A Dutch town put traffic lights in the pavement because people won't stop staring at their smartphones
by Rob Price Feb. 16, 2017
A Dutch town has introduced an unusual way of trying to keep smartphone-addicted residents safe: Installing traffic lights in the pavement.
Bodegraven, in the Netherlands, has put strip lights in the floor at a pedestrian crossing — meaning people who stare at their phones all day will see them, preventing them from wandering dangerously into traffic. (We heard about the news via the BBC.)
Apart from their unusual location, they work just like ordinary traffic lights: Green means go, and red means wait.
The lights are built by HIG Traffic Systems, a company based in the town, which hopes to sell them more widely to other towns and cities, The Guardian reports. Right now they're just being used at a single intersection in a trial.
A spokesperson for the companytold Dutch-language site OmroepWest: "Smartphone use by pedestrians and cyclists is a major problem. Trams in The Hague regularly make an emergency stop because someone looks at their smartphone instead of traffic."
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