Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => On The Road => Topic started by: rogerzilla on 11 March, 2009, 04:57:57 pm
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London pedestrians will have to walk faster under Boris Johnson plan - Times Online (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article5883358.ece)
Mr Johnson hopes that the extra green time will smooth the flow of traffic and help to cope with the increase in cars expected next year when he halves the size of the congestion charge zone.
Is this the 1950s?
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Just like to point out that, like an awful lot of people in London, I didn't vote for the charmless bigot.
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This is something I have noticed around here, you seem to get no time at all now to get across the road.
But then as we all know, the car is king ::-)
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I have a friend who models traffic patterns for a living. He's pretty convinced that Ken did not rephase the lights prior to the congestion charge introduction and is convinced that this is just a slur that has stuck.
However, he did tell me that rephasing the lights would take forever, and this seems to be born out by that figure of five years to carry out the complete programme.
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I voted for that nice Mr Livingstone :thumbsup:
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I have a friend who models traffic patterns for a living. He's pretty convinced that Ken did not rephase the lights prior to the congestion charge introduction and is convinced that this is just a slur that has stuck.
However, he did tell me that rephasing the lights would take forever, and this seems to be born out by that figure of five years to carry out the complete programme.
Are not the 'key' lights controllable by a central computer system? I thought it was possible to make on-demand changes to the lights.
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Boris is definitely not my favourite person of the moment.
Cancels Cross-river tram, spouts on about some idiot scheme for re-using the Crossrail tunnelling machines to extend the Tube south of the river to Camberwell instead of funding the perferctly rational and much cheaper tram. Then this.
It is a feature of our USA television dominated culture that people in the UK genuinely believe that there is an offence of "jaywalking". However on the converse side, how many drivers know - or even care- that there is a highway code rule which says give way to crossing pedestrians when turning into a side road.
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Well I do think he has a point about the number of lights and the time spent at them.
For example why have a four-way intersection come to a total stop so that pedestrians can cross in any direction. Why not have pedestrians able to cross parallel to the traffic flow, and any car-drivers turning should give way to them. It's the fact that drivers don't turn across pedestrians that makes them ignore the rule mentioned by SOTR in my view.
And the frequency of lights, including pedestrian lights, is ridiculous. As a cyclist I am deeply annoyed by them just as much as motorists. Would people RLJ as much if they didn't have multiple pointless stoppages. There are stretches on my commute where there are lights of one kind or another every 150 yards or less. Why not pedestrian crossings or temporary signals. Why not allow left-turning cars and cycles to treat lights as a Stop sign and turn if it is safe to do so.
I would like to see fewer lights and more people driving/riding according to what they can see rather than what they are told.
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Just like to point out that, like an awful lot of people in London, I didn't vote for the charmless bigot.
Nor did I.
Discussed this issue with my partner over lunch. Both agree he is very pedestrian unfriendly and not too good for cyclists either.
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If am in my car at a particular junction near work, I am able to cross the junction in a single phase.
As a pedestrian it's 3 phases. If I want to try to cross on red I have to have eyes in the back of my head due to vehicles coming from all directions.
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If BoJo really wants to speed things up for everybody / anybody, why doesn't he arrange to lose the dwell time between traffic light phases at junctions?
You know - when all the lights (including those for pedestrians) are at red - so nobody moves.
At a junction where there are four or even five phases this can amount to 30 to 45 seconds of Nothing Happening, for anyone.
Multiply that by the number of controlled junctions on the average London commute, and you'd have a significant time saving for all road users.
As opposed to introducing a system which encourages traffic into bullying pedestrians to stay on the pavement.
BTW - I didn't vote for him either.
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Just like to point out that, like an awful lot of people in London, I didn't vote for the charmless bigot.
Afraid I did - though I reckon I could still have replied perfectly honestly using the same words as you!
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ARRRGGHHHH!!!! This makes me so angry. BoJo, I think you are a useless twonk, you have no idea what makes for a pleasant city and are doing everything you can to destroy London. Idiot.
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Just like to point out that, like an awful lot of people in London, I didn't vote for the charmless bigot.
Afraid I did - though I reckon I could still have replied perfectly honestly using the same words as you!
That is no way to refer to Brian Paddick
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For example why have a four-way intersection come to a total stop so that pedestrians can cross in any direction. Why not have pedestrians able to cross parallel to the traffic flow, and any car-drivers turning should give way to them. It's the fact that drivers don't turn across pedestrians that makes them ignore the rule mentioned by SOTR in my view.
............. Why not allow left-turning cars and cycles to treat lights as a Stop sign and turn if it is safe to do so.
Both of these ideas seem to work perfectly well in Toronto (and probably plenty of other cities the other side of the pond - Toronto is just the one I have experienced as both a pedestrian and a driver)
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Just like to point out that, like an awful lot of people in London, I didn't vote for the charmless bigot.
Afraid I did - though I reckon I could still have replied perfectly honestly using the same words as you!
That is no way to refer to Brian Paddick
Sorry - forgot about him - how could that happen
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If BoJo really wants to speed things up for everybody / anybody, why doesn't he arrange to lose the dwell time between traffic light phases at junctions?
You know - when all the lights (including those for pedestrians) are at red - so nobody moves.
At a junction where there are four or even five phases this can amount to 30 to 45 seconds of Nothing Happening, for anyone.
Multiply that by the number of controlled junctions on the average London commute, and you'd have a significant time saving for all road users.
As opposed to introducing a system which encourages traffic into bullying pedestrians to stay on the pavement.
BTW - I didn't vote for him either.
I believe he said he was going to do just that in his Way to Go document.
All red phases are there to protect others from 'Amber Gamblers' and those who 'follow through' on red. I predict more crashes...
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Are not the 'key' lights controllable by a central computer system? I thought it was possible to make on-demand changes to the lights.
According to my sister, who has worked for various highways departments, you can override many lights from the central control room for the area. She once described to me watching as a controller gave one of their staff a green wave to get to a meeting, watching him on traffic cameras & switching the lights as he approached.
Of course, they wouldn't do that when traffic was heavy. Cause far too much disruption.
But - and it's a big but - inadequately planned changes to phasing of lights could cause chaos. It's all right doing a bit of ad hoc manual overriding, but making permanent changes without carefully modelling the consequences has some of the same risks as trying to repair a watch with a hammer. Get wrong - cue gridlock.
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I rather despair of the mindless leftwing politicing and name calling tendency on this forum. Apart from anything else its incredibly boring.
The article suggested that by providing timing information to pedestrians it would encourage them to time their crossing more appropriately which would in turn allow the total amount of time required for redlight phases to be reduced which in turn would improve traffic flow. I've experienced this in other countries as a driver and pedestrian and it makes sense to me.
Boris was quoted expressing his frustration at being stopped at redlights for no apparent reason. Er, thats it.
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We could usefully get rid of that completely unnecessary waiting at a red pelican crossing after the pedestrian has gone. If it were a much quicker, or instantaneous, change to green man the situation would arise much less. That would speed up both pedestrian and vehicle flow.
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I rather despair of the mindless leftwing politicing and name calling tendency on this forum. Apart from anything else its incredibly boring.
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I would like to see fewer lights and more people driving/riding according to what they can see rather than what they are told.
Agreed. Many pelican crossings should be replaced with zebra crossings. When a ped I'm fed up of waiting a-g-e-s for the green man to show. When in the car I'm fed up of spending 10 seconds watching the ped cross, and another 25 staring at an empty crossing & a red light >:(
That said, in some areas there are so many peds that zebra crossings would cause near gridlock. I guess this is where BoJo's idea comes in.
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We could usefully get rid of that completely unnecessary waiting at a red pelican crossing after the pedestrian has gone. If it were a much quicker, or instantaneous, change to green man the situation would arise much less. That would speed up both pedestrian and vehicle flow.
Likewise we could get rid of the completely unnecessary waiting that a pedestrian has to do when they press the button at a crossing. You go up to a crossing, press the button, then watch as a procession of cars driven by people that were finishing their breakfast at home when you got there flashes past. Eventually the software says "OK - let's go to Green for Peds".
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If its that important to get somewhere on time, leave earlier.
'Sorry I am late I was held up at the pedestrian crossings' FFS :(
Edit - This appies to car and drivers, not pedestrians.
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We could usefully get rid of that completely unnecessary waiting at a red pelican crossing after the pedestrian has gone. If it were a much quicker, or instantaneous, change to green man the situation would arise much less. That would speed up both pedestrian and vehicle flow.
Likewise we could get rid of the completely unnecessary waiting that a pedestrian has to do when they press the button at a crossing. You go up to a crossing, press the button, then watch as a procession of cars driven by people that were finishing their breakfast at home when you got there flashes past. Eventually the software says "OK - let's go to Green for Peds".
Sorry, I took that as a given.
The law could be changed so that where a pavement-cyclist uses a pelican to cross and in doing so makes a cyclist stop at the light, this is punishable by death.
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Are not the 'key' lights controllable by a central computer system? I thought it was possible to make on-demand changes to the lights.
According to my sister, who has worked for various highways departments, you can override many lights from the central control room for the area. She once described to me watching as a controller gave one of their staff a green wave to get to a meeting, watching him on traffic cameras & switching the lights as he approached.
Of course, they wouldn't do that when traffic was heavy. Cause far too much disruption.
But - and it's a big but - inadequately planned changes to phasing of lights could cause chaos. It's all right doing a bit of ad hoc manual overriding, but making permanent changes without carefully modelling the consequences has some of the same risks as trying to repair a watch with a hammer. Get wrong - cue gridlock.
Yes, that's what I thought was possible.
Assuming there was some modelling of the traffic behaviour (and there must be TONS of data available about how the flows / lack of flows work now), then it sounds like a good idea. Unless it's already completely optimised, which seems very unlikely.
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We could usefully get rid of that completely unnecessary waiting at a red pelican crossing after the pedestrian has gone. If it were a much quicker, or instantaneous, change to green man the situation would arise much less. That would speed up both pedestrian and vehicle flow.
Likewise we could get rid of the completely unnecessary waiting that a pedestrian has to do when they press the button at a crossing. You go up to a crossing, press the button, then watch as a procession of cars driven by people that were finishing their breakfast at home when you got there flashes past. Eventually the software says "OK - let's go to Green for Peds".
I've used a crossing which has two parts; one for pedestrians, and another for horses. Pressing the button on the horse crossing makes the lights change immediately, whereas the pedestrians have to wait. Why? It's handy when riding (either horse or bike ;) ) to use the horse crossing, but if it's acceptable to stop the traffic for the neds, lest they get uppity waiting for the cars, then why not for the other crossing? As a driver too, it makes no difference how long before the lights change - one wouldn't know when the button was pressed, so why not just make it happen straightaway?
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I get very annoyed about the length of time it takes for ped. and cyclists crossings to stop motor traffic in Southend. The crossing I use the most is about 200 yards from junctions in either direction, where traffic is likely to be queuing anyway, so if the lights changed instantly when the button is pressed, then there would be little likelihood of extra delay for anyone.
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Well, I suppose there's the danger that someone could stand and keep pressing it, and screw up the traffic completely!
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There is actually one instant-reponse ped crossing in Southend. It's between a pile of rubble where several acres of former Access credit card offices have been demolished and our local park.
Hardly anyone uses it now. The office workers, RBS staff, have been moved to a beautiful (?) new out-of-town complex, so they all drive to work.
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Well, I suppose there's the danger that someone could stand and keep pressing it, and screw up the traffic completely!
That's possible, but easy to defeat in software. There can be a minimum time allowed for the traffic to flow.
I was thinking there would be no reason for the waiting where the crossing is little used, and provided as a way to safely cross a busy/fast road. In heavily pedestrian use areas, I imagine the button would be pressed frequently anyway, so leading to a default sharing of the right of way based on time slices.
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I thought BoJo said the congestion charge didn't work, and now he's saying he wants to reduce pedestrian crossing time once he takes away some of the zone. He must have been talking bollocks then, since he clearly expects an increase in traffic as a result of reducing the zone.
Since I rarely drive my car in London, I'm quite happy if there's a shed load more congestion. It's not going to have much effect on me on the bike, and it's going to be much better at getting people out of their cars and onto bikes when they see all of us leaving them behind in the traffic.
I do think disadvantaging pedestrians in favour of the all-ruling car is contemptible though. And I'm not even a bearded lentil soup drinker like some of the more extreme on this forum.
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Wandsworth's pedestrian crossings seem to have particularly loooong delays for pedestrians.
I pass a lot of pelicans on my route to work. I often see people unable to cross in the time available, and cars (and, i am ashamed to say, bikes) streaming across the crossing as soon as the lights change with a complete disregard for the pedestrians. Shortening the cycle, or spreading them out will have disastrous effects. More people will get fed up waiting and just cross anyway, and more people will get trapped on the crossing, as more will have built up in each cycle.
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That's possible, but easy to defeat in software. There can be a minimum time allowed for the traffic to flow.
I was thinking there would be no reason for the waiting where the crossing is little used, and provided as a way to safely cross a busy/fast road. In heavily pedestrian use areas, I imagine the button would be pressed frequently anyway, so leading to a default sharing of the right of way based on time slices.
I thought that was what already happened - if you get there and noone has used it for a wee while, you get to cross fast - but if it's recently been used, you'll have a wait. That's always how I've experienced it but I might have made it all up in my head!
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That's possible, but easy to defeat in software. There can be a minimum time allowed for the traffic to flow.
I was thinking there would be no reason for the waiting where the crossing is little used, and provided as a way to safely cross a busy/fast road. In heavily pedestrian use areas, I imagine the button would be pressed frequently anyway, so leading to a default sharing of the right of way based on time slices.
I thought that was what already happened - if you get there and noone has used it for a wee while, you get to cross fast - but if it's recently been used, you'll have a wait. That's always how I've experienced it but I might have made it all up in my head!
Round us it makes no difference when it was last pressed, it depends on whether there are any cars about. There'll be some Traffic Engineer reason for it no doubt, but it actually weakens crossings because you end up looking for a gap in the traffic and crossing, or pressing the button, crossing, and hearing the bloody thing pip pip pip away stopping traffic for no one.
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They could usefully display a count-down of seconds to go before the lights change. I've seen this in another country (but can't recall where), and it appeared to be a good idea to me.
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That's possible, but easy to defeat in software. There can be a minimum time allowed for the traffic to flow.
I was thinking there would be no reason for the waiting where the crossing is little used, and provided as a way to safely cross a busy/fast road. In heavily pedestrian use areas, I imagine the button would be pressed frequently anyway, so leading to a default sharing of the right of way based on time slices.
I thought that was what already happened - if you get there and noone has used it for a wee while, you get to cross fast - but if it's recently been used, you'll have a wait. That's always how I've experienced it but I might have made it all up in my head!
Round us it makes no difference when it was last pressed, it depends on whether there are any cars about. There'll be some Traffic Engineer reason for it no doubt, but it actually weakens crossings because you end up looking for a gap in the traffic and crossing, or pressing the button, crossing, and hearing the bloody thing pip pip pip away stopping traffic for no one.
The crossing I use most is just like that. If there's no traffic coming, I cross, whatever colour of little man is displayed. Because the traffic is broken up by lights not far away, these gaps can be quite lengthy. Conversely, so are the streams of moving traffic.
I think it's quite acceptable to delay a motorist for a minute or two at traffic lights - after all, if it wasn't for the bloody cars we wouldn't need the bloody lights - but minimum delay should be a perk of walking and cycling.
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We whinge about RLJers all the time, you don't think people do that because they're waiting at lights with no one crossing?
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'...where they think there's no one crossing'
I frequently see a Road Warrior Ninja or whatever zooming through a red light at a crossing, just as pedestrians come into view round the front of a truck/bus/whatever. Plonkers.
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Oh yes, I do. I don't do it in the car, but I'm on my bike and I've waited at red at my local pelican crossing, the ped (or, too often, the pavement cyclist!) has crossed and there's no-one else there, I'll go.
Edit, in response to Clarion: I only do this if at the front and I can see clearly that there's no-one there.
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Bike or car, its the rules and I stop. However, this isn't a thread about RLJing.
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Bike or car, its the rules and I stop. However, this isn't a thread about RLJing.
No, we haven't mentioned David Cameron. ;D
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you have now ;D
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They could usefully display a count-down of seconds to go before the lights change. I've seen this in another country (but can't recall where), and it appeared to be a good idea to me.
That is the core of the proposal described in the OP. It's a system used in many cities in the US, and it works well. However, it should be combined with lights that default to green for peds when there's no traffic (though that would need rather better sensors than they have now), and which don't hold up traffic in any direction (including peds) when there's no traffic in the conflicting directions. Allowing 'left turn on red', as per the US (and enforcing their universal 'give way to peds' behaviour), would also ease traffic flow.
It's not a war, nor are there really different sides. Constructive and imaginative thought can improve things for all road users.
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It's not a war, nor are there really different sides. Constructive and imaginative thought can improve things for all road users.
:thumbsup:
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Are not the 'key' lights controllable by a central computer system? I thought it was possible to make on-demand changes to the lights.
According to my sister, who has worked for various highways departments, you can override many lights from the central control room for the area. She once described to me watching as a controller gave one of their staff a green wave to get to a meeting, watching him on traffic cameras & switching the lights as he approached.
Of course, they wouldn't do that when traffic was heavy. Cause far too much disruption.
But - and it's a big but - inadequately planned changes to phasing of lights could cause chaos. It's all right doing a bit of ad hoc manual overriding, but making permanent changes without carefully modelling the consequences has some of the same risks as trying to repair a watch with a hammer. Get wrong - cue gridlock.
Yes, that's what I thought was possible.
Assuming there was some modelling of the traffic behaviour (and there must be TONS of data available about how the flows / lack of flows work now), then it sounds like a good idea. Unless it's already completely optimised, which seems very unlikely.
Essentially this is what my friend does. Whenever they get told about road works they fire up the model and see what effect it's likely to have on traffic and then let a neural network loose on the model to try to evolve the most sensible solution to rephasing the lights (where they have control of the lights).
It sounds really clever, but of course drivers screw it all up by rat-running and changing their behaviour...
As for count-down timers on lights. They have these in Chicago and they work really well. The lights also change very quickly so when you press them you don't wait long before you can cross again.
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For example why have a four-way intersection come to a total stop so that pedestrians can cross in any direction. Why not have pedestrians able to cross parallel to the traffic flow, and any car-drivers turning should give way to them. It's the fact that drivers don't turn across pedestrians that makes them ignore the rule mentioned by SOTR in my view.
They have this near where I work and it doesn't work. Drivers just force their way through, regardless of children or prams crossing the road. So they installed another set of lights round the corner. so cars get a green light, make a left turn and then have to stop immediately to give way to pedestrians. Sometimes they don't realise that the light is not a "repeater" for traffic from the far side of the junction, fail to give way and someone gets run over, or the car ends up diving into the crash barriers.
It would be easier and safer if they stopped all the traffic on the junction and let the pedestrians cross corner to corner, since that's where most of them seem to want to go anyway.
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They could usefully display a count-down of seconds to go before the lights change.
Here's a video showing exactly that in Taiwan. How wonderful it would be to have that here!
YouTube - Traffic light timers in Taiwan (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W76ZvdwNECI&feature=related)
The video is filmed from a car passenger's point of view. It starts looking at the 12 seconds remaining of green time for the other traffic. When that reaches zero, we see it change to 50 seconds red time for the other traffic. Then the view changes to our own traffic light, where there is 5 seconds red time remaining. Finally it becomes 40 seconds green time and off we go.
It's interesting that the filmer preferred to look at a green signal as much as possible, even when it wasn't their own.
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Hobbling about on crutches a couple of months ago, thanks to my left knee's "Widespread internal derangement injuries and bone contusion", I gained a new insight into how variable the time given to peds to cross already is. A lot of the time, I was not making it to the opposite kerb in time. I could be wrong, but this seemed to be more of a problem on busier roads. Life would be much more difficult if the time available to cross was even less.
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It's not a war, nor are there really different sides. Constructive and imaginative thought can improve things for all road users.
:thumbsup:
If it's not a war, why is it that motorists' time is costed in cost/benefit analysis and pedestrians' time is not AFAIK?
That sort of thinking makes me want to FIGHT!
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If it's not a war, why is it that motorists' time is costed in cost/benefit analysis and pedestrians' time is not AFAIK?
That sort of thinking akes me want to FIGHT!
Arrrgggh!!! Yes exactly!
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They have the countdown timers in Las Vegas, but not many pedestrians. I think there could be a use for them on Oxford st and outside stations where there are high volumes of pedestrians, but not helpful at all anywhere else, putting pedestrians under pressure to speed up, when it may not be possible. :-\
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Perhaps we should reduce the time for pedestrians to 5 secs. Traffic flow would be increased leading to lower transport costs. It would be an advantage to all the fat B*st*rds who need to loose weight. The old and infirm would get squished leading to the survival of only the fittest. Costs to the NHS would be reduced - a double wammy!
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Not sure I should have posted that, but it's too late now.
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BornAgainCyclist, we get your point.
This attitude of "survival of the fittest" on our city streets is despicable.
One curious aside - not the recent advert for touch-cards for paying for things. The one with the bloke on crutches who swings past the newsagents, then ends up on a skateboard. You note what's missing - the streets are completely car-free.
ps. I down and drive a car - just commenting that the advertisers chose not to have lines of cars in the street, so advert chappie could swing down the street freely.
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countdown timers work well all over the US. IMO, right turns on red (or left turns on red, for the UK/Ireland) work best if the streets cross at right angles.
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Boris Johnson is on Vanessa Feltz's show on Radio London from 9am.
You can phone in if you like! BBC - London - London Homepage (http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/)
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Urrrgh, the thought of talking to either of them turns my stomach.
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Urrrgh, the thought of talking to either of them turns my stomach.
Ah yes, but the thought of them talking to each other while you are doing something else.
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You mean they were in the same place at the same time, and no one took the opportunity to improve humanity!
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For example why have a four-way intersection come to a total stop so that pedestrians can cross in any direction. Why not have pedestrians able to cross parallel to the traffic flow, and any car-drivers turning should give way to them.
Oi! Ever tried getting anywhere on foot in Central London in the evenings? You spend ages hanging around waiting for the green man, and then it usually only allows you to get to the refuge in the middle of the road, where you have to hang around again for another light to change. I've missed buses and trains because of this.
And why don't pedestrian lights change as soon as you push the button? Why do you have to wait for several dozen cars to pass first?
And come to think of it, WTF is it the pedestrians who have to push a button and not the drivers?
I've always held that at any light-controlled road junction, all the pedestrian lights should stay green long enough for a 90-year-old granny with a zimmer frame to get all the way round the junction. After all, we'll all be 90-year-olds one day, with any luck.
PS I voted for Ken, of course, as did most Central Londoners. It's the suburbans who never use public transport that voted Boris - the same people who wrecked Ken's Fare's Fair campaign years ago. Not voting Tory is part of my non-religion, like not crossing picket lines.
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It would be easier and safer if they stopped all the traffic on the junction and let the pedestrians cross corner to corner, since that's where most of them seem to want to go anyway.
In Japan (and at one junction in London), you can cross both corner-to-corner and side-to-side.
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It would be easier and safer if they stopped all the traffic on the junction and let the pedestrians cross corner to corner, since that's where most of them seem to want to go anyway.
In Japan (and at one junction in London), you can cross both corner-to-corner and side-to-side.
Actually, quite a lot in London allow this. This one (http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=17.04698,39.199219&ie=UTF8&ll=51.443455,-0.152854&spn=0.000274,0.000853&t=k) in Balham is one that comes to mind, and it's particularly clearly marked on the road. I've seen others.
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There's another on Queenstown Road in Battersea. Very sensible in my view, and don't make the pedestrian feel like too much of a second class citizen.
Shame that we can identify where those very few sites are. Should be much more common - standard practice, in fact.
I have often wondered how it would be if it were motorists who had to stop at conflict points with pedestrians, push a button, and wait for the lights to change... :demon:
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For example why have a four-way intersection come to a total stop so that pedestrians can cross in any direction. Why not have pedestrians able to cross parallel to the traffic flow, and any car-drivers turning should give way to them.
Oi! Ever tried getting anywhere on foot in Central London in the evenings? You spend ages hanging around waiting for the green man, and then it usually only allows you to get to the refuge in the middle of the road, where you have to hang around again for another light to change. I've missed buses and trains because of this.
And why don't pedestrian lights change as soon as you push the button? Why do you have to wait for several dozen cars to pass first?
And come to think of it, WTF is it the pedestrians who have to push a button and not the drivers?
I've always held that at any light-controlled road junction, all the pedestrian lights should stay green long enough for a 90-year-old granny with a zimmer frame to get all the way round the junction. After all, we'll all be 90-year-olds one day, with any luck.
PS I voted for Ken, of course, as did most Central Londoners. It's the suburbans who never use public transport that voted Boris - the same people who wrecked Ken's Fare's Fair campaign years ago. Not voting Tory is part of my non-religion, like not crossing picket lines.
Oi yourself. Actually if you stopped to think about it you would realise that allowing pedestrians to cross parallel to the traffic flow would not in any way reduce the amount of time available to them.
In fact it would probably give them more time because they would have the same length of time as the cars flowing through, minus some warning and clearing time at the end. On particularly busy turns at certain intersections it might be necessary to have pedestrians cross when the lights are against the turning cars but that would be no worse than the current situation.
I take the point that it doesn't work particularly well in the few places it exists at the moment but I suspect that is because it is the exception rather than the rule. As with left-turn-on-red-after-stopping it works OK in countries and cities where it is the norm and drivers know that when turning they have to look for pedestrians and give them priority.
I see it as another way of encouraging motorists to realise they do share the road. Having lights where only pedestrians can cross and cars have to stop is reinforcing the message that the roads are for cars and others are allowed on under certain controlled conditions.
P.S. Although I am now out of the country more than in it I do live in a central London borough, use public transport and cycle into central London when I am back and I voted for Boris. Sorry to disturb your stereotype. Sadly you forgot to mention the Daily Mail which of course I buy two copies of every day, one to read and one to w*nk over as I worship a picture of Margaret Thatcher eating a coal-miner's baby.