Left Turns

The good news is that there are many intersections with left-turn green arrows that provide motorists with time-saving and frustration-saving protected left turns. The bad news is that there are nowhere near enough of them.

There must still be hundreds of busy intersections in the Los Angeles area where drivers wanting to turn left form a line almost a block long, and only one car can make the left turn with each change of the light. In some cases, sufficient complaining will bring a traffic engineer to the site. The engineer will arrive with a clipboard and stopwatch to study the intersection’s traffic patterns. Then comes the conclusion: Yes, a left-turn arrow would save several minutes for those wishing to turn left, but for the oncoming motorists going straight, it would add three seconds. Decision: No green arrow.

I’m not an engineer, but I have enough science in my background to handle arithmetic. This is madness. I cannot imagine any reason not to install left turn arrows at all busy intersections. It would save time and reduce the accident risk.

STEPHEN SOBEL

North Hollywood