What’s wrong with this picture?

I was recently traveling in Washington, DC and was struck by their pedestrian signs.  There is a major design flaw here.  Why make the numbers red when red means stop?  Let me explain further…

Of course, it is obvious from the photos which means stop and which means go.  The problem is, at least as a New Yorker, I never really LOOK at these signs — rather, I catch them out of the corner of my eye.  If you are used to living in a city, you are probably conditioned in this way as well.  While in DC, I often found myself stopping when I should have been going because I caught a glimpse of the red timer out of the corner of my eye.  At each intersection, I would feel an unconscious hesitation because of the red-lit sign.  I doubt that I am alone in this reaction since most other cities follow the white (go) and red (stop) convention.

For this to be more effective, the timer should be white to match the GO indicator and perhaps it can turn red in the last few seconds, although after the timer reaches zero the red hand flashes to alert pedestrians not to start crossing so this may not even be necessary.

Is this a big deal?  Well, there are certainly worse things in life and this is a small issue.  However, this issue in particular would have been so easy and inexpensive to correct on the drawing board before it was rolled out across the city.  There is no reason why it had to be this way.