Ten North Texas cities are about to get smarter traffic lights instead of wider roads. Regional officials are investing more than $11 million in technology meant to make existing streets safer and more responsive, targeting corridors where fatal crashes have piled up and where adding lanes simply isn't an option.
The Regional Transportation Council has approved $8.7 million for the program, and authorized an additional $2,543,400 last Thursday, bringing total funding to $11,243,400, according to The Dallas Morning News. The participating cities include Frisco, McKinney, Allen, DeSoto, Duncanville, Cedar Hill, Denton, Arlington, Fort Worth and Southlake, each set to receive different systems based on their eligibility. Frisco, McKinney, DeSoto, Duncanville, Allen and Cedar Hill will all get emergency vehicle preemption, technology that lets ambulances and fire trucks trigger green lights as they approach an intersection.
Why Fort Worth's East Berry Street Made the List
Fort Worth plans to install smart traffic signals and detection technology along East Berry Street, stretching from Interstate 35W to Miller Avenue. The corridor sits on the city's High Injury Network and recorded 10 traffic fatalities between 2019 and 2024, per ThatCarHitMe.com's analysis of Dallas-Fort Worth crash data. Fort Worth's City Council approved a comprehensive Vision Zero Safety Action Plan last October after fatal crashes in the city climbed 31% and serious-injury crashes rose 22% over the preceding five years, the same analysis found.
Southlake will upgrade its traffic signals to use smart intersection technology, while Denton plans to deploy traffic-monitoring and traffic-calming equipment along roads with high concentrations of collisions. Arlington's project takes a different shape, deploying smart rail technology and traffic sensors along its high-injury roadways. Other technology improvements across the program include advanced signals that adjust timing based on incoming traffic and railroad-crossing systems that alert drivers when a train is blocking their path.
How Emergency Preemption Actually Works
Natalie Bettger, senior program manager for the North Central Texas Council of Governments, said traffic signals can return to normal coordination within a few cycles after an emergency vehicle's priority request passes through, according to the Morning News report. The goal, officials say, is ensuring patients reach hospitals quickly and safely. Research reviewed by the U.S. Department of Transportation backs that logic, finding that emergency vehicle preemption on signalized corridors can cut response times by 14% to 23% while also lowering intersection crash risk for first responders.
One of the proposed improvements would let emergency vehicles keep signal priority even as they cross city boundaries, a detail that matters in a region where ambulances and fire crews routinely move between jurisdictions. That cross-border coordination echoes the emphasis seen in NCTCOG's MetroX simulation last fall, which tested how roughly 2,000 personnel across 20 to 30 North Texas agencies could keep operations running smoothly during a large-scale emergency, as Hoodline reported in its coverage of the regional emergency prep drill.
Eligibility Rules and What Happens After Installation
Cities qualified for the program based on criteria that included innovative approaches to transportation needs, public-private partnerships and broader regional investment value, per the Morning News reporting. Technology readiness level and a city's willingness to share performance data with the council also factored into eligibility. Once installed, local jurisdictions will be responsible for maintaining the equipment themselves.
Project implementation is expected to begin in 2027, though no end date has been defined for the rollout. The underlying rationale, officials say, is that many of the transportation problems these corridors face cannot be solved simply by adding new lanes or widening intersections — a constraint that has pushed planners toward technology rather than concrete.
A Small Piece of a Much Bigger Regional Push
The $11.2 million initiative fits inside a far larger regional commitment. The Regional Transportation Council has allocated $57 million in roadway safety funding under a broader Roadway Safety Plan aimed at eliminating all traffic fatalities across Dallas-Fort Worth by 2050, according to ThatCarHitMe.com's crash-statistics review. North Central Texas recorded 849 traffic fatalities in 2024, down slightly from 859 the year before, mirroring a statewide reduction, as Hoodline previously reported.
The Regional Transportation Council serves as the Metropolitan Planning Organization for a 12-county core of the Dallas-Fort Worth area, a region whose population has swelled from under 3 million in 1974 to nearly 8.5 million residents by 2024, according to the North Central Texas Council of Governments. Fort Worth Mayor Pro Tem Gyna Bivens chairs the 45-member council, which sets regional transportation policy across the metroplex, Dallas Innovates reported. The council previously ran a Freight Signal Optimization Program across more than 500 traffic signals in cities including Arlington, Fort Worth and McKinney, establishing precedent for coordinated smart-signal networks that cross city lines.
There's also an environmental angle to smoother traffic flow. Dallas-Fort Worth recorded a 2026 ozone design value of 82 parts per billion, exceeding federal air quality standards, with vehicle emissions remaining a major contributor to regional smog, Hoodline has reported. Reducing idling at intersections through smarter signal timing is one of the incidental benefits regional planners point to as the region works to climb out of federal ozone nonattainment status.
