Near-normal commute returns to Montgomery Co.

The traffic light meltdown crippled the rush hours Wednesday and Thursday. The lights worked, but the computer system that controlled them crashed. The lights could not be synchronized.

Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett said there was a "breakthrough" in the repairs Thursday.

In a statement released Thursday evening, Leggett said engineers re-established a connection between the county's 800 traffic lights and the computer that controls them, so lights are now responding to commands from the computer.

It is still not clear if this fix will hold, as engineers continue to work on individual signals that are not responding.

The county also announced RideOn buses will be free on Friday.

Frantic repairs started in the overnight hours Wednesday.

Technicians and engineers had to go out to the lights and manually adjust their timing.

"This is a rather old computer. It's probably 25 to 30 years old," says Emil Wolanin, chief traffic engineer for Montgomery County. "It's a 1980s-vintage Data General main frame computer. Parts are not really available."

Wolanin says the computer crash comes as the county initiated a major modernization of the traffic computers.

"We are working to replace this old-aged system. We're just not there yet," he says.

In Thursday's statement, Leggett said he appreciated everyone's patience and thanked traffic engineers and technicians who worked "tirelessly 24/7" to get the problem resolved.

"For the longer term, I have directed staff to provide me with a plan as to how we can accelerate my ongoing $35 million project to upgrade and modernize our traffic management system," Leggett says.

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