EXPOSED
The analytical half of this job — tallying turning movements, computing peak-hour factors, drafting study reports, and generating signal timing plans — is exactly what video analytics, connected-vehicle data feeds, and adaptive signal software now do continuously and cheaply. What holds is the field half: placing tube counters and radar units on live roadways, setting up work zones, physically inspecting cabinets and detector loops, and checking that a retimed signal actually behaves in traffic. There is no license behind the role — the sealing engineer carries the liability — so the protection is manual, not regulatory.
Headcount grew steadily across the period.
Median pay $47,480 → $59,090 -0.4% in real terms
This line is counted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics — the one figure on this page that isn't a judgement of ours. Headcount moves on demand, offshoring, demographics and the business cycle, and automation is one term among several, often not the loudest.
So a falling line is not evidence that AI did it, and a rising one is not evidence that it won't. Both happen in this register: some occupations resist automation and shrink anyway, others are highly automatable and keep growing. The marked year is 2020.
BLS projection, 2024–2034
+3.7% 7,900 → 8,200 on the projections basis
Exposed, but growing
AI can already do a lot of these tasks, and the BLS still expects +3.7% more of these jobs by 2034. Demand for the output is growing faster than the work is being automated away — the mechanism BLS gives for software developers, and the combination people most often misread as an error.
Different clocks. The score is what current AI could do to this work today. The projection is how many of these jobs will exist in 2034. Everything between the two — how fast employers actually adopt, whether demand grows in the meantime — is why they can point opposite ways without either being wrong.
~800 openings a year on average, including replacing people who leave.
Sign TechnicianTraffic AnalystPavement EngineerPermit TechnicianTraffic SpecialistTraffic TechnicianTraffic CoordinatorTraffic InvestigatorCollection TechnicianTransportation AnalystStreet Light TechnicianSurvey Field TechnicianTraffic Control LaborerTraffic Signal InstallerTraffic Survey TechnicianTransportation TechnicianField Traffic InvestigatorTraffic Control SpecialistTraffic Control TechnicianTraffic Monitor SpecialistTraffic Management SpecialistTraffic Engineering TechnicianTraffic Signal Technician (TST)Radar Signal Processing Engineers
Holding it up: embodiment . Weakest point: liability shield .
Mixed — a routine tier and a judgment tier Half your week — pneumatic tube installs, cabinet checks, loop testing, before-and-after field observation of a retimed intersection — still requires a body on the pavement, but the other half (14-hour count reduction, PHF and warrant calculations, Synchro/HCS runs, standard study memos) is already being displaced by Miovision cameras and INRIX/probe feeds, which is why this sits at 8 rather than in the resistant band.
Hands-on in uncontrolled environments You work in the travel lane and on the shoulder: coning off taper, straddling a ladder to open a Type 170/2070 cabinet on a live arterial, chasing a bad loop in the pavement, running counts in rain and at 2 a.m. — uncontrolled traffic exposure, which is 13; it is not higher because much of the count and modeling work happens back at a desk and you are not doing bucket-truck signal head replacement like a signal tech.
No licence, no signature requirement No license, no exam, no continuing education gate — a high school diploma plus IMSA or ATSSA flagger cards at most, and every timing plan, signal warrant, or MUTCD sign recommendation you produce leaves the office under a PE's seal, so the 3 reflects the certificates being nice-to-have rather than any personal legal standing.
Meaningful discretion You make consequential field calls — whether a count day is invalid because of a crash upstream, whether an offset needs adjusting after watching the coordination, where a counter can safely be placed — but those calls run inside the MUTCD, the Highway Capacity Manual, and agency timing policy, and the ambiguous, high-stakes decisions (install a signal, change a speed limit) are escalated, which puts this at the low end of real discretion.
The verdict above describes this occupation as a whole. Almost nobody does the typical version of a job — tick what's actually in your week and see how your own mix sits.
Your task mix speaks to task resistance (8/20 here) — how much of the day's work current AI already does. That is the dimension the boxes above are about.
It cannot move the other three. Liability shield (3/20) is whether the law requires a licensed human to sign. Trust premium (4/20) is whether buyers specifically pay for a person. Judgment and accountability (7/20) is whether the role exists to own consequential calls. Those are facts about the occupation's standing, not about which tasks are in your week — a paralegal who does only trial exhibits still holds no licence. Together they are 14 of this occupation's 35 points (40%).
Embodiment (13/20) is also a property of the work rather than the worker, but we don't tag individual tasks as physical or not, so the picker can't tell you anything about it. That's a limit of this tool, not a claim.
Did we get the list right? Tell us what's missing — the tasks are written from the outside, and you're reading this from the inside.
Civil Engineers EXPOSED
Gas Plant Operators EXPOSED
Electrical Engineers EXPOSED
The moves above are yours to make. This is the other half: what would have to change in the world for the occupation itself to score higher. None of it is in any one person's gift, but it is where the floor actually comes from. Scores here are not a one-way ratchet. Only two of the five dimensions — task resistance and embodiment — track what machines can do. The other three track law, what buyers will pay for, and who is answerable, and those move in both directions, often in response to the same pressure AI creates. If every lever below landed, this occupation would score around 56/100, still EXPOSED.
Task-mix shift: this occupation has a genuine two-tier structure. If count tallying, peak-hour computation, and baseline timing generation are fully absorbed by video analytics and adaptive software, what remains is field verification of whether the retimed signal actually behaves — detector fault isolation, phantom-call diagnosis, ped-call timing complaints, resolving disagreement between the model and observed queues. Watch for job postings dropping 'conduct counts / prepare study reports' and adding 'validate ATSPM outputs and troubleshoot detection'.
Expansion of connected-vehicle and detection infrastructure (RSUs, radar/video detectors, fiber, battery backup) under IIJA/SMART grant deployments increases the volume of field installation, calibration, and failure diagnosis on live roadways — work that is physically unpredictable and cannot be done from a data feed. Already happening at state DOT and county level.
A state DOT or state law making IMSA Traffic Signal Technician (Level II/III) or Traffic Signal Field Technician certification a mandatory condition for anyone energizing, retiming, or returning a signal to flash/normal operation — with the certified technician named on the cabinet log and personally accountable. Several states already specify IMSA certification levels in maintenance contracts and some municipal codes; converting contract preference into board-style licensure with named sign-off is the change to watch.
A rule that conflict-monitor/MMU bench testing and cabinet acceptance after adaptive or AI-generated timing changes must be witnessed and signed by a certified technician before the intersection returns to service — analogous to elevator inspection sign-off. Would show up as a new item in a state Traffic Engineering Manual or an ATSSA/ITE-backed MUTCD-adjacent standard.
If ATSPM/adaptive systems make the technician the human who decides whether to accept, override, or roll back an automated timing change at a live intersection — including school-zone and ped-phase edge cases the model handles poorly — the role owns a consequential safety call under ambiguity. Recognizable as a documented override/rollback authority in a DOT signal operations SOP naming the technician rather than the sealing engineer.
The limit. No realistic route to a trust premium: the buyer is a public agency purchasing counts and signal uptime, and nobody specifies a human tallier. Also note liability_shield gains here are capped — even under IMSA licensure the sealing PE retains the design liability, so the technician's shield is procedural sign-off rather than professional liability. Combined realistic ceiling is roughly mid-50s, not safety.
| New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ | 750 | $81,910 +39% |
| Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA | 400 | $78,640 +33% |
| Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV | 300 | $70,100 +19% |
| San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA | 230 | $85,100 +44% |
| Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL | 210 | $62,300 +5% |
| San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA | 190 | $92,710 +57% |
| Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX | 170 | $57,130 -3% |
| Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler, AZ | 170 | $65,190 +10% |
| San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA | 190 | $92,710 +57% |
| San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA | 230 | $85,100 +44% |
| Santa Maria-Santa Barbara, CA | 70 | $84,650 +43% |
We have no reported case of a named organisation automating this occupation. Not one deployment, not one announcement.
That is worth saying out loud next to a score of 35. The verdict above is about what the work exposes — what current AI could do to these tasks. It is not a claim that anyone has done it. For this occupation those two things have come apart completely: the capability argument is on this page, and the evidence column is empty.
Has AI actually changed your work? One tap, anonymous, and the running tally is public. Nothing else is asked of you.
Rather than check back: get the digest and we'll tell you what changed — or watch a single occupation from its own page.