Don’t Let a Green Light Think For You

Green light? Why green light?

There is a CyclingSavvy saying, “don’t let the paint think for you.” But let’s take this thought a bit further: don’t let a green light think for you.

I determined to write this article when I read a Facebook post by a bicyclist. He was entering an intersection from a barrier-separated bike lane and had to evade a collision with a pickup truck. An animated conversation ensued. The bicyclist illustrated the conflict by dragging lines on a map on his phone and posted to a Facebook group. You may view the post here. (With the benefit of time and better tools, I have crafted a spiffier drawing.)

Coincidentally, I rode through the same intersection a couple of months earlier. I shot video as I rode. Here is the video.

So, when do you have a green light but you shouldn’t go? Much of the time. A green light is not the starter’s pistol in a race. You have to yield right of way to traffic already in the intersection, and to pedestrians. That can happen at any traffic signal, whether the light just turned green or, as in the video, has been green for a while. Motorists sometimes run red lights. Always look at the cross street before going on a fresh green.

If you use CyclingSavvy strategies for lane positioning as I did, the potential hazards will be in your forward field of view.

Manufactured conflict at a green light

Normally, drivers choose lane positions before reaching an intersection, so they don’t cross each other’s path inside the intersection. That is how I rode through the intersection.

Now let’s look at the bike-lane option. Try to identify the issues for bicyclists using the bike lane in the image below. Check out the signs, signals and markings. You may click on the image to enlarge it for more detail.

Spotting the hazards

In the video, I already pointed out the flashing yellow right-turn arrow. You can hardly have missed the bike lane behind a row of flex posts, or the cars turning right across it.

Directing motor traffic to turn right across the path of through bicycle traffic is a manufactured conflict, but the signs and signals here can confuse bicyclists and motorists into thinking that there is none.

A no-turn-on-red sign next to the bicycle signal suggests to bicyclists that motorists must have a red light when bicyclists have the green light. There is a yield-to-bicyclists-and-pedestrians sign, but it is outside motorists’ forward focus area.

Bicyclists expect that there will be no conflicting traffic with a green bicycle signal. Motorists expect that they must yield to conflicting traffic in front of them on a flashing yellow signal. Here motorists are required also to yield to bicyclists in their right rear blindspot. The bicyclist who posted on Facebook was legally in the right, but the motorist evidently thought otherwise.

Check before starting up on the green light

A motorists’ red right-turn arrow would resolve the conflict at the expense of delay, as long as everyone heeds the signals. This doesn’t always happen, so it is always wise and sometimes life-saving to look back when approaching a manufactured conflict. Note that I didn’t say “if you are the bicyclist.” That advice applies to bicyclists and motorists alike.

The image below looks back across the intersection. The waiting car is pretty clearly going straight, though not for sure. That next car might arrive just as the light changes. Better look back!

No bicyclist has died at this intersection since the flex posts and confusing signals were installed, but last June, two bicyclists entering similar Cambridge intersections died in collisions with right-turning trucks. The fatalities are, to be sure, just the tip of an iceberg. Down below the waterline are collisions causing injury, property damage, or luckily neither, and disagreeable encounters like the one described in the Facebook post.

Two choices

To sum up: you have two choices on a street with a barrier-separated bikeway. You may ride in the bikeway, but then you have to be cautious of the extra hazards. You need to look over your shoulder wherever motor traffic might cross your path. A driver’s not using a right-turn signal may mean that the driver is going straight through, or it may mean that the driver forgot to use the turn signal. You have to rely on other clues: the vehicle’s speed, its angle if stopped, whether the driver is looking at you. Don’t let the green light think for you.

I rode the same route on another day using the bikeway to show how to do it safely, and I have a description and video in another post in this blog.

Or you may ride as I did, according to the normal rules of the road. If that thought makes you uncomfortable, a rear-view mirror can help you prepare lane changes, and boost your confidence. Riding in the travel lane is legal in Massachusetts and most other states of the USA. And still don’t let the green light think for you!