In his old year cabaret show, Peter Pannekoek stated the buttons near crossings don’t actually do anything, they’re just there to just pacify people. I’m fairly certain they in fact do work, though for cyclists they’re mostly redundant: the magnetic loops in the road surface detect cyclists. Only for lightweight carbon bikes a manual button is still useful.
Am I correct in my assumption?
Don’t they give feedback? If they are the capacitive button kind, I see them with a red light on top that tells you you’ve pressed it. “wachten” or something lights up.