PHOENIX — When a streetlight turns yellow, how much time do drivers need to safely stop? An Operation Safe Roads investigation found many Valley cities were shortchanging the yellow.
Now, more than three years after our initial reporting on this important driving safety issue, the ABC15 Investigators have checked in with Phoenix leaders who planned to retime every intersection in the city. The goal is to reduce the number of red light crashes.
ABC15 recently spoke with Angie Kramer, who survived a red light crash in 2019 near 35th and Glendale avenues.
"I was leaving CVS... hit from the driver's side front end," Kramer said.
Her car was totaled, and her life was changed.
"It was at least a good full year before I was walking without a cane or a walker," Kramer said.
Kramer is one of hundreds of people a year impacted by red light runners in Phoenix. It's such a dangerous, even deadly, problem in the Valley, we spent months investigating in 2021.
Back then, we found nine of the ten largest Valley cities, including Phoenix, were timing yellow lights to be shorter in duration than the standards recommended by the Institute of Transportation Engineers. We also found research that showed giving drivers more time to stop could help prevent deadly crashes.
After our reports, Phoenix commissioned its own study, finding that longer yellow lights did in fact reduce red light running. The city council then greenlit a project to retime all the signalized intersections in the city over three years.
Simon Ramos, a traffic engineering supervisor for Phoenix, tells ABC15 his street engineering team is trying to pick up the pace. That is because nearly two years into the three-year project, they've only changed about one-third of the city's yellow lights.
As of May 1, 433 intersections were retimed, while 872 remained.
"We had a slow start as far as getting the right positions hired and to train the individuals. Currently, we're at 36%. The goal is to meet that deadline, October 2026 timeframe, and we're confident that we'll meet that goal," Ramos said.
The retiming process starts with a crew measuring every intersection and taking notes. Then, engineers calculate the yellow light duration based on an Institute of Transportation Engineers formula to give cars enough time and distance to stop, even if they are going up to seven miles an hour over the posted speed limit. For example, doing 52 in a 45-mile-per-hour zone.
Ramos said the city is studying the results in retimed intersections.
"It seems that the red light running behavior is normalizing in a positive fashion," Ramos said.
Jay Beeber with the National Motorists Association has long advocated for longer yellow lights, but he says city engineers should take an additional step by checking drivers' actual speeds on a stretch of road.
Beeber said if drivers are going around 50 when the speed limit is 35, they won't have ample time to stop, even with the city's 'plus-seven' formula.
"This is basic first-year physics. You have to set your light timing to the speed that traffic is actually approaching the intersection," Beeber said.
Beeber said that while longer yellow lights can prevent some crashes, they're not going to solve the problem completely. There are still drivers who are too distracted, tired or impaired to notice the light at all, like the driver who hit Angie Kramer.
Kramer offered advice for other drivers on the road: don't be in such a hurry to go on green.
"Never take off from an intersection when the light turns green. Wait that three seconds or so. Look both ways, even if people are honking," Kramer said.
Kramer said she's also in favor of the city's plan to reinstall red light cameras at some intersections, hoping it will encourage people to slow down and stop.