Sometimes massive government waste to support "that looks cool" is a good thing.

I want these everywhere! Everywhere I say!

I can't wait till the beer delivery truck parks blocking the lasers.

Where this would actually be cool is if those lasers worked like the slice and dice ones in the Resident Evil movies. Oops, shouldn't have encroached on the crosswalk, there went my engine block!

The hilarity would definitely ensue if the image control systems were networked.

Pedestrian impacts also cause unnecessary paint damage and may possibly void certain manufacturer warranties and/or service agreements.

Wtf? I recognize this intersection from anywhere. Front Street and Simcoe Street in downtown Toronto.

Yanko = Think Tank of Calamitous Intent

This makes me want to drive through it... not exactly the effect that a stop light should evoke.

This would be great until an emergency services vehicle such as an ambulance crashes because the driver's vision was impaired.

@strider_mt2k: The solution to that is not "laser walls". The solution is fitting your car with a reinforced cow catcher which has the added benefit of helping traffic flow by plowing through slow-moving vehicles.

All street lights do is give pedestrians a false sense of security coupled with a baseless notion of entitlement.

In Newark, the pedestrians huddle in fear against building walls because the terrible New Jersey drivers have conditioned the populace to realize that not even the sidewalks are safe.

I'm pretty sure any lasers powerful enough to be seen in daylight like that would cause instant blindness if you looked into them.

Instant fail.

Would I get resident-eviled to pieces driving through this? Could I be cut into tiny chunks? Cause that might deter me from running a redlight...

Something deep inside me wants to put on a suit covered in mirrors and dance around in that thing.

So I guess you'd need lots of pollution or fog in the air for that to work. But even then it wouldn't work. I don't think there's any physics that contrains light to only reflect off certain points as it propagates from point A to point B. So I guess this is a photochop from the mind of an artist and not a physicist.

I'm no rocket scientist, but I don't think we really have any technology that can do this.

This isn't new tech, this is no tech.

I can already see a hackers 'rick-rolling" or even worse "goatsie'ng" stopped drivers.

This is not unnecessary where I live at all. Quite the contrary, this will remind people that some weirdos, for whatever reason, walk places.

We have red light cameras that take your picture when someone crosses the limit line. We should covert the cameras to lasers and shoot out peoples eyes when they cross the limit line.

Or maybe sharks could pop up from manholes with freakin lazer beams attached to thier heads.

@tileeater: And that those weirdos are soft and vulnerable and squishy.

They're not pedestrians; they're future speedbumps.

I for one would LOVE to try to make a left turn while seeing through that -.-

@ZekeSulastin: Bah, judge trying to make a left turn on green, need sleep ...

I doubt most cities have right-turn-on-red, so ...

@James: Twat? sure we do, haven't you been to the space museum?

What a waste of money though, kind of like the $10,000 government toilet seat covers.

"now, look to your right... AAAAAHHHHHHH!!!! I'm blind!!!"

still cool tho. still cool.

@sorensilk: Disco Stew doesn't advertise.

If you really want people to stop at red lights, set up a spike strip that pops UP when the light is red and goes back down when its green.

Or just arm the pedestrians and let us shoot them. That works too. Hit me, go ahead. Make my day.

@OMG! Ponies!: Then I guess you wouldn't care much for the flyswatter street lamp approach. If you run a red light, you're suddenly swatted into a pancake by a big perforated spatula. It's comedic, and deadly at the same time.

I don't see how a laser can be set up to reflect off arbitrary locations in free space.

If that was possible, then R2D2-like projection would be possible.

@OMG! Ponies!: Strider and I are in South Jersey, and the rules are pretty much backwards here. People will walk 5 deep in the street with no regard to your oncoming vehicle.

@GOKOR: That's the Manhattan Pedestrian Philosophy. Which makes me wonder why there was never a Seinfeld episode on the "lean-and-look" whereby the pedestrian stands in the parking lane and leans into the roadway to look and see if it's safe to jaywalk.

Better than bollards, mate.

+ Watch video

"AHHHHHH Honey!! LOOK OUT!! There's giant people crossing the street!!!"
*Screeeeeech*
"Why are you yelling at me?!?! Don't you think I can see these enormous red idiots?"
"Well, if you weren't on your cell phone blabbing to your mom about the stupid puppy parade I MIGHT have slight confidence in your driving. And I can hear her on the other end talking shit about me.. you've got that damned volume up so high, Big Red over there can hear her cackle."
"Cackle?!?! Cackle!?!? My mother does not cackle. She was so right about you."
"Right about what?! That I stop at intersections with red lights the size of our house?!?! Cuz if that's what she said then fuck me sideways your mother's a genius. But if she said that I stay stopped when the big red wall turns into a big green "GO!" then she's just as big of a goblin as her daughter turned out to be. Now GO!"
"You are unbelievable.. un.... unbelievable."

@GOKOR: Ditto here in San Francisco. Day or night, people amble randomly through busy lanes of traffic. I can only assume that it comes from mothers tucking their little tykes into bed with the encouragement that, "Someday you, too, could become the hood ornament on somebody's Buick--make me proud!"

@scarbrtj: Nice!! Especially the one that almost flipped the car.

@92BuickLeSabre:
I agree. That's one of the coolest wastes of tax payer money I've seen in awhile.

How about instead of the cool light show though, when it's time for people to walk across the street those ram bars (or whatever they're called) come of from the street to stop oncoming cars.

Maybe even an automated sentry unit.

I dunno. After coming back from NYC, when crossing the street I'm really starting to get used to the "RUN FOR YOUR FUCKIN LIVES!!" routine.

Its also capable of stopping Obi-Wan from saving Qui-gon.

this looks very ugly. sure it may look cool at first, but imaging seeing the landscape littered with these. what an eyesore.

CAUTION: DO NOT LOOK DIRECTLY INTO LASER WITH REMAINING EYE!

Even better would be to have all cars know the status of the intersection they are approaching, and have indicator lights INSIDE the car.

Aside: Build tunnels and put all car roads underground.

Oh man, when the town I live in get busy enough for a stop light, we simply have to get one of these!

And to pay for it, they can show us advertising while we wait for the light to turn! Of course, people who don't want to stop for commercials can pay to drive on premium channels, er roads.

@CaptCaveman: Yes, but be patient. First you have to lay down pavement.

might as well set up a rock concert while you are at it. laser lights, smoke, fog and oh yeah, music!

That would just make driving on acid so dope!

It's from Yanko Design, I have no idea why anyone is caring about this at all, NOTHING from Yanko has been even prototyped yet.

should make it that the lasers destroy the car if it passes through

@Rabid Penguin: Those should be used for taxis!

@gusnyc.com:
It's not a bad idea, but it could cause a problem if someone fell through the laser wall while trying to cross the street.

What is this "The Onion"? This product could not work, the "lasers" that could be used for this would need some sort of interference (fog,water,glass etc.) to illuminate the area between the nodes. It would be so highly inefficient no sane person would ever try passing this into a budget. They would be pretty damn cool though...kind of a "fifth element" theme.

@Michai: You operate from the false premise that budgets are drawn up in a sane manner. Put enough lobbying capital behind it and some politico on the take will sing its praises as the greatest invention since sliced bread.

Itchytooth is actually onto something - dual purpose it for advertising. NYC has pretty much sold every surface possible for ad revenue to staunch the never-ending flow of red-ink (hey City Hall, the problem is Albany taking our money).

@Michai: You're an onion.