QUESTION:
More and more roundabouts seem to be popping up on the North Shore and fewer and fewer drivers know how to drive through one. Further to your Aug. 24 column, A Straightforward Guide to Roundabouts, can you please give the readers a lesson in how to drive around the roundabout including how to signal. The ones in West Vancouver at 21st and Fulton and Marine and Nelson are a headache! Marilyn Middlemass West Vancouver
Dear Debra:
Signalling in a traffic circle can appear a little more confusing than on regular roadways, but the same rules apply. When entering the circle, use your left indicator to let other drivers know you're entering the flow of traffic already inside the circle, to whom you must yield. When exiting the circle, use your right signal, even if it feels as though you're just driving straight out of the circle - you're still changing lanes and entering another roadway.
Your question reminds me of another rule about signalling that some people may not know. As most people realize - even if they don't consistently employ the knowledge - the Motor Vehicle Act says that a driver must not drive from one lane to another, in other words, when changing lanes, without first signalling his or her intention to do so. Interestingly, the Act does not require a turning vehicle to use a signal in every circumstance.
The Act specifies that if traffic may be affected by turning a vehicle (and here we should read "if there is any possibility that it will), a person must use a signal. Yet this rule conversely implies that a driver need not signal on turning if traffic will not be affected by the turn. Now, one must consider what type of driving reasonably "affects" other traffic, a task not easily accomplished since the test is fairly subjective.
Here again our laws rely on the good judgement of drivers, judgment that should include consideration of the volume of traffic in the area at the time, hour of day, available light, and a whole host of other factors that for the most part we consider unconsciously. My advice: when in doubt, signal; when you know, signal as well.
As for traffic circles, the rules are simple: yield and signal when entering, and signal when exiting.
Sgt. Peter DeVries
North Vancouver RCMP
Follow Peter on Twitter at www.twitter.com/rcmpdevries
If you have a question for Ask a Cop, email it to [email protected] or mail it to the attention of the editor, North Shore News, Suite 100 - 126 East 15th St., North Vancouver, B.C., V7L 2P9.
