Mitsubishi Blows Stop Sign and Nearly Causes Wreck

[S P]

One of the things I love best about going on vacation is that it gives me a break from driving in Rockville for a bit. We've been back a whopping two days. This idiot didn't even stop! Just rolled right through and pulled out as though I weren't even there. WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE HERE!?!

 

[megapixle]

Correct me if I'm wrong. Yes, he did roll through the stop sign. But when you're making the left turn your obligation is to turn into the nearest lane, which would have been the left lane. There should have been a full empty lane between the two of you.

 

[dash riposki]

Yeah, I can't find the maryland laws online, easily, but the lane selection can be a problem if there was an accident. No, the mitsubishi never stopped.

 

[S P]

Correct me if I'm wrong. Yes, he did roll through the stop sign. But when you're making the left turn your obligation is to turn into the nearest lane, which would have been the left lane. There should have been a full empty lane between the two of you.

While technically this is true "by the book", in actual driving practice this almost never happens, and, I had to make an immediate right turn at the next light right down the road, which is the case for a lot of turns around here. You can't enter the nearest lane if you have to make an immediate turn on the opposite side of the road following your turn. I get how it's "supposed" to work, but the roads don't always works like that, and you can never count on people to do that either because they're stupid, or they have to immediately make another turn like I did.

I was already rolling through the middle of the intersection, he should have looked and seen that I was coming, taking the turn wide, and likely entering the right turn lane that people commonly enter. Instead he rolled right through the stop, and either didn't look, or just didn't give a ****, and pulled right out. Had he actually stopped, I would have cleared the intersection before he started rolling again and there wouldn't have been an issue. In summary, yet another oblivious jackass that makes driving here in the DC burbs so freaking miserable. I'm just going to avoid turning left from here from now on. It's already terrible and extremely challenging to turn left there at times to begin with (there's been more than a few accidents), and then you have freaking douchewads like this. If there was a car coming down the road, I might have gotten T-boned from having to stop for this moron, which is probably how more than a few accidents have already occured here. I'll just exit from the other side of the business park and come out the other way from now on. It's a little further, but definitely safer, and not necessarily much slower.

 

[megapixle]

I get what you're saying but I'm guessing, in the event of an accident in that scenario though I think insurance adjusters & probably the police would find fault with both of you.

Sorry, people not turning in to the correct lane happens to be a pet peeve of mine.

 

[S P]

Yeah it's one of mine too, but this business park street is immediately off of a major intersection, so you pretty much have to go straight from your turn and into your needed lane. There's no time or room to turn into the closest lane first (left turn lane), and then try to maneuver all the way over to the right turn lane if you need to next. My anticipation was that the Mitsu driver was going to stop properly, thus leaving the right turn lane open for me to turn into. The fact is, he blew the stop and nearly caused a collision. Yeah he could have said, "well you weren't supposed to turn into that lane", and I'd say to the judge, "well you were supposed to ****ing stop first before entering the roadway." I was in the middle of the intersection already and had right-of-way. He didn't.

My favorite "failure to enter proper lane after turn" violations are the ones where people in the outer turn lane cut into the inner turn lane's space, leaving no room for the people in the inner lane to turn. This happens all the damned time, and drives me up the freaking wall.