Vivian Lay

So I just want to understand sort of how much what we've learned about ATSAC might apply to another city.

So if someone's sitting at a red light in another city, you know, Des Moines, Miami, how much of what's happening is basically the same and how much is really unique to the ATSAC system itself?

Okay.

And then finally, another Olympics are coming.

It's 44 years after ATSAC was born.

Is it going to play a similar role this time around?

Is it going to expand again?

Well, thank you so much, Salida.

It was really fun to learn about this system.

We really appreciate having you on.

Yeah, my pleasure.

We started with the question, how do LA's traffic lights actually work?

And the answer is that the whole city is wired up.

There are sensors embedded in the pavement at many traffic lights, and they connect through miles of underground fiber optic cables to a centralized control room.

In that control room, engineers monitor traffic flow and make adjustments in real time.

It's a system that started very small when Ed Roey and his team faced this impossible task, which was to keep traffic moving smoothly during the 1984 Olympic Games.

And since then, the system has grown, and ATSAC now manages nearly 5,000 traffic lights at intersections across the city.

With that, consider this service request resolved.

Today on the show, you heard Salida Reynolds, the chief innovation officer at L.A.

Metro, and Eric Zambon, a transportation engineer in charge of the ATSAC Traffic Management Center for LADOT.