Comment by nmeofthestate
Comment by nmeofthestate 5 days ago
Usually a crossing will instantly switch when the pedestrian button is pressed, if enough time has passed since the last "walk" cycle. Having a stage where walk is enabled when there's no pedestrians around wouldn't much help pedestrians, and would introduce inefficiency in throughput. And obviously, drivers can't press a button, so it makes more sense for controls to be accessible to the pedestrians.
Instantly? You're definitely not in North America. Many intersections around me, if you missed pressing the crossing button before parallel street had a green light, you missed your opportunity to walk for the next minute.