Flash Mode at a Dead Signal
It is 7:40 a.m. in late November. It is still dark, rain is falling steadily, and the wet asphalt throws glare from every headlight. You are southbound on a four-lane arterial in Halifax, in the left-turn lane, waiting to turn left into a shopping plaza. The intersection's controller failed in an overnight windstorm and the signals have reverted to flash mode: the heads facing you show a flashing amber, while the cross street shows a flashing red. The pedestrian signal is completely dark. A person in a yellow raincoat is waiting on the far corner with a dog and appears to want to cross your side of the road. A delivery van has pulled up close behind you, headlights filling your mirrors, and the driver has edged forward twice. Oncoming traffic is steady, and one car in the cross street's right-turn lane has begun to creep out.
1. What do the flashing amber and the flashing red each require of you, and what does the dark pedestrian signal change?
Read the worked answer
A flashing amber means slow down and proceed with caution, yielding to pedestrians and to any traffic already in the intersection; it is not the same as a green light, and it does not give you an absolute right of way. A flashing red on the cross street means those drivers must stop and then yield to cross traffic before proceeding, which gives you priority. Treat that priority as fragile: a flashing red is frequently treated as a rolling stop, and the creeping car in the turn lane suggests exactly that. A completely dark pedestrian signal does not remove the crosswalk. The crosswalk markings and the pedestrian's right of way exist independently of the lights, so you still yield to anyone on foot. If the heads facing you had been fully dark rather than flashing amber, the intersection would be treated as an all-way stop, with first-to-stop, first-to-go and yield-to-the-right rules.
2. Describe how you complete the left turn given the oncoming traffic, the pedestrian, and the van behind you.
Read the worked answer
Wait behind the stop line rather than nosing into the intersection, because with no signal cycle there is no phase that will protect you while you sit there. Scan the gaps in the oncoming traffic and only begin the turn when a gap is genuinely large enough to clear the whole turn without hurrying. Before moving, check the near crosswalk for anyone who has stepped off the far corner, and check the cross street for the car that may roll through its flashing red and turn right into your path. The van behind you is irrelevant to the decision, and braking late to satisfy it is how left-turn collisions happen; if you feel pressured, slow down further rather than accelerate. Keep your wheels straight while waiting so a rear-end impact cannot push you into oncoming lanes. Signal early, and complete the turn smoothly into the first available lane.
3. Midway through the turn, the pedestrian with the dog steps off the curb into the crosswalk you are entering. What now?
Read the worked answer
Stop before the crosswalk and let them clear, even if that leaves you angled in the intersection. A pedestrian who has stepped into the crosswalk has right of way, and a driver who completes a turn through them is at fault regardless of who arrived first or what the signals were doing. The pressure points are obvious: the oncoming traffic you were trying to beat, the van waiting behind, and the instinct to finish the move you have already begun. Ignore all three and prioritise the person on foot; a vehicle angled in an intersection is an inconvenience, a pedestrian struck at 20 km/h is a serious injury. If your stop leaves the rear of the car exposed to cross traffic, that is still the smaller risk. Resume the turn only when the crosswalk is completely clear on both sides.