All Columbia County traffic signals back up and running, but issues persist
COLUMBIA COUNTY, Ga. (WJBF) – Columbia County traffic signals are all back up and running, but it's still slow-going in some places.
All 83 traffic signals in Columbia County were wiped out by Hurricane Helene. It took about a week to get them operational again, but the traffic cameras still need some work.
"With all the wind we had, all the cameras were shifted, thrown, broken," said Kyle Titus, the Engineering Division Director for Columbia County. "We've gotten them all replaced and we have all the cameras pointed back at the right lanes."
Now, the county's traffic engineering department is focused on fixing the detection zones on each traffic camera. The zones tell the software when the lights should change colors.
"There's a lot more to that than it sounds, but we're working heavily with our vendor and our traffic staff now are working heavily to get all that set back up," Titus said.
These are the primary detection zones the county uses because they can detect more cars than the weighted zones in the ground.
"So run this light for twenty seconds and then go red, and then run the side streets for ten seconds and then go red. So it's constantly doing that based on the volume of traffic approaching each leg," Titus said.
Right now they're working on big intersections like Washington Rd. and Bobby Jones Expressway, Columbia and Belair Roads, and the whole Washington Road corridor.
"We're starting based on the volume that goes through that signal on an average day and we're knocking out the highest volume signals first and working way down to the more rural signals," Titus said.
Titus asks drivers in the area to practice caution and patience while the issue is sorted out.
"If you're at a light and it's not operating like it normally does prior to the storm, don't be alarmed, don't feel like you need to report it, you're welcome to report it to us, but don't feel like you need to report it to us," he said. "We're going through each signal individually to make sure all the components are corrected."
Titus said they're hoping to have the traffic system completely refurbished within the next few weeks, and traffic should be back to normal by Thanksgiving.
