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This PSA brought to you by several would-be assassins who tried to wave me in front of speeding cars in the last month and who will have to try harder next time.
this post was submitted on 14 May 2024
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This intersection looks fucking horrible. Is this how American streets are built?
Some of them yes, the real shitty version of this is the 65mph divided highway where you can reel they just plopped a highway down in a rural area crossing over a bunch of country roads so instead of spending a shit load of money on overpasses you get the pleasure of merging directly into a actual highway. I've never actually had a problem at one of those because they're always in the middle of nowhere but you really get to test your cars acceleration when you find one.
There is also the stroad that is basically what you describe only with entrances to and exits from business parking lots every couple of car lengths.
Am American, the intersection design itself didn't register to me at all. They're like this pretty often yeah
I'm so used to roundabouts and red lights. They're annoying for the lone driver, but add a bit of traffic and they move everything along so much smoother.
Round abouts are showing up in US cities. Unfortunately we’re too dumb to know how to drive in a circle, so they just end up causing confusion.
I live in Tennessee.. the scenario in the old is so common I saw it 4 times yesterday. It's in every town, city, metro area here. There is no planning, no thought to motorists... They only apply a light once public outcry gets to the point where city officials can't ignore it any longer.
The town my wife is from has an intersection like above. It killed ~30 people over the years before a traffic light was installed.
That's it's very much normal.
When I was teaching my older son to drive, I took him through it. My recommendation: "Never turn left at it. Turn right and find a safer way to go the other way."
When he got to the interchange the guy in front of him tried to turn left and got hit immediately.
Yes, classic stroad design. Although I'm seeing it more often where it's not possible to make a left turn from the sidestreet.
Yes, and the only safe (and often time-saving) answer is to just turn right and then make U-turn later. Fortunately we have "right on red" as a legal maneuver here, so that softens the blow a bit. And yes, a civilized response to this nonsense would be a roundabout but we're mostly allergic to those (they are gaining traction in places though).
Often, these intersections rely on traffic lights to be navigable during anything resembling normal traffic. Without it, it's also kind of miserable for everyone waiting for oncoming traffic to clear in order to turn.
The only time I've witnessed this "wave someone out" technique as a good thing was where two-lane road traffic was too dense for local traffic to join. But that's a regional thing in the US (around Massachusetts by my reckoning). At the same time I've also seen folks there blindly apply that grace to situations where it does not belong, like highway on-ramps.
Also, while we're talking about safety, don't forget the 45mph delta between the stopped lane turning left and the traffic whizzing by mere inches from the stopped cars. Some places have a wide raised curb between these two lanes, but most do not.
Lots of American roads are like this. Generally you are better off making a right turn and then a U turn at a traffic light. I don’t bother turning left at an intersection like this unless there is no traffic.
these are everywhere and I've never seen one without a traffic light