Color Blindness and Traffic Light Designs
During a conversation with my friend, who is color-blind and has difficulty differentiating some colors, including red and green, he talked about how driving is very dangerous for him because he sometimes cannot see if the traffic light is green or when it’s red or yellow, especially in rainy days when the light of one bulb shines on the one next to it. He often had to suddenly accelerate or stop due to the confusion of whether the light was yellow or red. This causes problems with other cars beeping at his slow movement or sudden stop and causes a lot of stress whenever he’s driving. Even if he remembers the order of the lights it is still stressful for him.
This was something that I had never thought about—how the design of traffic lights has caused such troubles for people with color blindness for so long, yet our world still uses the same system, and this issue has never been properly addressed. I realized how we often take our existing environment for granted and forget that it comes at the cost of the loss of personal security for other groups of people.
This is how people with green deficiency see the lights.
To address this issue, some newer traffic lights have been equipped with a bluish-green light rather than a pure green light to enhance visibility for red-green colorblind people. In Japan, traffic lights are usually red, yellow, and blue instead of green because green and blue share the same name “Ao” (although green can also be referred to as “Midori,” people usually refer to green traffic lights as “Ao”), so the government changed the green light to a blue light in 1973.
Although the Japanese government did not make this change for inclusivity for people with visual impairments, I think this is a possible solution that can help people with green deficiency while driving. In Taiwan, and perhaps in more countries, apart from red, yellow, and green lights, the red light also shows a countdown so cars can know exactly when they should stop and foresee. Sometimes there are countdowns for green lights too. Personally, I find the countdown useful as it tells us exactly how much time we need to wait, as opposed to anxiously waiting and staring at the big red dot. Also, having the numbers can potentially solve the confusion of red and yellow lights.
But there must be better ways to resolve this issue. So I looked into alternative traffic light designs and found an article on Web Urbanist that includes different redesigns of classic traffic lights. One of the designs stood out to me for the proposed solution for color-blind people, while some others are creative but the same problem still stands.
For example, the hourglass traffic light designed by Thanva Tivawong cycles through green, yellow, and red, emptying from top to bottom like an hourglass. However, though this concept is a fun and creative design, it would be a complete disaster for colorblind drivers because there is only one display, making it impossible for them to differentiate.
The design that I believe would be a perfect inclusive modification to the classic traffic signal is the Unisignal, designed by Ji-Youn Kim, Hwan Jun Jeon, and Soon-young Yang. They used simple shapes to convey instructions: a triangle for stop, a circle for caution, and a square for go. (When I saw this design, I was wondering why this PERFECT design has not been implemented yet?) I find this design to be very smart because it not only addresses the problems that colorblind drivers face by incorporating universal shapes to indicate the signal but also doesn’t require adaptation from people who are already accustomed to the red-yellow-green light system. The only adjustment I would make to this design if I were the designer is to make the lights bigger so that people can see the shapes clearer from far away.
It was very empowering to see how designers use their tools to create a more inclusive world. It showed me that design is not only about drawing things on paper or the computer, talking with clients, and creating eye-catching visuals, it is also a very critical skill that can drive social changes.
Work Cited
https://weburbanist.com/2010/12/29/stop-look-and-love-8-redesigns-of-classic-traffic-lights/
https://www.yankodesign.com/2010/11/18/sands-of-traffic-times/
https://dornob.com/full-stop-new-direction-shape-based-traffic-signal-design/
https://weburbanist.com/2010/12/29/stop-look-and-love-8-redesigns-of-classic-traffic-lights/
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