[QUOTE=Flipshod]
I’m with the OP on this one. Here in the South, too many people try to be courteous and wave me on a left turn that I am supposed to yield. Following people’s wave-ins causes accidents.
And I think the NC code, as quoted, was speaking of flashing lights that flash the same color in all four directions. Specifically, the flashing yellow language seems to be the standard “you can’t hit someone who’s in your way just because you have the light.” kind of language. But when, say, north-south have a yellow and east-west have a red, then north south should proceed through as if they had no signal at all, only hampered by the rule of not plowing into someone if you can avoid them and being cautious that there is a cross road..
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Exactly the way I feel. Also, if my movement through the intersection will impede your progress in any way, you have the right of way. I can turn right because you are going straight, I go straight because you are going straight. I cannot turn left because you are going straight. You impede less traffic, you go first. Even on the military base we understand this. In the community around here, it is like calculus on your fingers and toes.
Fuck, if people would only read the DMV manual for the states they drive in.
On to the dumbasses. When you approach the East/West intersection you have to stop and give right of way. If you are turning right----You have right of way. It doesn’t matter if I got there first, you have right of way. If you are travelling straight across the intersection, you yield to those turning right, and then you have right of way.
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NC driver who just happened to have to take the licensing test (renewing license, not a new driver).
I’m really confused about the whole turning right deal. Okay, we’ve got fucko, approaching on the road with a yellow flasher in front of him. If he’s travelling straight across the road, he doesn’t yield to anyone other than someone who’s already in the intersection, whether they’re turning left or right from the East-West road. If they haven’t begun to enter the intersection, he doesn’t have to yield to them, whether they’re turning right or not.
[QUOTE=pulykamell]
My head just exploded. I can’t believe that actually works IRL.
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It sure does, I sailed through that junction, oh, several years ago (maybe 15?) for the first time and it was just as easy as joining a motorway or driving on the right in a right-hand drive car. ie not easy but doable.
At the intersection closest my house, I’ll often wave a guy through even though I have right-of-way, because I’m about to start looking for a parking space and I don’t want him crowding me.
I have to agree with the gist of the OP. My personal pet peeve is regarding merging onto the highway. If you are the merger, it is YOUR job to adjust your speed up to highway speed. Period.
If you are already ON the highway do NOT slow down to “help” the mergers, it just screws us up. And also screws everyone else on the ramp behind the first merger. It screws up everyone behind the “courteous” driver on the highway.
Especially if, as Point on point describes, your “courtesy” is due to inattention and you suddenly realize at the last minute (after the person on the ramp has already properly calculated his/her speed and is ready to merge “oh, this person needs on, I’d better slow down and let him”.
Oh, and I HATE roundabouts. We’ve got two, and our stupid traffic engineers are planning more. I avoid the two we’ve got unless I forget (I do on occasion, they’ve only been in place a few years) From what I understand of my fellow Anchoragites, so does everyone else. The engineers were oh so very proud of their accomplishment.
“Oh look, it’s working the frontage roads at Dowling/New Seward intersection no longer get backed up”! Of COURSE not you morons, that’s because most people are using other routes because they hate the damned thing.
[QUOTE=Point No Point]
I agree.
Only it isn’t courtesy to wave someone on when it’s really your turn to go.
It’s inattention. Those people who wave others on are never being courteous, they are just waking up to the fact that someone else is on the road and they haven’t kept track of who’s turn it was.
To prove this, check every time somebody waves you on, or waves a pedestrian on. All the time (100% by my count over several years) they are waving one person right into the path of another. All because they were too inattentive and lost their sense of place. The poor pedestrian will often see the oncoming car in the other lane and simply wait, making the waver confused and upset. But better that then when they believe the waver and have a near miss!
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This is most of it. They feel that if they can somehow get everyone else out of the way it will be safer.
Or sometimes, they are trying to be nice but are completly clueless to the traffic situation. People will wave you on right into the path of a garbage truck. Opps, my bad, forgot it was a two way street.