BEAVERTON, Ore. (KOIN) — After years of late-night research, frustration, ridicule and even lawsuits, Mats Jarlström of Beaverton could finally say, “I told you so.” But he didn’t use those words after learning his research into whether yellow lights are too short for drivers making turns was validated at the highest level. Instead, Jarlström expressed joy.
“I feel totally vindicated here,” Jarlström told KOIN 6 while holding back tears after learning the news Thursday, which happened to be his birthday.
The Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE), which makes the traffic control policies for the United States and other countries, notified Jarlström that he’s right: drivers often get caught in a no man’s land when trying to make a turn and they end up running red lights.
“This is a tremendous amount of work I put into this and the impact this will have for everyone in the world, it’s going to be dramatic,” said Jarlström. “The yellow lights are too short in the U.S.”
It took Jarlström 6 years of research (and facing indifferent authorities in Beaverton, Washington County, and the state of Oregon), but he finally prevailed. Most entities responded that they follow best practices determined by ITE. And yesterday, ITE notified him that he was right and they had screwed up:
“The existing Kinematic Equation does not fully cover several dilemma-zone situations for left-turn and right-turn movements,” concluded members of an ITE panel considering Jarlström’s research. “The Panel suggests that this item be properly reconsidered by ITE.”
This is going to tick off a lot of bureaucrats in cities across the country. They're going to have to recalibrate all of those cameras.
