Road Rules

I understand the principle of a stop sign, and at a four way intersection appreciate the psudeo politeness that rewards the first to arrive as the one able to proceed, regardless of which way they intend to turn.

What I find less compelling is the apparently random placement of stop signs on minor suburban roads. What intuitively makes sense to to me is a hierarchal system where the stop sign is always placed on the lesser road. There is a kind of predictability to this, an ordering that makes sense. But here no such order exists, or if it does it is at a level of complexity that is entirely beyond my comprehension.

For instance, our road is a dead-end street which enters onto a minor road, several miles in length. Any number of streets similar to ours enter this same road. In Australia this minor road would be a single and uninterrupted stretch of road until it intersected a road of more substance, where any further progress would be governed by a stop sign or traffic light. All entering side roads would be controlled with either a stop sign or a give way sign.

But here there is no such consistency. The minor road that runs past the end of our street is interrupted, at apparently random intervals by stop signs. There is no logic to this. Some side streets you can pass with no thought or attention, at others you have to stop. These are not more important roads, and they are not in any way more significant than other streets you have just passed. But suddenly there is a stop sign, and you have to stop. Slavish adherence to this rule seems to be a deeply embedded cultural norm. 

Increasingly I find myself irritated by the placement of stop signs that seem to offer no traffic safety advantage. Where there is some likelihood that the placement of such a sign could serve some traffic calming function, I am willing to be likewise obedient. But when it makes no sense, and where the placement of such a sign shows all the characteristics of a petty bureaucrat having stuck a pin on a planning map, I feel my anarchic instincts emerge. I must confess to not always stopping. 

And I could live with such idiocy if there was some sense of consistency when it came to road rules in general. But no. While stop signs are obeyed with a mind-numbing display of stupid obedience, red lights are treated as fair game for any one. Never mind the queue of cars stranded in the middle of the intersection waiting to turn in front of oncomming traffic. If there is a light to run, it seems like there is some kind of civic duty to plant your foot and go for it.

Trust me, if red light cameras were installed in this country with the appropraite fines attached, the trillion dollar deficiet would be fixed in a matter of months.