>Yellow lights increase safety by avoiding the "slam on the brakes" effect you've described. They've replaced this with a very common "floor the accelarator" reaction which also decreases safety.
In a typical car, flooring the gas pedal is conservatively going to be about 9ft/s² in the same direction as you're already moving. Slamming on the brakes is going to accelerate you at about 15ft/s² in the opposite direction as you're already moving. The effects these two actions have on safety are not comparable
>Red light cameras combined with a short yellow seem the best approach to me.
Except that that approach has been conclusively demonstrated to increase both accidents and fatalities, while lengthening yellow lights has been shown to reduce both accidents and fatalities.
In a typical car, flooring the gas pedal is conservatively going to be about 9ft/s² in the same direction as you're already moving. Slamming on the brakes is going to accelerate you at about 15ft/s² in the opposite direction as you're already moving. The effects these two actions have on safety are not comparable
>Red light cameras combined with a short yellow seem the best approach to me.
Except that that approach has been conclusively demonstrated to increase both accidents and fatalities, while lengthening yellow lights has been shown to reduce both accidents and fatalities.