Traffic Signals

Slow, then stop, then go. Repeat.

Traffic signals have been around a long time around the world. Let's see what they do in Thingamajigs.

Traffic signals are created from various materials including the Traffic Component. There are railroad/railway crossing signals, traffic signals, beacons, and more.

Most of the traffic lights in Thingamajigs are premade/preprogrammed.

This means they use textures for displaying different signal colors/commands. Others are timed a certain way (meaning they use more complex and realistic behaviors) and can't be customized.

All texture-based traffic signals are timed and in-sync with other traffic signal's textures.

Some must be activated using redstone to do anything at all, or special helper blocks that activate them, such as the pedestrian flashers, which only activate if a pedestrian crosswalk button (if placed beneath the flashers block) is pressed.

In the future, there may be a chance these blocks will be converted into non-texture locked customizable traffic signals (possibly using blockstates or block entity magic).

Some specialty signals are described below. There may be some code explanation to make stuff make more sense.

H.A.W.K. Signals are a type of pedestrian signal. Use these to stop traffic and allow a safe passage for players walking the sidewalks of your towns and cities.

How do they work? Take a look at the code below (from Thingamajigs 1.6.9 source):

public void tick(BlockState bs, ServerLevel sl, BlockPos bp, RandomSource rs) {
    BlockState nbs = ThingamajigsBlocks.HAWK_SIGNAL_FLASHING_YELLOW.get().defaultBlockState();
    boolean signaled = sl.hasNeighborSignal(bp);

    if(signaled){
        sl.setBlock(bp,nbs.setValue(FACING,bs.getValue(FACING)),3);
    }
    else{
        sl.scheduleTick(bp,this,5,TickPriority.LOW);
    }
}

When you place the HAWK signal down, it will immediately start ticking (https://minecraft.wiki/w/Tick). The code above will run on every tick that this block is allowed to, in this case, every 5 ticks.

If you power this block with a redstone pulse or strong signal, the block will change to a different version of the HAWK signal, and begin an automatic sequence. Just sit back, and watch the rest. Note that if there isn't a redstone signal before the change occurs, nothing will change. The block will just sit and tick away until a redstone signal is applied.

There are 5 steps to the signal:

• Off (Mounts and Modded Cars can go)

• Flashing Yellow (Everyone must slow down)

• Yellow (Prepare to stop soon)

• Red (Stop)

• Flashing Red (Stop then go if all players are not in the crosswalk)

This is a simple signal, however if implemented properly can make towns and cities much more organized with multiple players about. Players in sidewalk must wait until all cars, mounts or whatever are stopped.

This concludes the traffic signals section. Read more about other blocks by using the sidebar for navigation, or click one of the buttons below to go to the previous or next section.