# Feature "avoid traffic lights" (primary for heavy vehicles)

**URL:** <https://ask.openrouteservice.org/t/feature-avoid-traffic-lights-primary-for-heavy-vehicles/4715>\
**Category:** directions\
**Created:** [March 29, 2023, 6:47am UTC](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/t/feature-avoid-traffic-lights-primary-for-heavy-vehicles/4715 "2023-03-29T06:47:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![tomastomas](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/user_avatar/ask.openrouteservice.org/tomastomas/32/2206_2.png) [@tomastomas](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/u/tomastomas)\
**Post date:** [March 29, 2023, 6:47am UTC](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/t/feature-avoid-traffic-lights-primary-for-heavy-vehicles/4715/1 "2023-03-29T06:47:53Z")

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As a driver of heavy vehicles (trucks mostly) it is often better to take a little longer route if it means I can avoid traffic lights. Traffic lights often mean repeated stop/start/stop/start which gives more fuel consumption and wear on the vehicle, and also takes longer time.

Every minute and fuel drop saved is worth the effort for a commercial driver. At present, there are no possibilities to avoid traffic lights, which makes the routes non optimal for heavy vehichles.

**Suggestion**

Add “traffic lights” under the “avoid features” section.

![ScreenShot3355](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/uploads/default/original/2X/3/3efb72ea38aa50bb7ad110b65384d4f5c152a365.png)

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**Author:** ![amandus](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/user_avatar/ask.openrouteservice.org/amandus/32/669_2.png) [@amandus](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/u/amandus)\
**Post date:** [March 29, 2023, 11:59am UTC](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/t/feature-avoid-traffic-lights-primary-for-heavy-vehicles/4715/2 "2023-03-29T11:59:35Z")

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Hi @tomastomas,

setting it as avoidable would mean that you can not use roads with traffic lights at all. If I understood you correctly you want to minimize the usage of such roads and not avoid them completely.  
This might be possible with e.g. a penalty for those roads but I’m not sure whether it is feasible within our live API.  
Maybe open [an issue](https://github.com/GIScience/openrouteservice/issues) in our backend repository and discuss it there.

Best regards

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**Author:** ![tomastomas](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/user_avatar/ask.openrouteservice.org/tomastomas/32/2206_2.png) [@tomastomas](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/u/tomastomas)\
**Post date:** [March 29, 2023, 5:55pm UTC](https://ask.openrouteservice.org/t/feature-avoid-traffic-lights-primary-for-heavy-vehicles/4715/3 "2023-03-29T17:55:47Z")

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Correct, minimizing traffic lights is what I aim for. I didn’t understand that “avoid” meant “take a detour of 10x the lenght to avoid them at all cost” 🙂

I thougt avoid just meant… _don’t use these roads if there are other fairly equal alternatives without traffic lights_.

I’ll open an issue in github.