It isn’t an accident that actually HAPPENED, but the circumstances made me wonder.
Imagine four lanes of traffic: two in both directions, and a turn lane in the middle - a very busy region of road due to it being the end of a major freeway, and melding into the business-heavy downtown area. In the left lane in one of the directions, a truck driver sees someone waiting in the middle turn lane (Driver A) to turn left through his direction of traffic to get into a business driveway. Because there’s a stoplight several feet ahead that has filled up the left lane up to the point of the business, the truck driver decides to stop to allow Driver A to go through.
Driver B is going in the same direction as the truck driver, but because of the size of the truck, he cannot see why the truck driver has stopped, and so keeps on going straight. So does Driver A, who assumably couldn’t see into the right lane she was turning into for the same reason.
In real life, Drivers A and B did not collide. But if they had, who would’ve been at fault?
FWIW, I was/would’ve been Driver B, and I can totally see an argument for it being my fault, but because of the truck circumstance, I’m not entirely certain. The only thing I’m even somewhat sure of is that it’s probably not the truck driver’s fault. So whose would it have been?
I’d say the guy turning left across a busy street without being able to see whether or not there was any oncoming traffic. It’s not against the law for driver B to keep going when the lane in front of him is clear.
UK rules, here: Driver A, entirely. One driver (the truck driver) waiving right-of-way does not mean that the route is clear. Even if the truck driver is letting them out, and even if he’s suggesting that both lanes are clear, the obligation is still on the driver crossing lanes to ensure that their route is clear.
Driver A is completely responsible. Driver B has a right of way in her lane of traffic. Driver A is a dumbass for turning left into oncoming traffic with an obstructed view of Driver B’s lane of travel.
Insurance guy says…Driver A for failure to yield to oncoming traffic. The only mitigating factor I can think of would be if Driver B is driving recklessly fast or opted not to take action to avoid the accident if such action could have been reasonably expected (for instance, remove the truck and pretty much all other traffic from the scenario and give Driver B ample time to stop), which could really only be determined by the perception of witnesses and the extent of damage to vehicle A. This would probably only come into play if Driver A were seriously injured or killed, and even then it’d be of little use to anyone at all.
Of course, if traffic is that heavy, you gotta be watching out for this very maneuver, if only to keep yourself from being right AND dead.
The same situation almost happened to me, but a little differently. In my case, I was in the left of two lanes, and the traffic in the right lane had backed up, with someone leaving room for a guy pulling out of a business or off of a side street to turn onto the main road (the one I was on). As I was proceeding down the left lane towards the stoplight, the guy pulls through the space in the stopped lane of cars. We both slam on the brakes and I jerk the wheel to the left and just missed him. I wondered about who would be at fault for a while, and came to the conclusion that I had the right of way so if I couldn’t have avoided the accident (i.e. if he’d pulled out a half-second later), it would have been on him.
That accident did happen to me. I was pulling out of horrible parking lot. Traffic was backed up at the light, so a woman stopped to leave me room to pull out. I did so, and three quarters of the way through the turn, I was whacked from behind.
I was found at fault. I still am a little annoyed at that, because based on where I was hit, and how long I took in pulling out (because I did check for traffic from the other direction), I find it highly unlikely that the guy was doing the speed limit. At any rate, I was at fault.
Yup, I agree with insurance guy. IAAL, and this is right up my alley. Driver B has to “see what there is to be seen”, so B sees this and if there’s a chance to stop, B can get hit with a small percentage of the liability. Also, as insurance guy says, if B is driving too fast, B gets hit with a %age. But otherwise, this is A’s ball game all the way. Since A is turning, he has to make sure the way is clear before he goes. Other than what I said about seeing what there is to be seen, B has the right to proceed into an intersection on a green.
This is what pisses me off about “nice” people who yield their right of way – they aren’t considering the rest of the traffic situation, and they create traffic hazards. I never accept such offers, and I usually heap abuse on the dumbsh**s who do it.
Hey, if there’s a stoplight up ahead and I would be blocking a driveway, I usually leave a space (incidentally, I do this even if no one’s there, in case someone needs to get in or out during the light). I figure whoever’s taking advantage of my kindness should be intelligent enough to assess the rest of the situation and not barge on out into traffic. Should my niceness mitigate their responsibility to pay attention to the road? I don’t think so.
Leaving access to a turn is different to yielding right-of-way. In one, you’re just allowing a gap, which is equally for oncoming traffic to turn into. Situations like the OP are where the driver then waves or indicates that it’s clear for the turning driver to manouvere, which may not actually be the case.
It’s A’s fault for sure if an accident occurs. But truck drivers are aware of much more that goes on in the road – they are elevated above the roadway, they have in-cab radios, and they drive for many more hours a week than you or I. Watching their behavior can give you hints about conditions ahead that you might not otherwise get until it’s too late. So if you’re B, and you’re paying attention to the road you’re on, your mental process should (ideally) go like this:
I’m on a road with a center left-turn lane. Because I’m leaving adequate following distance, I need to assume that someone might try to turn across it.
If I can’t see the turn lane, I need to realize it’s possible that there’s a car there that can’t see me, who might try to turn on the assumption that he just saw the end of a “block” of cars go by.
That tractor-trailer just stopped several lengths short of a red light. Could be that he’s leaving room to accelerate, but given (1) and (2), he’s probably allowing a left-turn.
Am I that smart? Sometimes. Do I think that far ahead all the time? Probably not. During rush hour, though: you bet your ass I do.
Not a cop, not a lawyer - just a pretty good driver.
Well, I’ve been the truck driver in this scenario. After the accident. I pulled over to help, and driver A loudly accused me of “telling her it was safe”, so it wasn’t her fault she pulled out in front of someone. Her insurance guy contacted me, got my side of the story, and basically told me her position was full of crap and had no legal standing.
I’ve been Driver A. (Hey I was young and stoopid - hush)
Turning left into a theater parking lot, from a center lane across two lanes of traffic. A woman in a sedan in the near lane stopped to give me space. A big red truck in the far lane sent me to the hospital and my car to the great toyota pasture in the sky. It was my fault, not the sedan, not the truck. (It was karma; I was playing hookie after lunch and not going back to work. Told you I was stoopid.)
I recall reading recently of a court case similar to this, but with a pedestrian instead of a car turning left.
The vehicle in the inside lane stopped, and waved to the pedestrian to cross the street. As they did so, another car driving along in the other lane struck the pedestrian. The driver of the first car was sued, and lost – his waving to the pedestrian to cross was the deciding factor in finding him partially responsible for the injury to the pedestrian.
Not sure I would agree with that decision personally, but it does indicate that your “niceness” can get you in trouble!
My rule of thumb for this is, “People who stop when they shouldn’t might start when they shouldn’t, too.” I’ve had people stop when they didn’t have a stop sign, wave me through the intersection, and then start rolling when I’m right in front of them.
I’m glad that this worked out this way. A pedestrian is not the same as another driver. And the UK driving test is explicit in saying that you should not indicate pedestrians that it is clear to cross, because it may not be. I reall really reallllllly hate drivers who (impatiently) wave at me to walk across a two-lane junction, just because they’re waiting.
I drive streets like this every day and have seen more than a dozen such crashes and hundreds of near hits. As for GM’s last comment, I have read of cases where the stopped vehicle did wave the turning driver thru his gap and was then found culpable in the resulting crash adjudication.
Unfortunately, in my case, I COULDN’T see that he’d stopped ANY amount of distance short of the red light - it WAS a truck, after all. For all I knew, he had another car directly in front of him.
Your other two points are very valid, though, no matter what the circumstances.