PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – The Philadelphia Streets Department fights daily skirmishes with balky traffic lights, some of which can cause major headaches.

“Getting off at 30th Street, top of the ramp, looks like the traffic lights short-cycle….”

That announcement from a June 6th KYW Traffic and Transit On The Two’s report referred to a light controlling traffic from the Schuylkill.

Deputy Streets Commissioner Steve Buckley says the issue there is unreliable power, “We’re in the process of trying to find a new location to tap into. Over the last few months, we’ve gone from tapping into a PennDOT line to our street lighting system. That doesn’t appear to be stable enough for us right now, so we are actually looking at a longer term solution of tapping into the Cira Center.”

Another recurrent headache, 7th and 8th and Vine which Buckley says is actually four intersections, “One signal system may run just slightly faster than another system and if that’s the case then over time they tend to fall out of synchronization and you may get a situation where traffic is not going to flow as smoothly as it can.”

If you see a malfunctioning traffic light, call 311 to get a repair crew on the way.

Reported by John Ostapkovich, KYW Newsradio 1060