I remember driving on a city street in Seattle where all the stop signs on the side streets had red and white striped posts, and I thought that would be helpful everywhere so that you could clearly see the absence of stop signs on the main road and their presence on side streets. That would make it much easier to know what to expect from crossing traffic.
I agree - no shortage of opinions, surprising shortage of actual cites.
In Ontario the driver turning left must always yield the right of way:
"At any intersection where you want to turn left or right, you must yield the right-of-way. If you are turning left, you must wait for approaching traffic to pass or turn and for pedestrians in or approaching your path to cross. "
If you arrive first and then 10 cars going straight arrive after you, too bad, you wait. Order of arrival only matters at a 4-way stop.
I’ve experienced this exact situation and decided to turn right instead of left, then done a driveway turn to change to the direction I wanted.
Although this is an interesting theoretical question, I’ve found in practice (in Ontario) that there are very few of these types of intersections. For the reasons we see in this thread, there is a lot of driver confusion and people sometimes do less safe things like u-turns. Usually if roads are that busy, the govt. puts in a 4 way stop or stop lights for safety (although I do wish they’d do more roundabouts).
What do you expect? Virtually all state traffic laws follow the Uniform Vehicle Code, as reflected by the two quoted above. The code reads: 11-402-Vehicle turning left
The driver of a vehicle intending to turn to the left shall yield the right of way to any vehicle approaching from the opposite direction which is so close as to constitute an immediate hazard. It seems rather pointless, and a lot of unnecessary busywork, to cite the laws of each state individually.
Now, if anyone has a cite indicating that it’s actually different in any state, that would be worth posting. Otherwise, it’s quite reasonable to assume that they’re all the same.
We got lazy AND smart! 
ETA: You can look it up here: http://www.iamtraffic.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/UVC2000.pdf
Most of what’s posted above is not opinions, but correct knowledge of the law, which is not negated by the lack of cites.
Ug. Around here, not so much. People in the circle yielding to people who are approaching it, people approaching the circle failing to yield to the people in it, and people just stopping with fear and surprise in their eyes, are all common. Less common but still something I’ve had to deal with: people going around the circle in the wrong direction.
I used to drive occasionally in Germany, where circles work very smoothly. Perhaps some day we will catch up.
What you fail to understand, as do most drivers, is that you aren’t supposed to barrel through an intersection unless you are certain that the cross-traffic is controlled. Used to run into this issue when living in Toledo, as much of the rural milage in southern Michigan is unpaved and uncontrolled. So, as you approach an intersection, you are required to slow down until you can be certain that you aren’t going to be hitting (or be hit by!) cross-traffic that has no stop sign either. It’s a bit of a pain when the corn grows higher than the knees (knee-high by the Fourth of July is an old Midwestern corn rubric).
So the fact that YOU have a stop sign is all that matters. You stop. Then, you don’t proceed unless/until you are certain that you will not hit or be hit by someone.
Actually, much of what is posted above is not actual fact, as evidenced by the fact that the opinions are in conflict.
Of course I understand that. What does that have to do with the point that the signage is extremely poor?
Yes, I have seen that (except the wrong direction part). Add to that people who will not enter the circle if it’s clear, just because they see someone else about to enter. They just put a traffic circle in the town I live next to and it confuses drivers because in spite of the fact that it is in driver’s training and the licensing test, they cannot remember the ONE rule of circles, which is “yield to traffic in the circle.” When you only have to remember one rule, you don’t have to screw around with who is to your right, who is to your left, who got there first, who is turning left, who is turning right. And nobody has to stop unless absolutely necessary.
I have driven in England, Italy, and France, they work beautifully there.
Except, that monstrosity in Swindon does appear a tad sub-optimal.
It’s a sick feeling to sit at an intersection waiting to turn and see a car approach directly approach from across that busy road.
Now the danger has multiplied. There’s still the heavy traffic and looking for an opening. You now have this late arriver that may steal your one chance to turn.
Around here, the first to arrive gets to turn. Otherwise a left turn would be impossible to make.
Expecting the person turning left to always yield doesn’t work in heavy traffic. Especially if cars are stacking up behind me. I have to turn and clear the intersection.
It is even more fun when that other guy forgot (or neglected) to signal and turns left in front of you when you both could have gone at the same time.
Yes. That happens all too often. There’s no excuse for not using signals.
The city will finally install a traffic light after enough wrecks get their attention.
That is (was?) the law in MA. But not NH. So lots of MA drivers visiting here got surprise tickets…
Until recently, traffic circles were extremely uncommon in the midwestern U.S. In the past decade or so, traffic engineers have gone mad for them (particularly up in Wisconsin, where I still have relatives, and where I visit frequently). If traffic circles were in the licensing test in midwestern states in the past (they may well have been), the knowledge of how to use them likely left most drivers’ brains years ago, because they never encountered them.
And, now, there’s a population explosion of traffic circles, and two generations of drivers who never had to navigate them before, don’t understand the “yield to traffic in the circle” rule, and, thus, don’t really know how to drive through them, and hate them.
I have an eight-way traffic circle four blocks from my house; it’s been there for decades, but at least twice a week, while I’m in the circle, I have to slam on my brakes when a driver goes into the circle right in front of me (ignoring “yield to traffic in the circle”). And, I, too, see people occasionally going into the circle clockwise (i.e., backwards) – I’m fairly certain that it’s a case of “but, I want to turn left, not right!!”
I have no doubt that traffic circles are more efficient than stop-sign controlled intersections – but that’s assuming that drivers have a common understanding of how to use them. IME, in the Midwest, this isn’t the case.
I don’t know how common it is, but I have seen this ambiguity intentionally used for its advantages. In a residential area where apparently there were problems with speeding, instead of putting in more stop signs, the authorities went in and took OUT all the stop signs that had been there. All the residential intersections are completely blank. Now nobody knows what the hell is going on, so they slow down.
Your complaint makes no sense. I’m approaching an intersection. Either I have a Stop sign, or I don’t. If I do, I stop; what difference does it make whether it’s a two-way or four-way stop? If I don’t, I slow down, unless I can see that the other direction is controlled. I don’t proceed through the intersection without knowing that I won’t be hitting anyone or impeding anyone from the other direction. Since I have no stop sign, the type of stop sign used is irrelevant.
The only thing added by knowing that something is a four-way or two-way stop in advance of the intersection is that I don’t have to hunt to find out what is true about the other direction. That’s of minor importance at best, since I’m already stopped. Even if the other direction is controlled, if a car is coming from that direction, and it isn’t slowing, I’m not going to enter the intersection anyway, because, you know, defensive driving and all that.
I think the implied problem is that one system ensures that all drivers know what’s going on at all times, while the other system is “shut up and stop, you’ll find out what’s going on later”.
In the scenario given by the OP, the driver coming the opposite direction stops at the stop sign and then must “yield, and grant immediate use of the intersection”. The other driver (in that scenario) must yield to allow you to turn left.
*Texas traffic law…
Sec. 545.151. VEHICLE APPROACHING OR ENTERING INTERSECTION. (a) An operator approaching an intersection:
(1) shall stop, yield, and grant immediate use of the intersection:
(A) in obedience to an official traffic-control device, including a stop sign or yield right-of-way sign; or
(B) if a traffic-control signal is present but does not display an indication in any of the signal heads; and
(2) after stopping, may proceed when the intersection can be safely entered without interference or collision with traffic using a different street or roadway.*
Although there is a requirement for the driver turning left to yield, there is also a duty of the other guy at the stop sign to yield before leaving the stop sign.
From my own experience in law enforcement for many years I’ll also add a caveat… not all police officers enforcement every traffic law as it was intended. And remember, a police officer cannot determine fault in any case. Only a court can determine fault. A police officer can only determine if a violation has occurred and it’s possible to determine a violation has been committed by both drivers in a collision sometimes. It’s even possible one driver can be cited and not be at fault for the accident. For example, speed has no bearing on right-of-way. A driver can be cited for speeding after an accident and although the court may find that speed was a contributing factor, it did not relieve the other driver of their responsibility to yield to avoid the accident.
I think it makes a difference because if you have a stop sign and the other person doesn’t, you expect to wait until they have cleared the intersection. If you both have stop signs, you expect to start moving once they have stopped. The problem it fixes is two cars sitting still trying to figure out who should go – which wastes time at best, and leads to slow speed fender benders and close calls some of the time.