Talk:Northern Parkway (Baltimore)

Removal of "First Traffic Light" claim
The article contains the following statement:
 * "The intersection of Falls Road and Belvedere Avenue was the location of the first modern traffic light in 1928."

The source of the citation is a State of Maryland website, and the origin of the claim is not cited on the Maryland web site.

However, in reviewing Wikipedia's own article on the traffic light is the following statement in its history section:


 * "The first electric traffic light was developed in 1912 by Lester Wire, an American policeman of Salt Lake City, Utah, who also used red-green lights.7 On 5 August 1914, the American Traffic Signal Company installed a traffic signal system on the corner of East 105th Street and Euclid Avenue in Cleveland, Ohio.89 It had two colors, red and green, and a buzzer, based on the design of James Hoge, to provide a warning for color changes. The design by James Hoge10 allowed police and fire stations to control the signals in case of emergency. The first four-way, three-color traffic light was created by police officer William Potts in Detroit, Michigan in 1920.11 Ashville, Ohio claims to be the home of the oldest working traffic light in the United States, used at an intersection of public roads (from 19xx to) 1982 when it was moved to a local museum.12"

This quoted paragraph cites SEVEN sources:

7. Mary Bellis (5 February 1952). "The History of Roads and Asphalt". Inventors.about.com. Retrieved 2009-05-19. 8. Sessions, Gordon M. (1971). Traffic devices: historical aspects thereof. Washington: Institute of Traffic Engineers. pp. 27–28. OCLC 278619. 9. "New Traffic Signal Installed". The Motorist (Ken Pub. Co): 28–29. August 1914. 10."USPTO # 1251666 Sept. 22, 1913". Patimg2.uspto.gov. Retrieved 2009-05-19. 11.Moyer, Sheldon (March 1947). "Mr. 'Trafficlight'". Motor News (Automobile Club of Michigan): 14–15, 27. 12.Neato Stuff At the Ashville Museum. Ashville Area Heritage Society. Retrieved 2008-04-16.

Furthermore, there is US patent 1,251,666 for his "Municipal Traffic Control System" in 1918, which predates the Maryland Claim by 10 years. This is cited on the History Channel site, and it matches the research done by CBS Sunday Morning on their Sunday August 1, 2004 show in which they recognized the Cleveland light as the first traffic light installation.

So I am removing the claim.

HOWEVER, the question remains is the claim correct, and if so, was it the first traffic light in Baltimore? Maryland? The first to be fully automatic? In other words, what was the light first at, if anything, that can be documented. Sjkoblentz (talk) 20:10, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

About its History
Okay, I tried finding the source for the road's origins but I couldn't find any sources about it. Any suggestions? Speed doesn't always mean quality 400Weir (talk) 18:58, 9 January 2023 (UTC)