+103 After the traffic lights turn green, the moment you start moving is the combined reaction times of every driver in front of you. amirite?

by Anonymous 4 days ago

I believe they also did a Mythbusters episode on this

by Anonymous 4 days ago

this video

by jodytrantow 4 days ago

Make people smarter. Not cars.

by Anonymous 4 days ago

Unfortunately it's much easier to make cars smarter. I say this as somebody who owns an almost completely analog car.

by fredrick47 4 days ago

Sadly. 02 civic 5 spd. I love my classics

by Anonymous 4 days ago

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by Anonymous 4 days ago

trains

by Babernathy 4 days ago

I mean, unless you are flooring it, you can maintain a safe distance without having to wait for them. I react to two cars in front of me but accelerate slower than the car in front of me. That way I can maintain a safe distance for the speed but also not hold up any people behind me.

by PanicFamous 4 days ago

No, it's not, because even if I react very quickly I cannot move until the person in front of me gets far enough forward. After the first person in line it is not purely about reaction time.

by rosinadickinson 4 days ago

Yeah. I've seen cars get crunched by some asshole running a red light a few seconds late.

by Anonymous 4 days ago

You're not reacting to the light unless you're first in line. You're reacting to the car in front of you moving.

by Anonymous 4 days ago

Yes. There is an equation for this that traffic engineers use

by Anonymous 4 days ago

I just wanna live in a world where everyone lets off the brake at the same time. Everyone's in a rush all the time up your ass, until the light turns green. Probably because phones.

by Anonymous 4 days ago

I think traffic lights should fade between the colours so that's always wiggle room

by torphyethyl 4 days ago

It takes people a truly insane amount of time to start driving after the light turns green

by Defiant_Oil_5516 4 days ago

Yup. Queuing theory. I'm too lazy to look up a source but it's super interesting

by Anonymous 4 days ago

the time it takes for them to move forward after reacting (which would depend on how hard they hit the accelerator)

by Anonymous 4 days ago

As an assiom to this, I noticed that the reaction time slow the longer you have been at the light, until it goes back to faster time. (Sorry for the bad English)

by Anonymous 4 days ago

Not exactly; each car needs to wait for the car in front to be at a safe distance, which take a couple of seconds. That adds up to many seconds if there is doyens of car in line. If cars were all connected like a train, then yes all car would start moving at the same time when the light is green.

by Strosinemmanuel 4 days ago