HouseHusban - What I'm saying is I don't agree they should be turning off traffic light systems unless they do their homework. How do they know which junctions are appropriate to turn off unless they turn them off? If an accident occurs at a junction that can then be reasonably attributed to a lack of a control system, who is then to blame? What if it's fatal?
All this is about motoring convenience at the cost of safety. If having traffic lights at a junction over a period of 10 years causes motorists millions of hours in delays, that is still worth it if having that control has, at some random point or by undocumented near miss, saved a person's life.
As for the cost, it's all about money. Motoring is massively expensive, as is road tax and council tax. I don't care if other, more technological ways of making adaptive systems is more expensive than just turning the things off, it's not worth the safety penalty. I also refuse to allow the fact that other country's policies being successful translate to it being the case on our roads. We drive differently, we have different attitudes to road use and separate research needs to be done here first. It should not be done on a whim, which is exactly what will happen and apparently already has.
My local council don't even have plastic wheelie bins, we just put bin bags at the side of the street. They say "they're currently trialing wheelie bins in certain areas". My mother has had a council wheelie bin for over a decade - they work. Why does my council need to trial something then that obviously works? It's because of money, wheelie bins cost money. So if they can't take data from other councils about things that don't relate to human safety, then they shouldn't be taking leafs out of other country's books which definitely do have safety issues relating to them. Especially if it's just a matter of money; which it always is.