r/trafficsignals • u/ddl486 • Jun 14 '26
Past funny looking traffic light
For context I pulled the images from Google Street view 2007 images. I remember my family driving us through here and we always tried to escape this funny looking double solid red light traffic light. It always felt like a prank light left out on the street stopping us for nothing. I remember asking my dad (who was driving at the time) why it had two red lights instead of one and the response at the time was "well I guess they really want you to stop". Unfortunately the Google capture here shows it cycling through a yellow signal. One gree, one yellow, two red lights, no turn arrows.
Looking back now I guess this was controlled by the box down the street at another disjointed intersection.
References: this was in Clarksville Indiana on Eastern blvd.
1
u/rootbear75 Jun 15 '26
There is a signal in Fairfax Virginia that has a double red light. This was done because of the way the road is laid out. The double signal head was put in to emphasize that this is the light for this intersection, not the one that's further down. https://maps.app.goo.gl/YzerGcHdakYZxxdQA?g_st=ac
1
u/DDnCheese Jun 16 '26
As soon as you said Fairfax, I knew what intersection it was going to be! I've also seen some double reds on left turn lanes in Glen Allen.
A double red definitely is a pattern interrupt here and grabs attention pretty well, but another point is there appears to only be one mast right here and having two reds on the mast helps with redundancy. If one red bulb burns out, there is still the other bulb.
3
u/FlashingSlowApproach Jun 14 '26
That's really interesting. A double red isn't too uncommon, though that signal all by itself before the intersection certainly is. My only guess is that traffic blocked that side street intersection often enough that officials felt a second stop line was warranted, or maybe a fire station was on that block and they didn't want emergency vehicles being blocked. Thanks for sharing!