The History of Traffic Lights

Controlling of the traffic is always a problem in crowded cities. Even before the motor vehicles, it was necessary to regulate the movement of horse cart, tramway, and pedestrians. In the past years controlling the traffic is made by police officers who wears white gloves and blow a whistle.

A traffic signal with light is placed in London capital of England next to Parliament building in 1868. The purpose of this traffic signal is helping the traffic police especially at night. There was colorful arms and colorful lamps on the device. The lighting is made by gas inside the device. The color of the light was changed with the help of green and red lenses. The police officer stands next to the pole that the device is connected and could turn the colored arms and lamps towards the traffic with the help of the arm just below the pole. That was the first time of using red and green lights to control the traffic. Two months later, this modernist lamp which works with gas was exploded and the police officer who used it injured.

In 1920, foundation of modern traffic signal was laid in Detroit which is the eleventh biggest city of USA. It was the first three colored electrical traffic control device which is made of three separated chambers as rectangle boxes shape. Each chamber illuminated separate lamp and equipped with different signal lenses. Yellow light added to red and green lights informed the drivers that the traffic signal was changing.

This application was followed accordingly by the largest cities of Europe. Electrical traffic lights used in Berlin in 1924, Milano in 1925, Rome in 1926, London in 1927, Prag in 1928 and Istanbul in 1929.

Especially after 1950, road traffic increased dramatically with the increase in the production and use of motor vehicles. In 1975, the number of automobiles in the world reached to 300 million. The increasing number of vehicles created a need for traffic lights to be used almost everywhere. Almost every city in the world used traffic lights to manage the traffic flow.

More than 100 years have passed since the first traffic light was used. Red, yellow, and green… Three color traffic lights have now become a daily part of every person’s life. Although the technology, appearance and management of traffic lights have changed, their function has remained basically the same.