Add quest for flashing_lights

[knkski]

General

Affected tag(s) to be modified/added: flashing_lights
Question asked: Does this crossing have flashing lights for pedestrians?

Checklist

Checklist for quest suggestions (see guidelines):

• 🚧 To be added tag is established and has a useful purpose
• 🤔 Any answer the user can give must have an equivalent tagging (Quest should not reappear to other users when solved by one)
• 🐿️ Easily answerable by any pedestrian from the outside but a survey is necessary
• 💤 Not an overwhelming percentage of quests have the same answer (No spam)
• 🕓 Applies to a reasonable number of map data (Worth the effort)

Ideas for implementation

Element selection:

Pedestrian crossings

Metadata needed:

Not sure. These crossings are common around me in the US

Proposed UI:

This is what the crossings look like near me:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0a/Bike_and_pedestrian_crossing_in_Portland%2C_Oregon.jpg

UI that asks "Does this crossing have flashing lights for pedestrians?" and presents "yes", "no", or "button" would capture ~90% of the tag values. Adding "always" and "sensor" would get up to ~99% of values, and allowing for multiselect would capture 25 uses of "button;sensor", but is probably too complex.

The UI would have to have some thought put into the "Traffic Lights" question, and maybe merged with it. The UI might present the options above when asking that, for a question like "Does this crossing have traffic lights?" with answers of "No lights at all", "Yes, pedestrians must wait for the lights", "Yes, pedestrians push a button to trigger flashing lights", "Yes, flashing pedestrian lights are always on", etc.

I looked to see if any issues existed for this and didn't find any other than #5471 mentioning it in the comments.

[mcliquid]

In my German-speaking area, such flashing lights are extremely rare (only 1 out of 2892 crossings in my district).
So let me ask you a few comprehension questions:

Adding "always" and "sensor" would get up to ~99% of values

Would the two answers always and sensor generally replace yes? Or are there other variants that are not covered by this?

The UI might present the options above when asking that, for a question like "Does this crossing have traffic lights?" with answers of "No lights at all", "Yes, pedestrians must wait for the lights", "Yes, pedestrians push a button to trigger flashing lights", "Yes, flashing pedestrian lights are always on", etc.

I would say that this needs its own quest, as I would advocate not activating this quest in the DACH region at least.

Which crosswalks do you use the flashing light for? On all or could you restrict it to only highway=crossing + crossing=uncontrolled/marked or even with crossing:signals=yes?

[HolgerJeromin]

I find the proposed question confusing

Does this crossing have flashing lights for pedestrians?

My initial thought was: The target audience for the lights are the pedestrian. Perhaps because I rarely have seen them (in western europe).

Suggestion:

Does this crossing have flashing lights to warn about pedestrians?

[westnordost]

Some traffic lights in Hamburg have flashing lights, but they are for the car drivers that turn right, to warn them that pedestrians have the walk signal at the same time. They are not for pedestrians.

E.g.

https://www.google.de/maps/@53.5733889,9.9489877,3a,22.9y,35.28h,91.93t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sSt5cxQtb46oocrMpKH54SA!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fcb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26pitch%3D-1.9336369002782732%26panoid%3DSt5cxQtb46oocrMpKH54SA%26yaw%3D35.28412017465697!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205410&entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI0MDkwOC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

[mnalis]

I too am worried about "💤 Not an overwhelming percentage of quests have the same answer (No spam)".

When you @knkski say "These crossings are common around me in the US", do you mean they are common in your neighborhood / quarter, in your city, in your state, or in whole of U.S.A. ?

Because, generally, it would be best if quest could be applied to whole world, but quests which are specific just for some country (or just for some State in case of USA) are also possible, but no finer granulation is available.

So, for example, if the quest would be useful in say Portland, but spammy in rest of the Oregon, it would be problematic to include it. (as it would confuse/annoy more users than it would help).

In Croatia, flashing_lights are quite rare, usually only found on busier & more complex intersections, where crossing=traffic_signals have failed to prevent repeated pedestrian injuries/deaths.
Also they could only be described as flashing_lights=yes as they usually fit neither always nor sensor (they are instead automatically synchronized with crossing=traffic_signals, which are in turn mostly based on timer, but sometimes take into account button_operated=yes requests too)

And yes, as noted above, flashing_lights=yes here are "to warn car drivers of possibility of unseen pedestrians", and not "for pedestrians" (crossing=traffic_signals are for pedestrians instead, to let them know when it is safe to cross).

[knkski]

I tracked down exactly what they're called, Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacons (RRFB):

https://highways.dot.gov/safety/proven-safety-countermeasures/rectangular-rapid-flashing-beacons-rrfb

Broad approval was granted in 2018 to start using these by the US DOT FHA, which mentions usage in Florida. I've noticed these installed more frequently around me in Minnesota as well, particularly as more intersections are being replaced with roundabouts, or with larger construction projects in general.

On to the questions:

Would the two answers always and sensor generally replace yes? Or are there other variants that are not covered by this?

Here's the snippet from the first link:

The flashing pattern can be activated with pushbuttons or passive (e.g., video or infrared) pedestrian detection, and should be unlit when not activated.

I don't recall having seen any that would be considered always, and the official recommendation is to not do that. I would say that yes would not be used, unless you couldn't determine if it was button or sensor for some reason.

Which crosswalks do you use the flashing light for?

As far as I've seen, these are used exclusively at crossings without stop signs or vehicular traffic signals. Pedestrian traffic signals, when they coexist with vehicular traffic signals, are of the sort that tell pedestrians when they are allowed to cross. RRFBs, in contrast, are put in where pedestrians always have priority whenever they want to cross, and the flashing lights are to inform traffic that they're crossing.

Does this crossing have flashing lights to warn about pedestrians?

Sure, that sounds good. For clarity's sake, these lights are warning traffic that a pedestrian is crossing, as opposed to the lights informing pedestrians when crossing is allowed.

When you @knkski say "These crossings are common around me in the US", do you mean they are common in your neighborhood / quarter, in your city, in your state, or in whole of U.S.A. ?

As noted above, I think the range here is US-wide. The OSM wiki notes them in Portland, I've seen them in Minnesota, and the approval process was based on installing them in Florida, which spans from coast to coast.

Let me know if there's any more questions and I'll answer as best I can. If this quest gets added, this PDF from the US DOT FHA has an icon that might work for the app:

[mnalis]

As noted above, I think the range here is US-wide. The OSM wiki notes them in Portland, I've seen them in Minnesota, and the approval process was based on installing them in Florida, which spans from coast to coast.

Could you estimate which percentage of all¹ of Minnesotan² pedestrian crossings would have those flashing lights? 90%? 50%? 10%? 1%?

Footnotes

1. i.e. both those with traffic signs and those with just markings on the road ↩

2. which I assume you're most familiar with ↩

[knkski]

It's difficult for me to estimate. These aren't used on quiet residential streets, so simply querying crossing=marked + highway=crossing pulls up too many extra nodes. These also aren't going to be used where there's already traffic lights for vehicles. They're going to be found primarily when crossing busy roads where there aren't nearby traffic lights (i.e. when crossing stroads). Maybe turbo overpass has a way to query those sorts of situations?

Here's an example of one. Here's an example of what would be useful when thinking about the total fraction. That crossing has the yellow diamond pedestrian crossing sign, but does not have the flashing lights. Out of crossings that have the yellow diamond pedestrian crossing sign, I would guess that RRFBs are 10% and rising in the metro area. I'm not a city planner, but it seems like it's the new thing whenever new construction is done to add them in.

You won't see these without marked crossings, so a useful filter would be "if crossing isn't marked, don't ask", "if crossing has vehicular traffic signals, don't ask", and "if crossing doesn't have tactile pavement markers, dont ask". The last one isn't actually a requirement, but I would be surprised to see one without tactile pavement markers, since these are relatively new and only put in where safety is a concern.

[mnalis]

They're going to be found primarily when crossing busy roads where there aren't nearby traffic lights (i.e. when crossing stroads). Maybe turbo overpass has a way to query those sorts of situations?

Uh, probably, there is around() function in overpass turbo, but I'm not that good with it. Bigger question is how to identify "busy roads" / "stroads" by OSM tagging alone. Are highway=residential considered non-busy (and thus unlikely to have flashing_lights), or are they more often busy "stroads"?

Out of crossings that have the yellow diamond pedestrian crossing sign, I would guess that RRFBs are 10% and rising in the metro area

Hmmm, and how many of all pedestrians crossings would you say have that "yellow diamond pedestrian crossing sign" ?

You won't see these without marked crossings, so a useful filter would be "if crossing isn't marked, don't ask",

OK, limiting the quest to only crossing:markings=yes (or other positive value) would make sense to me.

"if crossing has vehicular traffic signals, don't ask",

Huh, interesting. In my little part of the Europe, majority of flashing_lights are where there are vehicular traffic signals (and most often pedestrian traffic signals too!)

and "if crossing doesn't have tactile pavement markers, dont ask". The last one isn't actually a requirement, but I would be surprised to see one without tactile pavement markers,

Well, anything that can reduce the unnecessary asking of the quest would help; even if it results in some false positives (i.e. not asking a quest rarely when it could've been asked, is preferred to asking the quest all the time when answer would be "no" in majority of them)

[davidpnewton]

In the UK the only crossings which have this sort of thing are zebra and parallel crossings, ie marked crossings that don't have traffic signal control. Here it's the eponymous Belisha beacons that fulfil the function: the flashing orange lights on top of the black and white stripey poles. Those are to make the crossings more visible to vehicular traffic.

[knkski]

Are highway=residential considered non-busy

Yeah, based on a quick informal survey, roads marked highway=residential are very unlikely to have these (i.e. I didn't find any, and don't recall having seen any). I can find them on highway=secondary, highway=tertiary, and highway=service. Here's a case where the RRFBs are installed at the intersection of highway=tertiary and highway=residential. The highway=residential road has stop signs, but the highway=tertiary road doesn't, which is probably why the RRFBs were installed.

The highway=service usage is mostly for areas like parking lots near malls. I also found a usage of crossing a highway=unclassified, but that's probably just incompletely labeled.

Hmmm, and how many of all pedestrians crossings would you say have that "yellow diamond pedestrian crossing sign" ?

A lot of pedestrian crossings across anything other than highway=residential and not at a traffic signal have some sort of "pedestrian crossing" marking. Probably a large majority, based off of memory and a quick survey.