Unprotected Left Turn on a Green Ball With Children at the Corner
17:35 on a dry October evening, with light fading. You are stopped in the left-turn lane of a four-way signalised intersection, waiting to turn left into a side street. A rectangular sign marked 비보호 (unprotected) stands beside your lane and the vehicle signal is a solid green ball. Your front bumper is already about 1 m past the stop line.
An oncoming sedan in the opposite through lane is roughly 60 m away, closing at an estimated 55 km/h in a 50 km/h zone. Two children are standing on the near corner of the crosswalk that spans the road you intend to enter, and a 어린이보호구역 sign with a 30 km/h limit stands 80 m down that road. Two cars behind you have already sounded their horns.
Your vehicle is a loaded 2.4 t diesel truck that needs about 4 seconds to clear the intersection from its current position. The road is dry and the tyres are new.
1. The light is green and the drivers behind are honking. May you complete the turn now? Work through the timing and state what you should do with the truck already past the stop line.
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Legally: 비보호좌회전 is allowed only where the sign is posted and only on a green ball. It is not a protected phase, so you must yield to oncoming through traffic and to pedestrians. The horn behind you gives you no right of way - pressure from behind is never a legal justification.
Timing: 55 km/h is about 15.3 m/s, so the oncoming car reaches the conflict point in roughly 60 ÷ 15.3 ≈ 3.9 seconds. You need about 4 seconds just to clear, plus a margin of 1–2 seconds for the unexpected - you would be pulling across with essentially zero buffer. The oncoming driver is also 5 km/h over the limit, so the real gap is shorter than 3.9 s.
Verdict: do not turn across. Since you are already 1 m past the stop line, do not reverse - hold at the centre of the intersection with the wheels straight ahead, and complete the turn as soon as that car has passed and the crosswalk is clear. Accelerating to beat an oncoming vehicle is exactly the decision pattern that produces the classic unprotected-left-turn collision.
2. What obligations apply to the crosswalk and the 어린이보호구역, both before and after you complete the turn?
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Before the turn: the children are on the near corner of the crosswalk that spans the road you want to enter. A pedestrian who is crossing, or clearly about to cross, has priority - children at the kerb count as about to cross, because their behaviour is unpredictable. You must approach at a speed from which you can stop instantly, and check left–right again after the turn, not only before it.
After the turn: the 30 km/h zone begins about 80 m in. You must already be at or below 30 km/h when you enter it, not brake down to it after the sign - and the penalty for speeding in an 어린이보호구역 is heavier than in an ordinary zone. With children visible, 20–25 km/h and active scanning between parked cars is the sensible target.
A common error: using the horn to warn children instead of slowing. The horn does not discharge the duty to yield, and a child who reacts unpredictably to a horn may step into your path. Braking covers a mistake; the horn does not.
3. If you did turn and collided with the oncoming car, how would responsibility typically be apportioned, and what would the oncoming car's 55 km/h in a 50 km/h zone change?
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Baseline: in Korean practice, a vehicle making a 비보호좌회전 that collides with an oncoming through vehicle normally carries the large majority of the responsibility - commonly around 70–80% - because the breach is the failure to yield, not a signal violation. The oncoming driver had the green ball and the right of way.
What shifts the ratio: clear evidence that the oncoming driver was substantially speeding, was driving without headlights at night, changed lanes suddenly, or was distracted. Here 55 km/h in a 50 km/h zone is only marginally over - it would move the ratio a little at most, and would not transfer majority fault.
Practical consequences: the ratio drives civil compensation and the insurance 할증, and the injured party's claim is handled through 자동차보험. On the criminal side, an unprotected left-turn breach is not one of the 12대 중과실, so where comprehensive insurance applies the case is normally closed without prosecution - unless there is death or serious injury. That protection disappears if you leave the scene, so stop, help, and report regardless of who was at fault.