Road Warrior

The in basket: The Burwell Street-Warren Avenue intersection and its traffic signal in Bremerton continue to draw suggestions from readers. The latest comes from Ralph Gribbin, who says, “Nothing dumps so many vehicles onto Burwell in such a short time as the ferries. Yet when Burwell was redone a few years ago, the big dump was only given one lane to use, yet the eastbound traffic that straggles through got two lanes. Doesn’t make sense to me.  

“Now with the tunnel finished,” he said, “the intersection with Warren Avenue gets two lanes eastbound straight through and the left turn onto Warren only gets one lane. Most of the eastbound Burwell traffic turns left from (the) one lane.

During the tunnel the construction, he continued, “two lanes turned left without any problems. Make that a two-lane turn and ease the lines that are waiting, and just maybe the time for that signal could be reduced and still not cause backups,” he said.

The out basket: As I recall, making Burwell two lanes inbound and one outbound years ago resulted from having only enough right of way for three lanes. I imagine making it easier to get out of town than into town bore some psychological message in a struggling city, so they did the opposite.

As for allowing left turns from both eastbound lanes of Burwell at Warren, it worked fine when the tunnel project closed both lanes for going straight. 

Now, says tunnel project engineer Brenden Clarke, eastbound drivers can see two lanes available on the other side of the intersection. Even with the left-most green signal a left-only arrow,  he said, “this would violate driver expectancy and could result in eastbound Burwell traffic in the left lane continuing forward (because they can see an open lane in front of them) and could result in a collision with motorists in the right lane turning left.”

The in basket: Paul Ofsthun and Murray Webb like the widening of the intersection at Bucklin Hill and Tracyton Boulevard in Silverdale, but both think it could work better. 

Paul writes, “Although I love the new intersection with it’s new right turn lane and the new flashing yellow turn lights, I wonder why they put in a green right arrow (eastbound Bucklin to southbound Tracyton) but never activated it. 

“It sure would ease congestion if they had the green arrow on when the northbound Tracyton traffic is going. To me It looks like they planned on it but never activated it.”

Murray says, “….Kudoes to those involved….traffic moves much better!  

“However, could you please use your column to educate folks what a flashing yellow arrow allows them to do?  

“I remember reading that many lights in Silverdale will eventually be using them, but indications are that many (drivers) aren’t aware they are allowed to turn after yielding.”

Andy Boeckl makes the same observation about reluctant drivers at all of the yellow flashing lefts Kitsap County is putting in.

The out basket: About the right turn arrow, Doug Bear of Kitsap County Public Works says, “Activating (it) requires special programming, additional in-shop work, and consultation with the equipment supplier. 

 We … plan to activate the light when the process is completed.”

Those flashing yellow left turn lights are working their way north. The county debuted them in South Kitsap a year or so ago and has been retrofitting signals in Silverdale. 

So far, I think the county is the only jurisdiction in this county to use them, but a reader back in the Midwest somewhere who goes by the online name MidiMagic and follows the Road Warrior blog says the federal Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices underwent a major revision late last year and now dictates that flashing yellow left turn signals are  the standard at intersections where left turners are allowed to turn after yielding to oncoming traffic. I’m trying to learn more about that.

The flashing yellows consternate many drivers when they first come upon one. The lights replace the situation where left turners faced a green ball light and a sign requiring them to yield before turning. 

They mean that although oncoming through traffic has a green light, you are free to make your turn if it won’t endanger any oncoming vehicles. They usually follow a green turn arrow that comes up first, and means oncoming through traffic has a red light.

They are growing in popularity because it reduces the amount of time left turners must sit and wait, their cars idling, before turning.

The in basket: Patricia Evans and Peter Wimmer have commented on the still-to-open Greaves Way that soon will link Old Frontier Road and the Silverdale interchange where highways 3 and 303 meet.

Patricia says she travels Old  Frontier Road to Bangor every day and has her doubts about the new left turn created where Old Frontier and Greaves Way meet.

“When making a left turn after stopping at the new stop sign, a person is not able to make the complete turn without going onto the double yellow line toward the oncoming traffic,” she asserts .”It is a very tight turn even with my GEO.”

She doesn’t think a large truck or a school bus can make the turn without breaking the law.

Peter wonders why the county leaves what he considers the overly fancy street lights  on all night when no traffic is allowed on the road yet.

“I can understand the need for some lighting, but really isn’t that a bit much?” he wrote. “And a bit fancy? How about fixing ones that are not lit before they light  up an unopened stretch of road?  Are we not trying to save money in the budget?”

The out basket: I’m glad they asked, as it’s about time for an update on Greaves Way, which was days from its Nov. 16 ribbon cutting when it was all put on hold.

The reason, Project Manager Jacques Dean tells me, was that the cross-arm on one of the supports for the new traffic signal at Greaves and the realigned Clear Creek Road arrived bent. 

The company that provided it took it back, cut it, welded it and galvanized it. It was brought back Monday and installed, he said..

If the light was the only problem, the road might open next week. But some of the roadway has settled up at the top of Greaves’ hill, Jacques said. The contractor is trying to diagnose the problem.

Silver lining-wise, the postponement Nov. 16 is a good thing, or they’d be dealing with the pavement problem with traffic passing by. 

Whatever they learn, and whenever the road opens, the ribbon cutting won’t be until after the first of the year, he said.

As for Patricia’s concern, I told Jacques it does seem like a tight turn, even in a  passenger car. Another car sitting in the left turn pocket waiting to go east on Greaves (when it’s open) could present a long vehicle turning across its path with problems.

He looked at it Tuesday and says it follows the design, which meets turning radius criteria. A truck or motor home driver who pulls into the intersection before starting his turn won’t have problems, he said. 

The stop sign that halts traffic before making that left turn to continue on to Bangor will be removed. Southbound Old Frontier will become the stop street then and northbound Old Frontier and Greaves will appear to be one street.

Jacques said he hadn’t considered the possibility of disconnecting the street lights until the road opens. They are activated by darkness, but all of them can be disconnected at just two spots. He’ll look into whether labor or permitting issues to unhook them and then hook them up again would offset any savings from letting them come on at night until the road is open, he said.

As for whether the lights are too fancy, Jacques said, “This project can be considered one of the ‘gateways’ into Silverdale.  It will be a significant area of growth in the future and the county and community wanted it to be aesthetically pleasing, thus the ornate light standards, boulevard design, and extensive landscaping. 

“The light standards that were chosen are actually cheaper to purchase and install, including to maintain and replace, than standard light poles and luminaires,” he said,. “The number of light poles is based on standard parameters for a four-lane roadway and necessary disbursement of light.”

The in basket: Marilyn Painter wonders if there is anything about the left turn from Bremerton’s Loxie Eagans Boulevard onto the Highway 3 on-ramp to go north that doesn’t qualify it as a place a person can make the turn against a red light, after stopping fully and yielding to other traffic. 

” I often see people stopped (there) unwilling to go against the red light,” she said.

The out basket: There is no sign prohibiting it, so yes, those left turns are legal if done correctly. The fact that a red ball light stops would-be left turn traffic, rather than a red arrow light, makes no difference.

Readers who have missed all the previous Road Warrior columns describing this law probably are shaking their heads saying, “What is he talking about?”

It’s a peculiarity of Washington law that left turns onto a one-way street can be made against a red light, but only after making a complete stop and without endangering any other traffic.

This particular intersection is very close to the state patrol headquarters, so there’s a good chance an officer will see you if you do it, so be sure you do it right, stopping fully and yielding to anyone with the green light. I also noticed that it’s a little harder at that spot than others to be sure the two lanes of oncoming traffic also have a red light, which is cause for an extra measure of caution.

One-way streets are sufficiently rare in Kitsap County that the freeway on-ramps are among the few places it can be done. And I find that if I’m not first in the left-turn line, it might as well not be legal, because no driver ahead of me will do it. 

And as a November column on the subject noted, a police officer new to the state might not be aware of the law and cite you for it. It’s in RCW 46.61.055 if you ever need to look it up. It’s in the state Driver’s Guide too.

I’ve had no success finding out what led to this odd exception to normal driving laws, which has existed for years and probably decades. Do any of you readers know?

The in basket Lynn Hammond, who runs a salon in Kingston, wrote in July to ask, “When traveling northbound off the ferry in Kingston and you are stopped at the signal on Lindvog Road turning left, and there are no cars coming toward you going south toward the ferry, why doesn’t the light change for cars to turn left? 

“I know it has to do with the timing of the lights for the off-loading traffic, but if you are in line to turn, it takes forever for the light to change to go left.  The light at the corner of the motel in town has the same problem. I usually experience this in the evening when I am leaving town and there isn’t  a lot of traffic at that time of night.”

She claims to have waited five minutes for the light to change at times and seen exasperated drivers run it. She also told me this week nothing has changed since July.

The out basket: Jim Johnstone of the Olympic Region signal shop says, “During ferry offloads, the signals are in coordination in order to flush the ferry traffic out of Kingston.”

Two possible solutions that might help Lynn are not workable either technologically or for safety reasons, he said. 

Making the outbound left turn light at Lindvog work independently from the rest of the signal to provide just that movement in reaction to a waiting car is beyond that signal’s capabilities, he said. Once it is green, it will stay green until the adjacent through lane has used up its guaranteed 42 seconds of green and turns red, or traffic on Lindvog or the opposite left turn lane is detected. Inbound Highway 104 traffic within the 42-second cycle won’t trip the light, making those drivers wonder the same thing Lynn does about why it takes so long to get a green.

With an average of 470 inbound cars on Highway 104 during the afternoon comparing to only 92 left turners onto Lindvog, more traffic would be disadvantaged by such a change than is now, Jim said. 

Besides, he added, when the system is in coordination, the left turn signal won’t respond to detected traffic.

“It’s a painful lesson we have learned a couple of times,” he said, “including the Highway 303/Bentley (the Wal-Mart) signal (in east Bremerton,) which is not in coordination to allow us to conditionally reserve the left turn into Wal-Mart.”

Allowing left turns whenever incoming or cross-traffic permits, a so-called permissive signal, isn’t a good idea, he said. Once the state decides to allow left turns only when a green arrow permits, it doesn’t want to make the control less restrictive. Their high accident locations tend to be where drivers have the opportunity to turn left when the opposing green light for through traffic also is green, he said.

Kingston’s traffic signals go into coordination whenever a burst of traffic crosses detectors at the ferry terminal during off-loads, he said. The signals then all work on 80-second cycles, of which at least 42 seconds serves the main line. 

So no one should ever have to wait more than 80 seconds for a green light at Lindvog, he said. And an 80-second wait would occur only if the driver arrived at the light just as it goes red for his or her movement.

Outside ferry off-load times, the signals work independently of one another, reacting to the traffic the in-pavement detectors say is waiting.

The out basket: The Road Warrior has been able to help two of my readers who were incorrectly ticketed by city police for infractions where the officer didn’t know the law. 

Both men had read in this column that they could legally do what they did, only to have officers unaware of the applicable law cite them. 

First came Nicholas Sveslosky, who was ticketed last spring by an officer in Lynnwood in Snohomish County for driving past a school bus that was facing in the opposite direction with its sign out and red lights flashing, with a turn lane between his car and the bus. 

Though even the state public instruction office issues literature saying no stop is required in that situation, he not only was stopped and cited, but convicted in municipal court. He e-mailed to ask me what I thought. 

Then Doug Lemon relied on my description of an odd law that permits a left turn against a red light if turning onto a one-way street, providing a full stop is made and no other traffic is imperiled. 

A Port Orchard officer ticketed him for running a red light after he did just that at the Sedgwick Road on-ramp to northbound Highway 16  on Oct. 22. 

Like Nicholas, Doug asked me where he’d gone wrong.

The out basket: I advised Nicholas to appeal to superior court, as the municipal judge’s ruling, that the middle turning lane was not a traffic lane because it is not a regular driving lane where cars move in a single file, was clearly in error.

“The prosecuting attorney for the city called me the week of the case to let me know that I was right, and that they were dropping their case,” Nicholas wrote me on Oct. 3.

‘The judge at the superior court court looked surprised that the city dropped the case,” he said. “Great vindication! I did not pay any of the $400 fine, and I received a full refund of my $240 appeal filing fee.”

It didn’t take Doug nearly as long. Port Orchard Police Commander Geoff Marti, when I asked him about the case, invited Doug to call him, and he personally arranged for dismissal of the ticket. 

Still, Doug said, ”I’m not sure if I have the confidence to practice this left turn on red again.” Which may be the sad lesson from these two cases. Even when a person is right and the officer is wrong, it can be quite a hassle and take months to prevail. 

Having a copy in one’s car of RCW 46.61.055, the red light law, and RCW 46.61.370, the school bus law, probably would be a good idea for those willing to do it.

The in basket: Janet Brown wrote back in early September to say the traffic signal on Bethel Avenue allowing left turns into the South Kitsap Wal-Mart leaves something to be desired. 

“It needs a green arrow,” she said. “The left turn arrow never turns green and traffic is so heavy that you are stuck there for a couple of lights. People are running the red light to be able to turn.

The Road Warrior’s wife said she’s pretty sure the light had a protected green phase last Christmas.

The out basket: This is one of the many South Kitsap signals the county revised last year to provide a flashing yellow for left turns when on-coming traffic has a green light. The flashing yellow means the same thing as the signs that used to say turning left was legal on a green ball light but only after yielding to any oncoming traffic that is close. 

But most of them provide a protected green arrow signal right after the through lights turn green, offering a short time before the yellow flashing light takes over when left turners don’t have to worry about oncoming traffic because it has a red light. 

Doug Bear of Kitsap County Public Works says, “Your observation, and (your wife’s), is correct. There was, and should be, an initial protected green phase when a vehicle is detected waiting to turn. We are working to identify and correct the problem. Thanks for the heads up!”

That was on Sept. 18, and the problem remains. “There have been a few higher priority projects emerge,” Doug said Oct. 22. “We hope to get to that this week or next. We are hoping it is something easily remedied. If not, it could be a little longer before the work is done.”

The in basket: Patty Hill of North Kitsap comments quite often on the operation of the traffic signal on Highway 305 at Bond Road in Poulsbo, and now says the lights for left turn traffic onto Bond Road northbound have taken a turn for the worse.

“Within the last few months, they changed the way the lights work,” she said. “If you’re heading towards Bainbridge Island on 305 and you want to turn left onto Bond Road heading towards Kingston, the two left turn lanes always came on first, then the other two lanes going straight into Poulsbo came on and then both stopped at the same time. 

 ”Now,” she said, “they are set up so that the two lanes heading straight to Bainbridge come on first, then the two left turn lanes and then they shut down together (usually).”  The left turn lane green time is shorter than it used to be, she said, so more and more cars continue to turn as the light goes yellow and red. They also rush through in the right-most of the two left-turn lanes, trying to get ahead of those in the other lane as they turn, she said.

“What happens is more people are being left behind again,” she said. “My husband and I take that route every night from home.  When they first opened up all the lanes after the paving was done, we never once waited for the light to change other than when we first pulled up there. Now we are waiting for two and three changes before we can go through.

“We prefer not to get in the (right-most) turn lane because of aggressive behavior from drivers in the (left-most) turn lane thinking we’re trying to edge them out).

 ”Then if you’re coming from Kingston towards Poulsbo on Bond Road and you want to turn left onto Highway 305 heading towards Bainbridge, guess what.  Those changed, too, and when the people turning left from Highway 305 onto Bond Road rush through while the light is going back to red, those of us turning left from Bond onto the highway now have to wait when ours turns green for them to stop driving through.”

She said she has been in a line of only five cars on Bond at the light and it took her three light changes to make her left turn.

“Can you find out if someone made the change and either doesn’t know what they’re doing, if they think it’s working or is there a chance to go back to how it was before?” she asked.

The out basket: Left turn lights can be either “leading,” as this one used to be, or “trailing” or “lagging,” as it is now, usually based on what computer simulations say will move the most traffic through a given corridor. 

Jim Johnstone of the Olympic Region signal shop said they went to watch the light and confirmed Patty’s observations.

““We did make the left turn from southbound 305 onto Bond Road a lagging left,” he said. “This was done for progression purposes and to ensure that the left turners have arrived at the Bond Road intersection before giving them a green. We are going to make some adjustments to the timing at Lincoln/Iverson and also Bond Road,” he said.

But the changes won’t include a return to a leading left at Bond Road, he said. 

“Since everything is coordinated now from Viking through Hostmark, the traffic being released from Viking arrives at the start of green on the mainline at Bond.  So as this traffic progresses through Bond Road, the left turns filter out of the platoon and are served at the end of the Highway 305 mainline green. 

“If we were to lead the left turn signal at Bond, the vehicles wanting to make that left would not have arrived yet and would have to wait for the signal to cycle back to the leading left turn,” he said..