Cars Stopping in the Middle of the Street

[wilky]

Was going to reply to an old topic, but the mods locked it so I guess I will have to reopen the discussion topic. (I saw others were posting in the thread like "This is happening to me too" and "How do you fix this?")

I was having huge traffic issues where traffic getting off the highway onto my six-lane avenue was individually stopping in the middle of the street, causing a backup all the way back onto the highway. After studying the issue for a minute, it finally occurred to me that they were stopping at some extra node the game created where my bridge was touching back down to the terrain, and my problem was that I had extended a tiny road section into a "T" intersection, which was causing two nodes back-to-back (both with crosswalks, etc.)

At first, I went into TMPE and disabled the crosswalks for that extra "bridge" node, but this did not fix the issue. Then I went into TMPE and set "Keep Moving" signs for the bridge node, but this did not work either. Then I set up the whole works for BOTH nodes (yield/keep moving signs, plus I manually connected the lanes to reduce collisions, dedicated turn lanes, etc), and still the cars were stopping in the middle of the street! (at the "bridge" node, right in front of the intersection)

Finally, in order to solve the issue, I had to bulldoze the road going back to the bridge, and I had to reconstruct the bridge so that it stayed in the air until the T-intersection, and did not come down before it. Now that extra crosswalk/node is gone, and the cars are actually honoring the intersection rules I set up, and traffic is moving again.

[MessengerOfRage]

there probably was a base game stop sign hiding there.

TMPE priority rules and base gam stop signs are both possivle on same intersection....

[wilky]

Originally posted by Coookyman:

there probably was a base game stop sign hiding there.

TMPE priority rules and base gam stop signs are both possivle on same intersection....

I thought of this possibility after the fact, but I doubt it was the likely explanation because there was no cross-street at the "bridge node" where the stopping was occurring. So I doubt the base game would have put a stop sign there. There was simply no reason for a stop sign to exist (probably why I didn't even think to check).

[OneJasonBradly]

So originally the road touched down just before the intersection and created a node right before the intersection. Which caused vehicles to slow or pause before arriving at the intersection?
Shame you didn't get a shot of it, cause I would like to see that.

I found that I could change vanilla rules or exploit them at intersections a bit with angles and distances of nodes. I don't use traffic manager so I gotten creative or experimental with traffic control ideas. This game has some hidden things to it. I know how to make several different multi-state traffic lights depending on my needs for a intersection. Or mixed intersections where one of the streets coming into the intersection is NOT controlled by a traffic light. I am guessing but I think your road touched upon this "magical area" of the intersection. If you could re create this anomaly and take a shot or video clip of it, I would like to see that.

Here is just a sample of things I have done.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2412728885
Since this clip I have learned how to change "this lights" cycle by adjusting the intersection, or the streets attached to it.

Here I remove a traffic light to create a more priority path for traffic.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1812918493

[wilky]

I think I was able to recreate why it was happening, and the explanation. I think if enough cars came through here at the same time, the tiny little space between the "bridge node" and the intersection node would fill up with like three cars (e.g., let's say if the lead car at the intersection needed to pause for even just the tiniest half-second). This was causing a domino effect at the "bridge node" where the cars here were stopping to allow the space ahead to clear. Moreover, the cars were actually stopping before the node because they seek to keep the node itself clear, even though in this instance the "bridge node" did not represent an actual intersection that needed to be clear. So they were coming to a hard, full stop here and not flowing smoothly through to the intersection node. The intersection node was actually running more smoothly than the extra "bridge" node (probably because I had optimized the intersection to reduce collisions). But the lost momentum at the "bridge" node appeared to be enough to start backing up toward the highway.

[OneJasonBradly]

Originally posted by wilky:

I think I was able to recreate why it was happening, and the explanation. I think if enough cars came through here at the same time, the tiny little space between the "bridge node" and the intersection node would fill up with like three cars (e.g., let's say if the lead car at the intersection needed to pause for even just the tiniest half-second). This was causing a domino effect at the "bridge node" where the cars here were stopping to allow the space ahead to clear. Moreover, the cars were actually stopping before the node because they seek to keep the node itself clear, even though in this instance the "bridge node" did not represent an actual intersection that needed to be clear. So they were coming to a hard, full stop here and not flowing smoothly through to the intersection node. The intersection node was actually running more smoothly than the extra "bridge" node (probably because I had optimized the intersection to reduce collisions). But the lost momentum at the "bridge" node appeared to be enough to start backing up toward the highway.

Yup, that's sounds about right. The node that separates elevation is the key here. Thanks for your work on the issue.