PASSING THE RED LIGHTS

Evening Star, Issue 21811, 29 August 1934, Page 8

PASSING THE RED LIGHTS

DISOBEYING “ STOP " SIGNAL PIONEER OF METHOD FINED. A man who said that he believed he was the first to introduce automatic traffic lights into Britain was fined 20s at Croydon, London, recently for passing the red lights at Carshalton. The man, Mr Oeorge Longlield Beasley, of Homefield, Merton, pleaded guilty, and added that he did not see the lights. The chairman of the bench, Sir Arthur Spurgeon, took advantage of the expert’s presence to usk him what he thought could be done to make the lights more visible.

Air Beasley suggested that they should be brought down to the motorist’s line of vision, and Sir Arthur said that they were impressed by the suggestion and hoped that some notice would bo taken of it.

“ Another thing wrong with them,” Air Beasley said afterward, “is the glass. Sometimes when the sun catches the red lights you cannot tell whether the light is on or oft.” Air Beasley said that he introduetd the automatic traffic lights into England in 1925. An American firm offered him a complete apparatus to see whether he could get any of the municipalities in Britain interested. “ 1 travelled about the country and saw several chief constables about the idea,” Air Beasley added, “ but they all turned it down and laughed at it. Many of them now have their cities full of those signals. “ Eight years ago they thought these signals just ‘ funny.’ Later 1 was bought out of the business.”