Change comes slowly to small towns, so something like the installation of the first traffic lights in a place like Black Diamond, Alta. can take on a significance beyond their effect on congestion and flow.

"It means we're not the small town that we used to be, and it's quite sad, but I understand why it's here," said Lori Green, standing in front of the big windows of the Black Diamond Hotel and Bar that look onto the new lights.

Green said it freaks her out when she looks out those windows and sees cars hurtling towards an intersection where there has always been a four-way stop, and the obvious need to slow down.

"It's very different for me," she said.

Lori Green, the manage of the Black Diamond Hotel and Bar, says the new lights outside her business are a sign that her town is not what it used to be. (Monty Kruger/CBC)

'And now we have them'

The lights replaced the stop signs that have long sat on this busy intersection of Highway 22 and Highway 7 after the provincial government measured the high levels of traffic rolling through.

"The government did a traffic study here and they estimated that pretty close to 10,000 vehicles a day go through this intersection, and I guess they decided that traffic lights were a smarter alternative to stop signs," said Tom Dougall, the public works manager for the town.

Dougall takes a laid-back approach to the lights, saying those who might have been resistant to the change will just have to accept them.

"The government decided they were going to put in a set of lights, and now we have some," he said.

Dougall said he saw a bit of pushback against the project on Facebook but hasn't encountered any resistance in the real world.

"In a small town like this, some of the older residents and whatnot, they're not keen on change a lot of times," he said of the lights that start blinking red in one direction and yellow in the other between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m.

'Usually they don't stop at one'

The new lights are at the busy intersection of Highway 22 and Highway 7. (Monty Kruger/CBC)

Some, like lifetime resident Arthur Pittman, aren't sure if the lights are worth the cost, though he says they're nice as far as traffic lights go.

His concern is twofold: remembering the four-way stop he's always known is no longer there and that he has to stop —and stay stopped — on a red light; and what the lights mean for the future.

"What I'm concerned with is now that they have one here, they're going to want one up top the hill, they're going to want one down by the post office, the grocery store. Those spots you can sit there a while because it's not a four way," he said.

"That's my concern. Now that we have one, usually they don't stop at one."