I've got three completely off the wall responses to this item.
First, the "blue lights" being used in Moscow to get through traffic. It seems that thousands of Muscovites have bought the emergency blue flashing light that marks a priority vehicle. This model attaches magentically to the roof of your car. The outcome is predictable. When everbody has priority, no one has priority.
Second, in the town of Herndon, Va. they instituted a strange radar device to control speeders. If the radar detects a speeding car, it turns the next signal ahead to red, and then lets it pick up the cycle from there. That'll stop you. As long as you stop at the light, there's no ticket, no warning, no nothing. The only people who speed there are those who don't know or don't care, and those who also go through red lights.
Third, in the book Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution, theres a vignette about one of these guys who always commuted down Memorial drive to get to MIT, in Cambridge Ma. He noticed that the red lights seemed to perversely turn red at the wrong times. So one night, he stopped, took one of the traffic lights apart, figured out how it worked, and replaced the "wrong" algorithm with a "better" algorithm. The only thing this guy couldn't figure out is why the officials weren't happy with him. As far as he was concerned, he had done his civic duty!
