The big Tesla news of the day was the new Early Access Program (EAP) software release, 2020.24.5 (or 2020.20.16 in China) that includes a bunch of highly-requested features.
Now late today, several EAP owners in the US have reported receiving an even newer update, 2020.24.5.1, which includes a big update to Traffic Light and Stop Sign Control (beta) (TLSSC).
In the first beta release of the feature, your car would stop at all traffic lights, regardless of the stage they were at (red, yellow, green). To continue through an intersection, the driver had to provide confirmation by either tapping the accelerator, or pressing down on the gear stalk.
Now according to the release notes, provided to us by a reader of Drive Tesla, TLSSC will continue through an intersection when the light is green.
But there is a catch – in order to do, there needs to be a car in front of you proceeding through the intersection. You also can’t be in a turn lane (Autopilot does not do turns at an intersection yet).
There is also a change to the visualization. Instead of the stop line displayed on the screen being red, it will be green, indicating to the driver the car will proceed through the intersection.
This is a pretty big change for Tesla to implement so soon after releasing the feature in the US less than two months ago. This is a good sign that Tesla is quickly improving the feature with data received from the many owners already testing it out on the roads.
Canada only recently got the feature last week, so hopefully this update arrives in Canada at the same time our friends down south officially get it.
As with before, this feature can be used with either Traffic Aware Cruise Control (TACC) or Autopilot are active. It is also only available to Tesla owners with the Full Self-Driving package and the latest HW3.0 computer.
Here are the full release notes of this new feature:
Traffic Light and Stop Sign Control (Beta)
The Traffic Light and Stop Sign Control feature no longer requires explicit driver confirmation of pushing down the gear selector to continue straight through an intersection for green lights when there is a lead vehicle ahead of you. The stop line in the driving visualization will now turn green to indicate the car will continue through an intersection.
Please continue to pay attention and be ready to take immediate action, including braking because this feature may not stop for all traffic controls. This feature will not attempt to turn through intersections but over time, as we continue to learn from the fleet, the feature will control more naturally.
