You are driving in the US and come to an intersection and your signal light is green. You put on your signal to make a left-hand turn. The on-coming traffic continues to flow but someone stops and waves you to make a left-hand turn.
I was a passenger in the car with someone who told me he hates when people do that, and they aren’t following the traffic laws. He refuses to comply with the wave and waits until they continue driving and there is an opening to complete the turn.
It got me wondering. It is legal or smart that driver’s wave people on like this?
I don’t know if it’s legal or smart, but it’s polite. If I’m on a two-lane road (one lane in each direction), I’ll often wave the other fellow through. Not so much to be polite to him, but to be polite to the folks in the five cars directly behind him who are stuck waiting until he gets out of the way before they can move.
On a four-lane road, no way. Somebody behind me in the other lane might not notice what I’m doing and plow right into the fellow who is crossing over our lanes. And it would be all my fault.
Never give up the right-of-way, ever. It’s not polite, it’s dangerous. Traffic “works” because (hypothetically) everybody knows the rules, and you don’t have to guess what anybody’s going to do.
I dislike it when others stop like that, whether for me or someone else. I will sometimes slow down when approaching a left-turning car and wave them through if traffic is being held up behind them, but I won’t stop, and only if I would not hold up traffic in my lane.
Absolutely dangerous to stop when you have the right to go. First, the person may go when you don’t expect it. Second, what if the guy behind him doesn’t realize he’s stopped and plows into him and pushes him into you? Third, in 4-lane traffic as mentioned, really really dangerous. What if the guy behind him thinks he is stopped for another reason and tries to go around?
Basically, people who don’t do what is expected of them are very dangerous.
(I almost got creamed like that, closest I came to a serious accident on my motorcycle. Some idiot stopped in front of me on the road… Why the traffic jam. Ok, maybe he’s trying to turn right into the gate. As a motorcycle, I can go around them. I start to drive around him and jam on the brakes just in time as someone coming out of the driveway gate at a pretty good speed to turn left almost hits me. Yes, the guy two cars in front was being polite by letting the vehicle exit the hidden driveway. But… it can lead to other people having accidents. )
When driving don’t be polite, be predictable. People shouldn’t have to guess your intentions. Plus, I don’t know how many times some idiot has done that with no one behind them and if they had just maintained course and speed they’d have cleared the intersection and I’d have made my left more quickly than I could after they slowed to a halt clogging the road.
I had a gf who got in a bad accident in the same scenario. And I have a turn I make almost every day on a 4-lane road where I’m the one getting waved (it’s at a light, where usually oncoming traffic on their inside lane is backed up, but the outside lane is not.) Can’t believe how many times someone has gotten pissed at ME because I wouldn’t go when they are waving me through.
This is my take, too. Be predictable. Being “polite” has nothing to do with it. Follow the damn rules. The people being “polite” end up being assholes in my view most of the time for fucking up the normal flow of traffic. Not that I have an opinion, or anything. But they confuse the shit out of me and add unpredictability to a situation where I desire predictability.
Absolutely! Exactly this. The essence of safe driving is predictability, not random politeness! In fact in my jurisdiction and likely many others there is an obscure traffic law that is rarely enforced along the lines of “failing to proceed when indicated” or words to that effect, meaning you could theoretically (and IMO should be) charged for failing to proceed when the light is green.
This is not the same as leaving an intersection clear when traffic is stopped ahead of you on the other side, to avoid blocking the other road or preventing drivers from making turns onto it. In most cases that’s actually mandatory. Common sense – sadly, it really isn’t all that common.
Yup. Just let me say I agree with this and what others have said. Unless it’s a gridlock situation do NOT do this. Be predictable.
ooohhhh. Also, if you STEP INTO a crosswalk, don’t stand there taking in the scenery/waiting for friends and wave me through. Don’t step into the crosswalk in the first place. I’ve already committed to stop. (we have a number of crosswalks that are not at intersections.)
It’s a common cause for an accident when there are two oncoming lanes - someone in the (oncoming) left lane stops to let you turn, and you’re hit by the driver you can’t see in the (oncoming) right lane…I refuse to turn in such situations as well (unless, as someone above said, it’s a heavy traffic, stop-and-go situation in both oncoming lanes and I am 100% sure the way is clear.)
About 90% of the time when I’m riding my bike on the bike path and approaching a crosswalk, if there’s a car and they see me they will stop and wave me through – even if I’m 50 feet away from the crosswalk, let alone actually IN the crosswalk. I think that’s silly. But here’s the kicker. If everyone suddenly changed their silly behavior, it would surprise me and possibly cause an accident. :-/
In the scenario of the OP, I stay where I am and wave the oncoming car through with vigor, and they eventually cross.
Regarding four-lane roads: One of my guilty pleasures is watching those car crash and instant karma videos (though often the two concepts are not in the same scene)…whenever I see a person cutting through an opening in a double oncoming lane I know they are about to be nailed by someone in the far lane. Folks who try to wave you through a gap in a traffic jam on a four lane road when they are on the inner lane are not thinking things through to their natural conclusion.
From my own personal experience, what really bothers me are people who do this at night where you can’t see the driver at all. So you have no idea what is going on. For all I know, they could be stopping to adjust their seat belt, spilled their coffee or whatever, and aren’t waving anyone though at all. If a car turns in front of them unexpectedly it could cause an accident.
In the midwest, I noticed people do this a lot in suburbs. In the New York City metro suburban area, I didn’t see this behavior until about 10 years ago, and now I see it every day. I don’t know where it is coming from. I just looked in the driver’s manual online, and in the hundreds of pages there the work “wave” and “waving” doesn’t exist. So it doesn’t sound like this is something addressed by the DMV at all.
Do they really think they are being nice and polite doing this? Or is it something else? It would be interesting to know if these are the same people who do excessive lane changes, tail gate and cut people off.
IME most of the time following waving motions of another driver to turn left in front of them when you are supposed to be yielding the right of way is not smart, and is often quite dangerous. The other driver isn’t authorized to supersede the traffic laws in place or tell you what to do, and often is not even aware of the bigger picture of what’s happening in the intersection around them (such as the lane to their right full of cars zooming through who don’t know some other driver is playing traffic cop for 5 seconds). They are usually just fixated on you and the space immediately in front of them and just following an opportunistic urge to “be nice” for a few seconds without actually thinking the situation through.
The only exceptions I’ve encountered when it is reasonable to follow such motions involve very large and slow-moving vehicles waving through much smaller and fast-moving vehicles, though usually at stop signs and not fitting the scenario presented in the OP.
Sometimes you’ll be in a situation where you arrive at an intersection after a big slow-moving transport truck opposite you, and it should be his turn to turn left in front of you first. There are small 5-10 second gaps in the cross traffic big enough for you (the smaller vehicle) to safely proceed through, but too small for the 30 ton tractor-trailer to turn into from a dead stop, and the driver will wave you through to indicate he’s not taking the opportunity. Or sometimes the opposing driver will need to get you out of the way before making a big sweeping turn.
But in everyday similar sized vehicles on busy streets traffic, following other drivers suggestions to make risky turns is a bad idea.
I never allow a driver to cede their right of way to me. I will sit there all day shaking my head no until they get pissed off enough to move.
If I allow them to cede the right of way to me, and there is an accident, who is at fault? ME, that’s who, because I didn’t have the right of way.
These drivers are idiots and poor drivers, nothing polite about them. Driving rules are there so we all know what to expect and we don’t need people just making them up as they go.
There’s an intersection near me where people often try to wave me through their right of way, and I’ve had a few of them get visibly angry when I refuse. Tough.
But they confuse the shit out of me and add unpredictability to a situation where I desire predictability.