Level Crossings trigger nearby traffic lights to switch to perpendicular green.

[Codewow]

Describe your idea

Because of some short segment roads vehicles will stop before proceeding across the level crossing. This can be rectified at a cost by allowing vehicles to fill the level crossing. While this fixes the short segment issue, it causes train traffic to be held up. My idea is to utilize the level crossing trigger to force-change nearby traffic lights.

In the real world, when a train is nearing a crossing, traffic lights will sync with crossing gates. The gates will close while the perpendicular light will turn green to clear any traffic in that road segment or those potentially on the tracks (Why would you do that?)

Poorly edited screen shot below:

Notes or questions?

I'm not entirely sure if it's possible or how difficult it would be to implement, but I think the ability to do something like this could really change how people make their cities and towns. No more avoiding creating level crossings altogether and no more train traffic hold ups due to trains being afraid of tiny vehicles.

[originalfoo]

Tagging #426

[originalfoo]

It will need some careful consideration, for example, take this situation:

A car exiting the crossing on the left of the image wants to turn right (pink route). But if there is already traffic on that road, which is now stopped by the traffic lights on the right side of that image, traffic might jam on the level crossing.

So, at the very least, there should be sufficient time for existing traffic to clear; the level crossing light-changing effect will likely need to start well in advance of the train arriving.

[Codewow]

The change of lights should be short and temporary. Because the green light in the picture would go red after a few seconds to let the cross traffic flow while the gates are closed. The left intersection lights would also turn green before the ones on the right if a train wasn't coming from the opposite side. Which could leave room for traffic to have cleared enough space to allow those few cars in if they were turning right.

The main goal is to worry about the level crossing so trains are not blocked. If the traffic is bad enough at the level crossing I would think that that would be the job of the player to manage.

This addition as a feature should definitely be an optional one as not all level crossings act the same for trains and traffic lights. It would definitely make managing traffic more fun. I don't like completely avoiding creating level crossings at all. Thanks for your interest!