Lights, Action … & Cameras

The last of a series of new traffic lights on Whitney Avenue in Hamden has became operational. Though there is still more work to do replacing pavement and signage and painting lines, Hamden’s Traffic Project Manager Ted Braza, said he’s ​“seeing the light” on the project’s completion.

Six years ago, the town of Hamden applied for a grant from the state to replace traffic lights along Whitney Avenue. It was the second phase of a five-phase project to replace signals on Hamden’s two state-owned thoroughfares: Whitney Avenue and Dixwell Avenue. The first phase, in which the town replaced the traffic lights on Whitney from the New Haven border to Skiff Street, was completed a few years ago.

Hamden owns all of the traffic signals on Dixwell and Whitney even though the state owns the roads. The state offers grants to fully fund the replacement of town-owned traffic lights on roads it owns.

In total, the project will cost $3.8 million, funded or reimbursed in its entirety by the state. The actual installation costs $2.3 million, and the design $350,000. The rest of the cost is to cover contingencies and the overhead costs on the state’s end.

Braza said he hopes to have the work completed by May 31. Though the lights themselves are mostly complete, the contractor, Ducci Electrical Contractors, still needs to put in signage, repaint lines on the road, and replace the sidewalk it had to tear up in the process.

As Acting Chief of Police John Cappiello explained, replacing streetlights is not just a matter of swapping out the lights themselves. The contractors must replace the whole system, including the poles on which the lights are mounted.

The current light replacement phase includes intersections from Whitney and Worth Avenue up to Whitney and the Route 40 Connector, and also includes the intersection of Dixwell and Washington.

Improved Timing

The new lights come with a host of improvements on the previous ones. Many of the traffic signals along Whitney, said Cappiello, are 30 to 35 years old. Braza said that there have been problems with rust inside the lights.

The new lights come with a more efficient signaling system that uses cameras for detection rather than wires running under the street. Cameras sit on top of the poles on which the signals are mounted, one pointed in each direction of the intersection.

“The cameras,” said Cappiello, ​“are for detection. They’re not red light cameras. Red light cameras are not legal in Connecticut.”

Braza explained that each camera is pointed about 40 feet before the intersection, with certain activation points in its field of view. When a car pulls into the activation point, it trips the light to turn. This ​“fully actuated” system is more efficient than the older ​“fixed time” system because green lights only occur for any given lane when there are cars in that lane.

At each intersection is a large metal box that houses the computer and control system. In each one is a screen that shows what the camera sees, with the activation points marked with ​“P”s. When a car crosses the activation point, a blue box appears on the screen, signaling that the camera has detected the vehicle. Should a camera stop working, the intersection would simply switch to a fixed-time cycle until the camera is repaired.

And bicycles fear not: the cameras can also detect bikers.

The old detection system used wires under the ground that could register cars at the intersection. That system was less efficient because it still used a cycle, though the timing changed if the wires registered more cars in a certain direction. The system also did not register bikers.

The other drawback of the old system was that anytime the roads were repaved, the wires had to be dug up and replaced. Now, paving crews won’t have to worry about putting those wires back in.

The new system also connects all of the computers that control the individual intersections back to the police station, so that if need be, the lights can be controlled from a central location. That function can come in handy, said Braza, when an accident happens. If a crash is blocking lanes on Whitney, for example, the traffic department can quickly change the timing of the lights so that people on alternate routes like Dixwell have more greens.

The walk signals are also new. They’re ADA compliant, and make a sound when the signal is on for those who cannot see.

After the current replacements are complete, three more phases await, all of them on Dixwell: from Shepard Avenue down to the high school, from Benham Street to Church Street, and from Church Street down to Arch Street.

Once the time comes, the town will have to apply for grants for those projects. Due to financial hardships, the state has stopped fully funding traffic light replacements. Next time around, Hamden will have to cover the cost of design — 20 percent of the full price.