If you were on a motorcycle instead of in your car, you could watch as those "smart" systems go through a few cycles for the vehicles travelling in the other directions without ever once giving you the green light.

Fortunately, the state I live in (Indiana) finally passed a "dead red" law a couple years ago, meaning that I can now disregard that red light and proceed through the intersection anyways (assuming it's all clear and safe to do so).