Almost a decade later, there are numerous examples of
small European towns that did away with signal lights and traffic signs and,
voila, traffic began to flow better, transit times decreased, and roadways became less dangerous for pedestrians and vehicle passengers alike.
The absence of conventional rules improved outcomes.
The concept of a “shared space”—an area without traditional traffic signs, signals, or regulations that’s intended to be used by both cars and pedestrians—underpins many such traffic reforms. Humans don’t normally need formal rules to figure out how to navigate a crowded sidewalk, the logic goes, and isn’t everyone driving a car really just a pedestrian wrapped in a 3,000-pound potentially-lethal steel box? Backers of the
Poynton intersection project near Manchester, England,
note that “pedestrians in the shared-space scenario, when there are no lights to dictate behavior,
are seen as fellow road-users rather than obstacles in the way of the next light.”
