Is left turn on red now permitted? (Denver: school, most dangerous)

[reed303]

Originally Posted by Mach50

The law here states you can proceed to turn while in the intersection as long as you yield to oncoming traffic.

https://law.justia.com/codes/colorad...tion-42-4-702/

That section only speaks to the "Right-of-Way" versus oncoming traffic.

This section https://law.justia.com/codes/colorad...tion-42-4-603/ speaks to disobeying a traffic signal
"1) No driver of a vehicle shall disobey the instructions of any official traffic control device"
which is what the OP asked about.

[BarryK123]

Originally Posted by Mach50

The law here states you can proceed to turn while in the intersection as long as you yield to oncoming traffic.

https://law.justia.com/codes/colorad...tion-42-4-702/

That's with respect to other traffic, but doesn't say anything about the right to ignore a red light.

[Mach50]

Originally Posted by BarryK123

That's with respect to other traffic, but doesn't say anything about the right to ignore a red light.

Well it appears the law is unclear

https://www.thedenverchannel.com/tra...go-way-or-wait

[TCHP]

Its messy but the gist of it is you are not allowed to run a red light, but if you are doing and are in the intersection, on coming traffic must yield to you. Obviously, as shown above, there is some latitude in interpretation and you are welcome to argue the point in traffic court should you be ticketed for it. I tried to do so and had a judge who did not agree with me. So I got a ticket and traffic school.

[BarryK123]

I took Driver's Ed in High School in NY state (not city). To make a left turn, we were taught to pull into the intersection, put your turn signal on (attention Coloradans!) and keep the wheels pointed straight until just prior to your turn, so if you're rear-ended, you're not pushed into oncoming traffic. When traffic allows, turn left. If the light turns red while you're in the intersection, you are supposed to complete your turn. There are stiff fines in NYC for "blocking the box."

[Sonic_Spork]

It's funny, I get hell from other drivers here at times, because I lived in Olympia, WA for a while. Up there, ALL of the intersections had cameras (which I see we're about to get at a few of 'em.) If your car had not cleared the intersection, at the precise moment that the light turned red, your plate would be photographed and you'd get a ticket in the mail. I did hear through the grapevine that people had some luck fighting those tickets in court, but it definitely had an effect on driver behavior. People don't really run red lights up there. They will stop when it's just yellow, if they safely are able to.

Here, though? Yellow pretty much always means, "GO GO GO" and often enough cars are entering the intersection even after its gone red.

Not long ago I needed to cross north Academy on foot. I reflected upon the fact that it was much, much easier and safer to do that when NOT at an intersection, taking it one section at a time and waiting on the median until the other side was completely clear, as compared to crossing on foot at a light, where people turning may very well not see you. Running red lights is the single most common bad driving thing I see here.

Well. I've also seen some really stupid...I mean...creative...use of lanes lately. Just a few days ago I was sitting in traffic on Cimmarron/24 at the intersection with 21st St. I was heading west. When the light went red in front of me, we had two people in left turn lanes who had crept out into the road...but northbound 21st is closed for construction. So the guy who thought he was going to turn left there? Decided to go straight instead. He swerved from the turn lane right out in front of those stopped at the light. But he forgot that there were red light running lefters going the other way, and nearly caused a wreck. Horns and all. He maybe should have done a U-turn, it would have been arguably safer.

So now I've seen people using straight lanes to turn, and turning lanes to go straight. I don't even know anymore.

[IndyRC]

This all sounds like stuff migrating north from Texas.

[TCHP]

Originally Posted by COcheesehead

There’s an old joke.

How can you tell which driver is from Colorado at an intersection?

They are the third person thru the red light!

I thought you could tell us by the lack of turn signal use.

Originally Posted by BarryK123

I took Driver's Ed in High School in NY state (not city). To make a left turn, we were taught to pull into the intersection, put your turn signal on (attention Coloradans!) and keep the wheels pointed straight until just prior to your turn, so if you're rear-ended, you're not pushed into oncoming traffic. When traffic allows, turn left. If the light turns red while you're in the intersection, you are supposed to complete your turn. There are stiff fines in NYC for "blocking the box."

There's that signal thing again.

My daughter just completed driver's school and got her license a couple months ago. They were teaching that you do not pull into the intersection unless you either have a green arrow or a clear passage to complete the turn left. They did not endorse entering the intersection and sitting, although that has long been a tactic to ensure you get through because of the way the law requires oncoming traffic to yield to whoever holds the intersection.

[Count David]

Originally Posted by Sonic_Spork

Well. I've also seen some really stupid...I mean...creative...use of lanes lately. Just a few days ago I was sitting in traffic on Cimmarron/24 at the intersection with 21st St. I was heading west. When the light went red in front of me, we had two people in left turn lanes who had crept out into the road...but northbound 21st is closed for construction. So the guy who thought he was going to turn left there? Decided to go straight instead. He swerved from the turn lane right out in front of those stopped at the light. But he forgot that there were red light running lefters going the other way, and nearly caused a wreck. Horns and all. He maybe should have done a U-turn, it would have been arguably safer.

So now I've seen people using straight lanes to turn, and turning lanes to go straight. I don't even know anymore.

Me either. I remember another one that is pretty recent.

I was on northbound University Blvd in Denver turning left on Alameda, and I was behind another car in the left turn lane waiting for my turn to turn.

The car in front of me (kind of classy middle-aged guy), also turning left (I presumed), decided to turn right from the left turn lane during his turn cycle. Yeah, he looked to make sure there wasn't any northbound traffic coming, but how one goes from needing to go west to east in a single instant is pretty remarkable. This caused me to have to wait for another turn cycle, because this little event used up all of our green light turn time.

I've seen all kinds of stupid crap in my time here (I spent ~ 7 years as an overnight courier ), just as I would have seen anywhere else, but some of them are so bad that I remember them many years later when I go to those locations again.

The absolute best one I ever saw:

-I-225 southbound, just past Mississippi.
-It was a semi-blizzard, middle of the night, prior to the I-225 expansion. Snow was completely covering the road.
-I'm in what should be the right lane (can't see the lanes obviously).
-An old hoopdie comes up from behind me very quickly, goes around me on the left, and loses complete control, and ends up facing west when it gets in front of me.
-It slides completely off the freeway, manages to turn back southbound, and continued going southbound for about 1/3 mile OFF the freeway (this was a grassy area {covered by snow} at the time).
-They then lose control again while off the freeway, and they end up sliding back in a direction that makes them face east. This puts them back onto the freeway.
-Once back on the freeway (somewhere near the Iliff off-ramp), they turn back southbound, and continue on at a very quick pace like nothing ever happened.

^If they weren't completely drunk when that happened, I hope whomever that was remembers it. It would be awesome if it wasn't absolutely dangerous.

[Jobster]

Originally Posted by mike from back east

i've done left on red for 25 years, starting back in nova where gridlock is legendary. If there's zero on-coming traffic in sight and lots of room, then i'll go for it. Never been caught, never had any issues. So tired of sitting at red lights when there's no traffic around, especially late at night.

I try to avoid a full stop at stop signs in my local residential streets where i can see there's nothing in sight so i ease on through, hollywood style. Coming to a full dead stop wears on brake pads the most and getting re-started from a dead stop is the most inefficient way to use your gasoline. Stop signs came about over 100 years ago when cars had to yield to horses (true) because cars often scared the critters. Time to modernize a bit.

+100