ROSEVILLE —

Call it organized chaos, and the City of Roseville has got traffic control down to a science.

“Roadways have a limited capacity,” said Rhon Herndon Roseville’s Public Works Director. “We kind of liken it to a sink drain: You can only get so much water down the drain, the rest has to wait in the sink and be patient to get through.”

To prevent a dampened holiday spirit, the City is debuting it’s new real-time sensors to help manage the increased volume of traffic.

“We have counters that are actually in the pavement on all the approaches of all of our signalized intersections, and we can put that into a software program and build a model and calculate the most efficient traffic signal timing and provide the minimal amount of delay to the motorist,” explained Herndon.

The system uses a network of 172 cameras and sensors that Roseville’s Public Works staff monitors to make changes to the traffic signals on the fly. But the maximum time you’ll see a green light during the holiday season, according to Roseville’s Assistant Traffic Engineer Tito Zamora, is about 45 seconds.

“Not only do you time it to get cars through, but you also have to consider the delay, so it’s a balancing act.”