This seems like a nice idea but I actually think it would be terrible. The big discovery recent-ish is "Traffic Expands to Fill Available Road Space" [1]. A situation where traffic lights become smarter to keep traffic balanced between main streets and side streets and between different intersections of the city would just mean result in every single intersection of a given city being in grid-lock simultaneously rather than just some of them.
Already, I've notice that rush-hour lights seem to tuned to take longer than mid-day light - assume that's because any light-change is going to be inefficient (logically enough). But since rush is fated to total congestion anyway, the result just congestion plus tortuously long lights.
Already, I've notice that rush-hour lights seem to tuned to take longer than mid-day light - assume that's because any light-change is going to be inefficient (logically enough). But since rush is fated to total congestion anyway, the result just congestion plus tortuously long lights.
[1] http://www.culturechange.org/issue8/traffic%20expands.htm