Wrong way to go - they should keep the standard lights and let people wake up. Stupidity should be painful.
From The Washington Post:
This city embedded traffic lights in the sidewalks so that smartphone users don’t have to look up
Few nations in the world take red traffic lights more seriously than Germany.
Foreign visitors frequently wonder why crowds of Germans wait for traffic lights to turn green when there are no cars in sight.
That is why officials in the city of Augsburg became concerned when they noticed a new phenomenon: Pedestrians were so busy looking at their smartphones that they were ignoring traffic lights.
The city has attempted to solve that problem by installing new traffic lights embedded in the pavement — so that pedestrians constantly looking down at their phones won't miss them.
"It creates a whole new level of attention," city spokeswoman Stephanie Lermen was quoted as saying. Lermen thinks the money is wisely spent: A recent survey conducted in several European cities, including Berlin, found that almost 20 percent of pedestrians were distracted by their smartphones. Younger people are most likely to risk their safety for a quick look at their Facebook profiles or WhatsApp messages, the survey found.
That problem may be even more widespread in the United States: A survey by the University of Washington found that 1 in 3 Americans is busy texting or working on a smartphone at dangerous road crossings. The Department of Transportation has established a clear connection between such habits and an increase in pedestrian deaths.
This is a long thin wedge being driven into highway design. What's next - barriers that come down and block traffic when a cell signal is detected? These snowflakes need to learn that poor attention can be fatal. Like I said, stupidity should be painful.
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