Traffic Light Tree is a public sculpture in Poplar, London, England, created by the French sculptor Pierre Vivant following a competition run by the Public Art Commissions Agency for the London Docklands Development Corporation under their Public Art programme. Originally situated on a roundabout in Limehouse, near Canary Wharf and Millwall, at the junction of Heron Quay, Marsh Wall and Westferry Road, it is now located on a different roundabout near Billingsgate Market in Poplar.
Eight metres tall and containing 75 sets of lights, each controlled by computer, the sculpture was described by Vivant thus:
The Sculpture imitates the natural landscape of the adjacent London Plane Trees, while the changing pattern of the lights reveals and reflects the never ending rhythm of the surrounding domestic, financial and commercial activities.
The Public Art Commissions Agency has said "the arbitrary cycle of light changes is not supposed to mimic the seasonal rhythm of nature, but the restlessness of Canary Wharf."Traffic Light Tree was installed in 1998 on the site of a plane tree that...