11 ms·
Why do we have right-on-red, and is it time to get rid of it?
- cgriswald 3y agoIs there some reason that green right turn arrows are bad where the cross traffic has a protected left and u-turns are not allowed?
- windows2020 3y agoI recall a particular intersection where a two-way turns into a one-way that has crosswalks on all sides. v > > v^ A driver traveling north receives a green right arrow instead of a green globe. I assume this is to make it extra clear not to proceed straight, but then is it technically illegal for a pedestrian to use the rightmost crosswalk?
- Volundr 3y agoA pedestrian won't be given the the walk signal while the turn light is green. I'm not sure if this feature would ever appear on an intersection with pedestrian signals.
- windows2020 3y agoThere aren't walk signals here. Here it is: https://www.google.com/maps/@39.9631617,-75.1899368,3a,75y,231.89h,80.83t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sMGjK_j1TBNmTIjcZD94U7Q!2e0!7i16384!8i8192 https://www.google.com/maps/@39.9631617,-75.1899368,3a,75y,2...
- Volundr 3y agoAnd a bike lane too. God that's galling. Accident waiting to happen (and I'd be willing to bet it has).
- henriquez 3y ago[flagged]
- eesmith 3y agoThe biggest insight I got from Vision Zero is that the focus on dangerous drivers is deeply flawed. All you are doing is doubling down on that flawed viewpoint, seemingly to justify your disdain of bankers, without really understanding the consequences your argument. Roads and traffic laws did not appear by magic. They are created by people, and the design of those roads and laws, and the construction of those roads, contributes to any crashes. Some intersections are dangerous due to bad design, and it's possible to design a less dangerous intersection. We haven't made all intersections as safe as we can because it's expensive and a whole lot of people prefer shorter drive times and the increase in danger over safer intersections. Using your logic, any city with a dangerous intersection - effectively all of them - are already committing TREASON, and the voters who authorized the bond sales which paid for them are accessories to crime who should be subject to criminal liabilities. When the vast majority of adults are treasonous criminals who control state power, it's no longer treason or criminal. The large majority of the traitors and criminals who founded the US never faced British criminal punishment for their actions against the Crown. Calling George Washington a traitor will make you few friends in the US, yet that is what you are doing here.
- aorloff 3y agoWe also have left on red, from a one-way to a one-way.
- yojo 3y agoIn Oregon, there is left on red from a two-way to a one-way. Every time I do it it feels insane, but if sight lines are good it’s reasonable I guess. See: “Left or Right Turn: Two-Way Road to One-Way Road” https://www.oregon.gov/odot/dmv/pages/online_manual/study-section_3.aspx https://www.oregon.gov/odot/dmv/pages/online_manual/study-se...
- walrus01 3y agoOne of the nice things about Seattle and WA traffic law is that you can turn LEFT on red when going from a one-way street onto another one way street. In addition to right on red, of course.
- operatingthetan 3y agoSeattle is starting to add "no turn on red" to many intersections, which is good in my book as a frequent pedestrian. People ignore them though and run the lights.
- alphabettsy 3y agoYep. True in other places as well
- chungy 3y agoThe answer to this question-in-a-headline is, of course, no.
- bunabhucan 3y agoIt's tempting for drivers to drive towards an intersection looking left - the direction their threat will come from - and keep speed to turn right on red if no traffic is coming. What they wont be looking for is the cyclist or pedestrian in their path. The faster they go the more attentive they need to be on that left window.
- Noumenon72 3y agoIf you make a small dedicated right-turn lane it will signal to pedestrians to watch out for RTOR. If you don't, I guess you have to ticket people who don't stop at the red. I would naturally stop. Of course, 19/20 intersections never have pedestrians anyway.
- johntb86 3y agoI always liked the idea of slip lanes, as then you could check first for a conflict with a pedestrian (looking left and right), then cross that point and worry about a conflict with a car or bike (looking far left). But some people are now trying to remove them because they're worried they can cause drivers to speed through the pedestrian crossing.
- dventimi 3y agoThe answer to a question that begins with "Why" is "no"?
- fiddlerwoaroof 3y agohttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headli...
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- _heimdall 3y agoPedestrians already have the right of way. If drivers ignore that, how will banning right on red help? Replacing one honored rule with another rule seemed illogical, bad drivers are going to be bad drivers either way.
- aeternum 3y agoIt makes it more likely that bad drivers will be caught. It's much better to catch a bad driver before they run over a pedestrian rather than after. Many drivers believe that getting to their destination is more important than yielding to pedestrians and minor traffic laws. It's important to enforce those minor traffic laws before that behavior/mindset leads to a fatality.
- KennyBlanken 3y agoBecause there's no enforcement of this, and "gee I didn't see them" is accepted without question by police, prosecutors, and the public? Banning right on red is called a "protected" crossing - the driver has to very visibly violate the law (in a way that can even be enforced in an automated way) to even be in the situation with the pedestrian. That is substantially more protection and it works.
- tuukkah 3y agoThe article had the numbers, e.g.: > crashes increased by more than 20% in states that allowed RTOR. They also explained some of the mechanics: truck drivers don't see the bikers, SUV drivers don't see the pedestrians, other drivers press you to clear the intersection quicker than is safe etc.
- eesmith 3y agoBecause the "honored rule" isn't honored well enough, as "about 57% of car crashes involving pedestrians happened because drivers failed to yield to people in all intersections", quoting one of the listed study results, and "crashes increased by more than 20% in states that allowed RTOR" quoting another. Some rules are more honored than others. Consistent rules are more likely to be followed than ones that differ by state and even by city. Rules which require more situational awareness - you may turn right if the light red, traffic is clear from the left, no people are in the crosswalk, and no one from the right is about to cross - are harder to follow than ones which require situational awareness - you may not move if the light is red. Rules with personal choices are more subject to peer pressure. You aren't required to turn right on red, but if you don't, you may get honked at. This may encourage people to make the wrong decision, and turn even when not clear. If RTOR is illegal, honking is no longer peer pressure but only an "I am an asshole" indicator.
- monkaiju 3y agoGetting rid of RTOR is such a low hanging fruit, we should absolutely do it. Currently our roads prioritize vehicle speed over all other considerations.
- PakG1 3y agoI don't think that's something the roads prioritize. That's something that the drivers choose to do. A better word might be that roads afford or allow drivers to prioritize speed. I've been in cities where drivers don't prioritize speed. It's nice driving in such cities. People are civil on the road. It's really nice.
- Noumenon72 3y agoInstead of penalizing those nice cities with RTOR rules designed for reckless cities, we should step up enforcement in areas where the drivers choose to speed, until they also become nice.
- monkaiju 3y ago"Nice cities" ? Mind elaborating? Sorta sounds like youre implying some cities are just 'nice' based on like personal choice and not other variables like urban design. If so thats naive...
- Noumenon72 3y agoIt doesn't matter if your city is nice because it only has cobblestone streets, because it's populated by the Amish, or because police lasers zap speeders. Once it becomes nice you should get to reap the benefit by enjoying safe right turn on red.
- KennyBlanken 3y agoIt was absolutely the intention for traffic/urban planners to prioritize motorist travel times, which is why you see long delays on "beg buttons" at intersections, or making peds wait for a cycle or more of the lights, and so on. Some cities like Cambridge, MA integrate a default pedestrian cycle at all phases of the lights, sync the lights to not provide a "green wave", and have an extensive arrangement of one-way streets to discourage drivers from using residential roads as shortcuts.
- tasn 3y agoI miss right on red every time I drive outside the US. Right on red is a blessing, and it makes a lot of sense. Why would anyone want to take it away?! The only exception is maybe next to bike lanes.
- dventimi 3y agoIf you were told that getting rid of it would lower pedestrian fatalities, and you believed that, would YOU want to take it away?
- PakG1 3y agoSure, except Americans may also have a weird obsession with driving that makes them oblivious to pedestrians, whereas many other nations may be more aware of pedestrians and thus have fewer fatalities per capita. I have no data to back up such a statement. Just anecdotal experiences.
- sshine 3y ago...pe-de-strians? What's that? Walking people??? Have they lost their car? You have to know what it is to see it. :-D
- detourdog 3y agoI found the statistics in the article were not presented in a coherent manner. I couldn’t tell if right on red had a greater impact or not.
- cykros 3y agoIf it's really pedestrian fatalities we're concerned about, we should be implementing red right-facing arrows, which are on when the walk light is on. Right on red, unless that arrow is on. Perhaps a blinking yellow arrow for when it isn't, just to avoid the ambiguity. Or, when you're walking into the road, maybe make sure that drivers nearby see you. I played Ingress and Pokemon Go for years, in the city, at night, for years. Perhaps it's that I knew it put me at heightened risk so I paid more attention, but I really have a hard time understanding why people think that drivers are the only ones who need to pay attention when they're in the street.
- hot_gril 3y agoHeadline has "is it time to ban gas stoves" vibe
- silisili 3y agoI'd be OK getting rid of it IF we mandate smarter lights everywhere. That or get rid of lights where possible altogether in favor of some type of roundabout. Where I live now is a hellish mix of 4 way stop signs, and lights that seem to be on a 60 to 120 second timer no matter what. It's infuriating driving in the evening, not another car in sight, and getting caught at a redlight for more than a minute. A lot of people here seem to run red lights, and I think that's a huge reason why.
- dan_wood 3y agoAs an Australian who has driven in the US. I miss this so badly… Although for us it’ll be left on right. Being upside down doesn’t help either.
- 78zeros 3y agoThere are a few left-on-red intersections in the ACT. There should be more IMHO.
- PakG1 3y agoSo out of curiosity, are Americans not taught to stop at a red light and check their right-side mirror and blind spot for cyclists or pedestrians before turning right on a red light? Because I certainly was taught that when I signed up for driving lessons? Just Americans don't do this?
- chungy 3y agoIt's taught and the law.
- Johnny555 3y agoThere's a vast difference between what is taught and what is actually done. Everyone (well almost everyone) knows what they are supposed to do as drivers, but few do it.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- walrus01 3y agoIt's certainly taught but the practical reality is that a lot of people are very sloppy and careless in driving. As a frequent pedestrian in big cities that do allow right-on-red it's extremely common to see cars that try to make a quick right turn immediately at the same moment that a pedestrian crosswalk "Walk" sign comes on, risking running over a pedestrian. When the reality and law is that the car has to wait for the pedestrians to cross and then make its right on red after they have cleared the intersection. I think the main reason why right on red is banned in NYC is for pedestrian safety and traffic flow reasons.
- PakG1 3y agoI imagine the insane traffic volume in NYC also incentivizes more aggressive driving. There's a higher trip time penalty for not making the turn, compared to a city with less jammed roads. This matters for people who need to make appointments or any other driving where time matters (does anyone still offer pizza delivery in 30 minutes or it's free?).
- whycome 3y agoWe just need a right turn arrow at all intersections before pedestrians walk.
- timbit42 3y agoLet's get rid of traffic lights and switch to roundabouts.
- pixl97 3y agoPlease include a trillion dollar electro-shock driver retraining program in this package. For some considerable subset of Americans the roundabout is an indecipherable creature that induces fear an panic. For a bit I lived in a more modern US neighborhood filled with them, including some larger ones on the main streets. Some people treat an empty roundabout like a stop sign coming up to it. Others panic and stop inside the 'about waiting for entering traffic. Then you get the occasional rebel that demands to go the wrong way. I do like the roundabouts, but there are a lot of people still untrained in their ways.
- hot_gril 3y agoIn the US, sometimes it's the driver's fault, sometimes the roundabout is put in a nonsensical location and is actually confusing. I think they're just trying to be fancy in those cases. Like here's one I still remember from living in Mountain View. https://www.google.com/maps/@37.3911031,-122.0805526,3a,75y,11.93h,87.1t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s4kox0YgjzE_rNgbDfCjYyA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu https://www.google.com/maps/@37.3911031,-122.0805526,3a,75y,... Roundabout with straight/left traffic lights (not the right turn lights sometimes seen on large roundabouts in Europe), an oxymoron. Someone drives through a green as usual and bam, hit by someone still clearing the roundabout. Is right on red legal here too? Extra islands also add to the confusion, making people U-turn wrongly. Lots of foot traffic and peds don't know when to safely walk in this situation. Having tons of signs there just adds to the overload. Two-way stop signs with a roundabout. Who has right of way here? "CROSS TRAFFIC DOES NOT STOP," but roundabout normally means to yield to whoever's already in it: https://www.google.com/maps/place/37%C2%B023'14.3%22N+122%C2%B004'49.0%22W/@37.387304,-122.0809327,315m/data=!3m2!1e3!4b1!4m4!3m3!8m2!3d37.387304!4d-122.080289?entry=ttu https://www.google.com/maps/place/37%C2%B023'14.3%22N+122%C2... Can they just remove the crap in the middle? Or most commonly, zero stop signs but the roundabout is so tiny that it's unclear whether or not two cars can safely use it at the same time.
- jaybrendansmith 3y agoThere is very little evidence that right on red creates any sort of danger to pedestrians. Yes, it's annoying to cyclists and pedestrians, but we'd be better off investing in many other traffic calming and pedestrian safety tactics. https://jabberwocking.com/right-on-red-works-fine-theres-no-need-to-ban-it/ https://jabberwocking.com/right-on-red-works-fine-theres-no-...
- johnea 3y agoYea, having to pay attention to the "world outside my brain" is such a distraction from my true identity! Instead of making it all worse by allowing traffic to flow more often, let's introduce stop lights in the middle of blocks so there's more equality in who get's to stop being distracted by the outside universe, and instead focus on our true selves, which of course involves our online accounts with large corporations. Driving is such a distraction from being on the phone...