Top 10 oldest traffic safety technologies

Armco railing or guardrails were popularised in 1960 by their manufacturer, the American Rolling Mill Company (hence the name). The deformable steel barrier was designed to prevent an errant vehicle from exiting the roadway, and to minimise the harm to vehicle occupants in the event of a collision.

Prior to the advent of guard rails, white wooden or concrete posts, often with cable or rope stretched between, served a similar purpose; though with nowhere near the same effect. Modern guardrails have since evolved to dissipate impact energy entirely, effectively ‘catching’ the vehicle in the barrier, rather than ejecting it back into traffic.

In many countries, including Australia, so-called Wire Rope Barriers made of parallel steel cables suspended between aluminium posts now replace Armco-type barriers.

Unfortunately, these put motorcyclists at an unnecessary risk and have little effect in slowing larger trucks and buses.

The cat’s eye road reflector is so-named because inventor Percy Shaw noted similarities between his invention, and the eye-shine properties of cats' eyes.

But it wasn’t the domestic feline that inspired Percy’s creation. Travelling at night through roadworks to remove tramlines, Shaw noted the polished strips of steel reflected his car’s headlights effectively, leading to his 1934 patent for the Reflecting Roadstud.

Shaw’s idea housed a pair of reflective lenses (invented six years earlier by Richard Hollins Murray) in a steel and rubber dome which was set into the roadway to denote the edge of the road. The invention was a life-saver in thick British fog, and was adapted globally shortly after WWII.

The humble stop sign made its debut in Michigan in 1915, though the octagonal shape we know today wasn’t popularised until 1922.

The eight-sided design was aimed at ‘stopping’ illiterate drivers as it was a different shape to every other sign on the road. Initially the S-T-O-P lettering was black on a yellow background, the red (for stop) adopted almost universally in 1971.

According to international standards, a stop sign should be mounted 2.13m (7ft) above the ground and visible from “a distance suitable so as to provide adequate stopping time for an average vehicle in the speed limit zone hence advised”. Clear as mud, really.

If it wasn’t for a leaking milk tanker, we’d never have the painted road line.

OK, that’s only partially true. But on observing the vivid white line left on the roadway by a leaking milk tanker, Michigan road chairman, Edward Hines, proposed the trial of white painted road lines as a means of separating directional traffic.

The idea caught on quickly, and by 1914 was in use in the UK, eventually marking sharp corners, the road’s edge (fog line), pedestrian crossings, and railway lines.

Reflective road markings were conceived in the 1930s when glass beads were added to the paint mixture. Rumble strips or sleeper lines – where raised paint creates a ‘rumble’ through the car’s tyre – were conceived in New Jersey in 1952.

The idea behind the speed hump is almost as old as the car itself. First adopted by the municipality of Chatham, NJ (USA) in 1906 it consisted of a raised five-inch pavement section to separate the roadway and footpath.

Nowadays, we’d consider that the kerb. But the idea did inspire Arthur Holly Compton whose 1953 ‘traffic control bump’ became a study for various road bodies around the globe. It culminated in the installation of the first speed hump in the Netherlands in 1970.

Known as the speed bump, traffic control hump, and even the sleeping policeman, the speed hump is now a common fixture in just about every modern city – and the bane of every lowered-car owner world-wide.

If you really want to go back to the start, there are examples of pedestrian crossings in the ruins of Pompei. Here, raised stones helped people cross the streets, which also served as the town’s sewer. Gross.

But in modern times, the first ‘true’ pedestrian crossing dates back to 1868 when a semaphore signal stopped horse traffic to allow people to cross London’s busy Bridge Street – the same time we find the first traffic light used (see below).

Now known as pedestrian crossings or cross walks, the two main types comprise a red and green traffic light-style arrangement, usually at intersections, or painted ‘zebra’ style crossing that aims to have pedestrians cross at a specific point, like the one seen on the Beatles’ famous Abbey Road album cover.

Rail signalling systems inspired the first gas-lit traffic light. Installed in London in 1868, the lantern was lit manually by a police officer who in turn controlled horse-drawn and pedestrian ‘traffic’ flow at his own discretion. It exploded a year later, severely injuring the policeman operating it.

A mix of semaphore arms and revolving boxes with illuminated ‘Stop’ and ‘Go’ panels were trialled around the globe before the electric traffic light we know today was developed in 1912.

Invented by American policeman, Lester Wire, the familiar red (stop) and green (go) pattern was accompanied by a buzzer to tell drivers the light was changing. The amber (caution) light was added in 1920.

Automation of traffic lights followed in 1922, while Down Under, the first installation of a traffic light was in Melbourne in 1928 (cnr. Collins and Swanston Streets).

Round intersections have been around since 1768. But the roundabout as we know it today was first implemented in 1907 by American architect, John McLaren.

McLaren’s ‘traffic circle’ differed from earlier French designs by controlling vehicular and tram traffic separately, inspiring similar designs in the UK that still prove popular today. The US didn’t persevere with the roundabout as a general rule, and in the 1950s removed many ‘traffic circles’ in favour of the four-way stop. Modern roundabouts are favoured by road designers as they allow entering drivers to give way to traffic within the roundabout without the need for traffic lights.

Depending on where you live, roundabouts are known as road circles, rotaries, rotundas or islands. France now has more roundabouts than any other country, with over 31,000 built across the nation.

Like many of the traffic technologies listed here, the speed limit actually predates motorised vehicles. The first recorded ‘speed limit’ (1652) advised New Amsterdam residents that “no wagons, carts or sleighs shall be run, rode or driven at a gallop”. There was even a fine equivalent to $150 for breaking the law.

The UK State Carriage Act of 1832 introduced the offence of “furious driving” while numeric-type speed limits followed in 1861… though mainly for the rail system. Town speed limits for roads followed soon after, the Red Flag Act of 1865 making a 3km/h limit (walking pace) in towns the rule until 1896 (when it was raised to 23km/h).

In the US the first numerical speed limit was set in 1901 (19km/h in cities and 24km/h on country roads), the UK setting a national speed limit of 32km/h in 1903. The UK’s national speed limit was set at 112km/h back in 1967.

The boom gate or boom barrier serves mainly to stop cars driving in front of trains – or from exiting a car park without paying!

The horizontal folding arm can also be used to stop traffic flow into intersections, raised bridges or even tunnels, and was hand-operated until automation took place with the popularisation of electricity in the 1920s.

Depending on whom you ask the boom gate can trace its origins to the Middle Ages when logs were chained together across a waterway to protect a harbour from attack, or to stop a ship from avoiding its harbour toll.

It’s believed the idea was adapted for road use in the first quarter of the 20th century, but with no solid information to be found, we may need to leave this one to your imagination.