Daily conversation: What is the worst possible answer?

[Big John]

Paint the lenses whatever color you choose.

[Max Rockatansky]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Laugh at it akin to how Grif's goons would in Back to the Future Part 2. 

[Sapphuby]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Wait at the intersection for the next car to get confused, and go when they do and honk at them for not understanding the intersection.

[vdeane]

8-26-2025

The opposite question: which currently existing highway should be decommissioned?

Every US highway in the 400's. Sorry to the legit ones like 411 & 441, but amongst your ranks are 3 cancers that must be excised, and it's better safe than sorry.

This thread is supposed to be about the worst answers.

[1995hoo]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Imitate the men driving horse-drawn wagons in that commercial from some years ago: Everyone sit there arguing that someone else should go first until a female driver shows up. Then everyone agree that she goes first. Then return to arguing.

(I don't remember whose ad that was. If I could remember, I'd link the video if it's online.)

[kphoger]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Oh, this is an easy one!

Stop and wait for a green light.

[I-55]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Gun it, the red light cameras are probably out too

[JayhawkCO]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Get out your jumper cables.

[kphoger]

Get out your jumper cables.

Is there a second step?

[JayhawkCO]

Get out your jumper cables.

Is there a second step?

Depends on if you have a ladder or not, otherwise you have to wait for someone that has one.

[hobsini2]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Waive to the adoring crowds like you're the Queen of England. If someone hits you, off with their head!

[hobsini2]

8-25-25

Which decommissioned highway should be revived?

US 666 just because stuff.

[hobsini2]

8-25-25

Which decommissioned highway should be revived?

I-15-BL, Holden, Utah.

Furthermore, the [NO SERVICES] sign should be removed from the exit signs, because otherwise people won't realize that there are services at Holden Cold Drinks.

I wonder if that machine makes more money in a month than some of those "households" in a month.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/TgxACnHQaYSj4Jju9

[kphoger]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Park your vehicle in the middle of the intersection, effectively turning it into a roundabout.

[Mapmikey]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

If it's NYC, treat the intersection as a 4-day stop, same as when the signals are working.

[Mav94]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Engage it in consciousness raising until it realizes that it has more power than it knew.

[kphoger]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Turn on your high beams, set your windshield wipers to the fastest setting, honk your horn repeatedly, and thus proceed slowly and carefully through the intersection—not stopping until you reach the other side* of the intersection.  Once on the other side, stop the vehicle, turn off your headlights and your windshield wipers, but continue honking your horn until either power is restored to the signal or a uniformed officer arrives to direct traffic.

*  "Other side" means diagonally opposite your approach to the intersection, which will require either (a) turning left at the intersection or (b) proceeding on the opposite side of the highway.

[Henry]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Get out of your car and kick the pole as hard as you can! Then, when the signal starts working again, get back in your car and just drive the hell away.

[Great Lakes Roads]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Wait for the other cars to show up and let the Midwest way of directing traffic do the rest!

[kurumi]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Play or hum the music shown:


Engineers and contractors will arrive within 30 minutes and start replacing the obsolete, power-dependent signalized intersection with an [optionally crash-prone modern] roundabout! They've already been installed in Brockway, Ogdenville, and North Haverbrook.

[Scott5114]

Play or hum the music shown:

For some reason, just looking at the notation, I thought this was going to be the theme to Merv Griffin's Crosswords, which would have been a fantastic Alanland reference. It is not, as I found out by punching it into a notation editor (though I really should have known that by the complexity of the rhythm in measure 2), but it's still pretty good.

[GaryV]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Shimmy up the pole and start fiddling with the wires. You'll be up for the "most dad-like dad" award soon.

[xonhulu]

2025-08-27:
What should you do when you encounter a traffic signal that is without power?

Cry.

[kphoger]

28 AUG 2025:

What should the default speed limits be?  Criteria below:

1.  Must include the following five categories of road:
- a.  street in business area
- b.  street in residential area
- c.  rural road
- d.  state highway
- e.  Interstate or other access-controlled highway

2.  Answers for (a) and (b) must be less than answers for (c), (d), and (e).

3.  Only positive integers >15.

4.  Additional categories and/or special conditions allowed.

[hotdogPi]

28 AUG 2025:

What should the default speed limits be?  Criteria below:

1.  Must include the following five categories of road:
- a.  street in business area 21
- b.  street in residential area the last speed limit sign you saw, regardless of which road it was on
- c.  rural road the speed of the car behind you minus 1 mph
- d.  state highway the route number, and all surface routes numbered 15 or less must be decommissioned
- e.  Interstate or other access-controlled highway 40th percentile, dynamically adjusted on the fly

2.  Answers for (a) and (b) must be less than answers for (c), (d), and (e).

3.  Only positive integers >15.

4.  Additional categories and/or special conditions allowed.