around Zurich, I came across a sign saying that the rode I was driving on that implemented a "GrĂ¼ne Welle" or a "green wave". I wasn't sure what that was, but the sign said I should drive a constant 45 kph.

It was amazing. The lights on this long stretch of rode were synced so that if you drove at the right speed, you would hit all green lights all the way.

According to this Wikipedia article, here are the benefits of implementing a green wave:

  • Reduce CO2, NOx and PM10 emissions from traffic.
  • Reduce fuel consumption of vehicles.
  • Be used on roads that intersect with other green waves.
  • Reduce the time cars wait at side roads.
  • Give pedestrians more time to cross at crossings and help them to cross streets as vehicles travel in platoons 
  • Control the speed of traffic in urban areas.
  • Reduce componant wear of vehicles and indirect energy consumption through their manufacture 

Pretty sweet. And here is a video of a green wave in real life in Copenhagen from the point of view of a bicycle:

3 comments:

Katie Lewis said...

Man, that is so awesome. I wish they did that here. Also, I think way more people would actually drive the speed limit if this were implemented. Which I think would be awesome.

Nathan said...

The streets and sidewalks and buildings in that video looked a lot like Poland. And Germany.

Kathy Haynie said...

The main road from Oregon City to Portland (McLoughlin Blvd) has the lights times like this. Makes the drive so much better. Going that way hrlps me opt out of a whole lot of freeway stress.