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Jun 25 '12
20 years from now "THIS IS JUST LIKE THE TIME YOU TOLD ME PRESSING THAT BUTTON DOESN'T MAKE THE LIGHT CHANGE FASTER, WHY DO YOU LIEEEE?"
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u/RapedBySeveral Jun 25 '12
I'm still not convinced it does.
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u/rcktkng Jun 25 '12
They don't always. It's a psychological thing to make people happy. Here's an article about it and other non-real buttons.
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u/brevityis Jun 25 '12
They work by me, not repeated pressing, but you have to press it once to let it know there are pedestrians waiting to cross. Otherwise it will just go on forever and all the crosswalk lights in all directions remain red.
So it makes it faster, but not with repeat presses.
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u/xatmatwork Jun 25 '12
In the UK, main road ones with lots of traffic are just placebos, since the traffic light timings in that area are all carefully timed with complicated simulations to minimize the chance of traffic jams and accidents.
However, on the quieter streets with little risk of traffic jams, the road light will stay green permanently if the button is not pressed. If it is pressed, it will stop the traffic as soon as approximately 20 seconds have passed since the last time it was stopped (and instantly if it's already been 20 seconds).
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Jun 25 '12
Reddit. Where we bitch about how most kids these days are little shits and then we laugh at people undermining parenting...
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u/SullyZero Jun 25 '12
One time I was in the supermarket and this little boy kept saying that people had chips on their heads. I don't know what sparked him to say that, but he kept insisting to his mother who was getting more and more flustered with each person that walked by. I ran ahead to the chip aisle and grabbed a bag of Doritos and put them on my head as I rounded the corner where the mother and son were. The boy got the most delighted look on his face as he pointed at me and said "look mommy that man has chips on his head." The mom fixed me with one of the iciest stares I have ever received and said "he does have chips on his head doesn't he?" Oh how that woman hated me that day.
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u/mydadsahero Jun 25 '12
On an early Sunday morning in Seattle, I once got stopped by a cop and told that he'd seen me jaywalk across 10 blocks and told me how much in fines that would be. "I just got here from Chicago," I explained. "Yeah," he told me, "I could tell you weren't from around here. Go on." So I walked another ten blocks with no one around and waited for each Walk sign. I felt like an idiot.
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u/silent_p Jun 25 '12
Tell them it only works if they press the button 250 times. You might even spark an obsessive compulsive ritual.
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u/toproper Jun 25 '12 edited Jun 26 '12
Here in the Netherlands the second push cancels the request, so we never push the button twice.
Edit: This is actually a lie that I tell people that push the button even though I'm standing next to it and it's obvious I already pushed it.
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u/edgarallenbro Jun 25 '12
I know this feeling. I was working at a college cafeteria and we had a bunch of elementary school kids with their parents come through one day for some reason (happens every so often and we don't always get told why).
This kid's mom had lectured him about bringing his dirty place back up to not be wasteful. The health department policy is that we can't serve food onto a dirty plate, and it's something we get reminded of a lot by the management. I politely informed the child that I couldn't serve him food on his dirty plate, as I dished up what he had asked for onto a clean one.
He looks at me dumbfounded, with this look on his face that just says "My mother can be wrong?". His mother walks up and asks why he is getting a new plate instead of getting food on the old one and he gets really confused and doesn't know what to say. I repeated what I said to him to her and handed him the new plate.
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u/thattreesguy Jun 25 '12
This is a good time to introduce children to experimentation.
Time the wait when just pushing the button once, and again while pushing it multiple times and compare.
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u/Rinnee Jun 25 '12 edited Jun 25 '12
I was once waiting on a corner for a friend to bail me out of a shitty car situation and got to watch a few people interact with the traffic signal. One family came by and the kid pushed the button a couple times. The mom scolded him for it and that really struck a chord in me. A kid should be able to push a harmless button if he wants. It's not like it'll fuck him up later in life if he pushes the walk button a few too many times.
Anyway, I didn't want to do anything to upset the mother and father, so as they were walking away I waited until the kid looked back and mashed that button a couple times and winked.
"See kid? Adults can fucking push buttons all they want. Your parents aren't always right." is what I hoped our subtext was.
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u/NewRino Jun 25 '12
Man talk about picking your battles. As a parent I can tell you that if a kid wants to push a button like that, why not let him/her? Give them all the freedom to do what they want you can, when you can.
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Jun 25 '12
At intersections equipped with speakers (to assist the visually impaired in crossing safely), pressing the button a certain amount of times in quick succession (5 times in my city), results in the speakers engaging when the light changes.
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Jun 25 '12
When I was a young little pain in the ass, my mom was walking with me into a department store. And I was just being an asshole, whining and shit about how I didn't wanna try on pants for school. A man walking out said loudly, "Hey! No one likes a whiner! Babies whine and you're walking and talking, so you must not be a baby!"
My mom thanked him and I was the maddest I ever was at that age, cause I knew I lost.
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u/00aeef Jun 25 '12
I always feel a little guilty when a parent is patiently waiting with their child at a crossing (obviously trying to give a good example), even though there's no traffic coming, and I just cross anyway.
Still do it though, every time. I've got places to be dammit!
(UK, we don't have silly "jaywalking" laws.)
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u/Only_If_you_ask_me Jun 25 '12
You're a jerk