For the first time in nearly 30 years, the City of Minneapolis is fine-tuning all of the roughly 800 traffic lights throughout the city.
By counting traffic and adjusting the timing of the lights accordingly, the city expects drivers will see a 10 to 15 percent reduction in delays and a significant reduction in gas emissions once the project is complete in late 2013.
âÄúWeâÄôve adjusted small parts of the city here and there, but this is a very large undertaking for us,âÄù said Nick VanGunst, a professional traffic operations engineer for the City of Minneapolis Traffic and Parking Services Division.
The retiming process has already started in downtown Minneapolis and will finish sometime in the summer, VanGunst said.
About 600 of the signals in the city are programmed to fixed time schedules based on traffic counts from the city. Signals give priority to routes that are more heavily trafficked âÄî lights on main routes will stay green longer than their cross streets. During peak drive times, the timing of the lights is extended so traffic can flow.
These lights continuously run on their preset schedules and canâÄôt detect if cars are waiting.
Traffic signals around the University of Minnesota are actuated, which means they can detect vehicles and adjust timing independently.
VanGunst said ideally Traffic and Parking Services would like to retime at least a quarter of the cityâÄôs lights every four to five years. A lack of funding has made that impossible in recent years and has caused many of the lights in the city to fall out of sync.
âÄúSignal timing is one of those things where itâÄôs good to do but from a priority standpoint, it ranks pretty low,âÄù VanGunst said. âÄúItâÄôs usually the first thing out the door.âÄù
In addition to the signal adjustments, the City Council approved a purchase Friday for a $160,000 upgrade to the traffic signals operating system software.
Known as TACTICS, the new software is necessary for traffic to flow efficiently with the Central Corridor light rail.
It also has the ability to give priority to mass transit vehicles. The new system can detect if a bus is running behind schedule and prioritize its timing schedule for the delayed bus.
âÄúItâÄôs basically a $160,000 CD that will be handed to us,âÄù VanGunst said. âÄúItâÄôs like buying Microsoft Office 2011 to upgrade from Microsoft Office 2003.âÄù
The Metropolitan Council covered $130,000 of the software upgrade cost.
But the total cost to install the new system will be closer to $5 million because Traffic and Parking Services will have to update many of its traffic signals in the city to be compatible with TACTICS, VanGunst said.
The upgraded system will eventually replace the old signal system that has been in place since the âÄô70s.
Allan Klugman, a traffic engineer with Traffic and Parking Services, said the new TACTICS system will have better traffic management and timing control than the old system.
âÄúWhen you coordinate lights, the biggest thing isnâÄôt just that they turn green, yellow, red, but itâÄôs that they do it in a timed pattern,âÄù Klugman said.
For the majority of traffic lights in Minneapolis, timing is everything. That was proven in early October when a power outage knocked out the traffic signalsâÄô central computer.
The outage caused signals to work out of sync, which caused significant and noticeable delays, Klugman said. The signals resumed their normal timing last Monday.
Sandy Colvin Roy, a Minneapolis city councilwoman, said the new TACTICS software is essential for efficient traffic flow along the light rail.
She said the current signal system âÄúcan be incredibly frustrating,âÄù especially along the Hiawatha light-rail line.
Because they donâÄôt need to be updated, the traffic signals around the University will be the first around the city to be upgraded to the TACTICS system.
By the end of 2013, the city hopes to have every signal retimed and running on the new software.