Bright solution found for I.F. intersections
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IDAHO FALLS — More intersections are being equipped with traffic signs designed to grab your attention.
The most visible street signs available are hitting the streets of Idaho Falls and Bonneville County. The stop and warning signs have flashing LED lights that are designed to grab your attention, day and night.
Most of the signs have eight long-lasting LED lights. For stop signs, the LEDs are red, and for warning signs, white.
Without anything in the way, the signs are visible for up to 2 miles. They can also flash for 30 days without external power.
Crews are now installing flashing stop signs on roads that cross Lomax. Some of the signs are wired in directly to street lights, while most are solar-powered.
“Flashing stop signs are a concept we think is beneficial is some areas,” city engineer Kent Fugal tells EastIdahoNews.com “But we need to be careful to not overuse the idea.”
Fugal says he’s worried if the city uses too many of the LED signs, drivers will stop noticing the traditional ones.
That’s why the city is placing the signs in areas with a lot of traffic incidents (such as crashes or near-misses) or where new traffic conditions exist, like First Street and North Freeman Avenue, where a traffic light used to be.
“Traffic counts there didn’t justify replacing to the damaged traffic signal, but when we removed it, we started to get complaints about people running the stop sign,” Fugal says. “The new traffic conditions at that intersection justified the need to use a sign that is better at getting the attention of drivers.”
Fugal says other new signs that have been installed in areas where there have been complaints about drivers running stop signs. For instance, the four-way stop at Pancheri Drive and South Bellin Road has been equipped with solar-powered stop signs with the red flashing LEDs.
“When we finished the widening of Pancheri, we started to get a lot of complaints about people running the stop signs,” Fugal said. “We received federal funding to install the solar-powered stop signs there.”
The long-troubled intersection of Curtis Avenue and 17th Street has also been upgraded. In response to several accidents attributed to speed, including the death of two women in September, drivers traveling east and west on 17th are now shown with digital signs that rely on optical technology to display the speed of approaching vehicles.
A strobe light flashes at drivers who are speeding.
The digital speed signs also collect data on the average speed and peak times of day of traffic.
Bonneville County Road and Bridge has also started installing signs on trouble rural intersections.
“So far we have installed around eight signs,” Road Manager Ken Ray tells EastIdahoNews.com. “It comes down to safety. The intersections we have started with are ones that we get more driver reports of difficulty seeing regular signs, or there is some kind of obstruction in the way.”
Ray said the county plans to install more of these signs.
Some rural roads go miles in between stop signs. In the past, solutions like larger more reflective signs have been used, even rumble strips near stopping intersections, but the new flashing red stop signs can be seen for hundreds of yards, effectively warning drivers sooner.
Bonneville County received funding for the signs through a grant. Details on the grant were not available Tuesday.