Some Wikipedia research helped to half-illuminate the issue. It seems to say that a “permissive” signal (what they call a “doghouse” signal and what I have always called a “Christmas Tree”-one red light on top, with a yellow and green on the right for going straight and a yellow and green arrow for turning left on the left) is where:
“…the law requires one to yield to oncoming traffic and turn when the intersection is clear and it is safe to do so.”
But it says nothing about whether you can park yourself out there for a minute or more way past the white line while waiting for the head-on traffic to clear.
Then there’s the issue of the “yellow trap”:
“This happens when traffic proceeding the other way gets a green light for a longer period of time than the direction of a turning vehicle.”
Thus if you do this at a yellow trap light, the oncoming traffic may not clear for quite awhile, and all the while you are stuck there. But again there’s no mention as to whether you are allowed to park out there in the first place.
Now, going to the source and consulting the MUTCO (Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices), I again find no explicit mention of whether you can park in the middle of the intersection; in relation to a steady green signal, it says:
“Permissive Only Mode—turns made on the CIRCULAR GREEN signal indication after yielding to oncoming traffic and pedestrians.”
Essentially what Wikipedia says. My feeling is that, if you are yielding to other traffic which has the lawful right of way, then you must remain behind the white line.
In another section on Pavement and Curb Markings, I find this:
“…stop lines shall consist of solid white lines extending across approach lanes to indicate the point at which the stop is intended or required to be made.”
I argue that, since you have to stop and wait for the oncoming traffic to clear, that behind the white line is where you must do the stopping at. It then goes on and describes “yield” lines, but since these lines are hardly ever seen at such intersections they are irrelevant here.
The law is one thing, and then there’s the reality that if you don’t make your left turn after the red light has come on and the red-light runners have cleared, there are intersections in busy cities where you will wait for hours before being able to make that left turn. This is where the chicken drivers really bung things up, because they won’t make the turn that they have to, and try to back up instead. I’ll compromise with you on this one, cerberus; I’ll try not to enter the intersection behind a left-turner, if they will promise to clear the intersection instead of trying to back out of it. I think your (generic you) first left-turn back up should get you a warning, and the second offense should cost you your license until you can prove 10 hours of professional driver training and pass your road test again. If you make a habit of backing up in intersections, you obviously have not learned to drive properly.
Featherlou, we disagree. My “backing up the intersection” is safe driving. I do not trust others’ driving, especially in an urban environment. In my neck of the woods, sitting in the intersection is not a safe practice. Perhaps in your world of ideal, fictitious professionally-trained drivers, this is safe practice. And skilled urban drivers use routes that minimise the need for left turns.
So, “manning up” involves stupid, careless, reckless driving? No thanks. And fuck you and your “program”. I am not going to sit in the intersection on green. I’m going to determine that I can make the turn safely, first, so that no pausing in the intersection is required.
See, stupid fucker, if my reckless ass isn’t in the fucking intersection, fucker, I am much less of a stupid, fucking, careless fucking target. Understand? It might be “legally proper” to sit there in the intersection, but it is stupid, given the worst conduct of the most careless and reckless drivers. If I have to balance the traffic laws against safety and/or the laws of physics, safety and physics win. Every single time.
Oh, and a quick note on the turning on red, “after the red light runners”. Guess what? If you’re turning left on that red light, unless you’re doing so on a green left turn arrow, you’re running a red light and also possibly failing to yield the right of way. Maybe you should re-visit driving school, to review the rules about red lights and right of way.
Unless, of course, “professional driving” means that drivers only break the law in ways that you approve.
No, it is not. Sitting behind the white line on a green light means that at least one and perhaps two cars will not get through during a busy period. This does not make it safe, because the lights are set to pass through some standard number of cars on each exchange. If every person making a left turn causes two cars to be unable to turn, this means that the traffic going stright will soon be blocked by people who cannot even get to the left turn lane (or, where there is no left turn lane, all traffic is now stopped). Pretty soon, your line has backed up to clog the intersection behind you, cars attempting to turn left through the line cannot make their turns, and soon your intersection is blocked by the traffic for which you are waiting because you can’t be bothered to follow the actual traffic laws and pull into an intersection on a green. Then, when the inevitable fender-bender occurs because of the traffic jam, the emergency vehicles cannot get through, causing some poor person excessive pain and suffering just because you cannot follow the law.
Your argument is similar to the one used by the guy going 45 on the freeway, causing a big wreck, and then blaming all the other cars for going “fast.”
I have never seen a car waiting for a chance to turn left on a green light T-boned. I am sure that it has happened when some drunk rushed through the intersection against the light, but the drunks are usually sufficiently out of control that their actions are already unpredictable. (The one similar T-bone I have seen occurred to the car waiting to turn left behind the line, because the drunk panicked when he saw the red, lost control, and hit the guy anyway.)
I think the person you are responding to here meant the kind of situation where you’re already in the intersection and then the light turns red. In that case, you are not running a red light. You only run a red light if the front of your car passes into the intersection while the light is red.
The section on left turns assumes the driver will pull into the intersection while waiting to turn left:
I could go on. There are oodles of links to various traffic regulations and driver training manuals on the internet. Other than in a handful of states where they have ‘anti-gridlock’ laws, you are expected to pull into the intersection when it’s safe to do so on green, then turn left when there is a safe gap in traffic. Period. The status of the lights is irrelevant, so long as you began your move into the intersection on a green light.
Now, obviously there are other types of left turns. There are left-turning lanes with flashing green arrows, others that have their own red light while the main lanes are still green, etc. They all have their own rules. But in the case of a simple intersection with a typical 3-bar light system (red, yellow, green circles), the correct procedure for turning left is to stop behind the stop line, then advance into the intersection on green when it is safe to do so, then turn left when the oncoming traffic has cleared the intersection.
I’ve found that most people who don’t do this often jump the yellow light (i.e. they’ll sit behind the stop line on green, then if the light goes yellow and the oncoming traffic stops, they’ll proceed through the yellow and around the corner). This is both illegal and far more dangerous, because traffic going the other way may ‘jump’ the light, not expecting you to dart out in front of them. If you’re already in the intersection when the light goes yellow, everyone can see you and they know to wait until you exit the intersection.
John Di Fool: The white stop line is the line that you must stop behind if you cannot enter the intersection. That’s it. If you CAN legally enter the intersection, it’s irrelevant. It’s there to prevent people from hanging the noses of their cars into intersections or across crosswalks, or in the case of left-turn lanes to keep them set back from the intersection enough to allow cars and trucks turning left on the perpendicular road to have more room for the turn. None of this has anything to do with whether or not you should procede into the intersection on a green, regardless of what your gut feeling tells you.
Cerebus: No ‘manning up’ means that if you’re uncomfortable with the rules of the road, you should take steps to make yourself a better driver so that you’re not letting your fear cause you to block traffic. When cars enter the intersection on left, it can double the throughput of traffic in the left lane at a busy intersection. It can mean the difference between smooth flowing traffic and traffic jams. You are expected to drive safety, but also to drive efficiently and not unduly hold up traffic. If entering the intersection to turn left scares you, go hire a driving instructor and learn to do it right.
I’m quite comfortable with my driving - it’s the idiots blasting through the intersections that bother me. My good driving can’t nullify the physics involved in an intersection collision.
There’s a general rule for driving speed and lane choice, and I follow it: Slower Drivers Keep Right.
Where I drive, we have left turn arrows on red. So there is no backing up of traffic. The left turning people can do so on their signal. I have seen too many cars hit, nearly hit, and in one case, T-boned by people blasting through intersections on the wrong light.
If a couple of cars have to wait for the next light, then so be it.
So… You’re doing it your way, even though it’s incorrect and possibly even dangerous. Got it. Just don’t pretend you’re a good driver.
P.S. just because there’s a left-turning arrow does not mean that’s the only time you can turn left. In fact, left-turning arrows are put in at intersections where there is more than average left-turning activity, which means it’s even more important for you to do your part and keep the traffic moving efficiently.
I have seen where people may pull into the intersection, not where they must. There’s a distinction. And the laws vary by place.
Where I drive, I am not aware of any requirement to expose myself to intersection collisions. I’m perfectly capable of doing so, yet choose to not do so. It isn’t a matter of fear, it’s a matter of safety.
Pulling into the intersection and raising the odds of a crash is not safe. The impact damage and time costs of clearing intersection wrecks likely exceeds the small gains achieved by cramming two more cars through at the light. Cars piling in too tightly in the lanes increases the odds of wrecks involving more vehicles. If people would s-p-a-c-e t-h-e-i-r f-u-c-k-i-n-g cars properly, the “danger” of not driving like an over-aggressive idiot would not be present.
That’s why lots of places use the left turn green arrow cycle - it works, and it safely reduces congestion.
That’s all I was looking for, thanks Sam, but I still agree with Cerberus on the iffy safety of the manuever you describe, even if it is “legal.” In a intersection with a huge amount of cars going every which way I’ll be thinking three times before I venture out there without the right-of-way. In my neck of the woods however these “Christmas Tree” lights, while in vogue here for awhile, have pretty much disappeared and many intersections which used to have them have gone back to the more traditional separate red light-perhaps the local traffic engineers have recognized the safety/confusion issues with these lights?
I do agree that backing up in such a situation is probably ill-advised, and definitely if someone is behind you (where you going to go?).
Guys, if this was a safety hazard it wouldn’t be allowed. It’s not. You think it is, because it makes you uncomfortable.
In all my years of driving, I have NEVER seen someone get T-boned while waiting in the intersection to turn left. Never.
And of course it says ‘may’ and not ‘must’. ALL traffic regulations are stated that way in cases other than imperatives. Or let me ask you - if the law says you may proceed through the intersection on green, does that mean it’s okay for you to come to a dead stop at a green light on a whim, because the law doesn’t say that you MUST go through?
The bottom line is that every driver training manual I’ve ever seen instructs you to proceed into the intersection on green and then turn left when it is safe to do so. It’s expected behaviour. Other drivers expect you to do it. Making up your own rules because you think it’s safer is arrogance and dangerous because you are behaving in an unexpected way. One of these times you’ll stop and sit there and get rear-ended by the guy behind you who wasn’t paying complete attention and fully expected you to move into the intersection. Especially if you start to do so then hammer on the brakes, as many people who are too timid to enter the intersection seem to do.
Unless you’re driving a semi with a 48-foot trailer, you do NOT need to swing halfway into the lane on your right before making a left turn.
You turn left into the LEFT lane, not the middle or the right. This allows the people heading toward you to continue making right turns (into the RIGHT lane, of course) while you are making your left without mucking up traffic.
And, for the ongoing debate, once your wheels cross the white line, you’re committed to the turn. Do not back up. If you don’t think you can make it, don’t cross the line in the first place.
In Brooklyn, NY, where I live, some specifically say, something like “Do not turn. Wait for left-turn signal.” Other that that, your post(s) make sense, in terms of skilled, safe driving.
Well, you guys who think you should never, ever pull into the intersection unless you have a green turn arrow or you can complete your left turn without hesitation should never drive in L.A., then. They simply do not have turn arrows at most intersections, including some MAJOR intersections (or at least they didn’t have when I lived there a few years ago, and I’d be surprised if things have changed since then). Take the intersection of Wilshire Boulevard and Santa Monica Boulevard – 2-3 through lanes in each direction, plus, at least on Santa Monica, two left turn lanes onto Wilshire. And not a turn arrow in sight.
The ONLY, and I mean ONLY, way you can make a left turn there, since that is a hugely busy intersection at any time, day or night, is to pull out as far as you can on the green, wait for the red light runners from the other direction to clear, and then complete your turn on a red light. If you sit and wait till the intersection is completely clear on a green light to make your turn? You’re going to be there for a long, long time. Probably collecting ticket after ticket for hosing up a major intersection by your stupidity.
Say wha? Around here, the person turning right from across the street has the right-of-way, and if you’re turning left you shouldn’t be heading into any lane, left or otherwise.
If you are turning left, you turn into the left lane of the road you are turning onto. That way, oncoming traffic that is turning right onto the same road can turn right into the right lane, and you won’t conflict. If you turn left into the right lane, you are actually changing lanes inside an intersection, which you should never do.
It’s very common here to have people turning left while oncoming traffic is turning right into the same road. It’s also a common form of accident when people cross the lane boundary into the lane someone else is turning into. So never change lanes in an intersection.
To the OP: Hey, asshole, pay my next ticket. I’ve received TWO in my life for doing what you want me to do; one in California and one in Nevada. Both times, I was informed by the cop(s) writing the ticket(s) that it was ILLEGAL to pass the line until you can complete the turn safely. Not, “Do not pass the line if the light just turned green, figuring you can make the turn before the yellow.”
So, man up and pay my tickets or stop whining because I don’t need another hit to my bank account and therefore don’t drive like you think I should.
My experiences here (NE Florida) probably color things a bit, as this situation was rare to begin with here and lately virtually non-existent. On a 4 lane road with no turn lane (as you might indeed see in NY-ditto LA) I think I would have no choice but to sneak ahead into the intersection. In any event I believe I intimated that I really have no problem with this scenario except in certain rather rare (for me) cases.
Quick edit in response to D.E.S.K.Top668: hmm the plot thickens. The links provided upthread seem to indicate that doing this is legal, and getting a ticket in Cali is even stranger given Mama Tiger’s response.