Dark Signal at a Wet Four-Lane Arterial
It is 8:15 on a Thursday night and you are northbound on a four-lane arterial posted 35 mph, two lanes in each direction. Rain fell an hour ago and the asphalt is still dark and wet. As you crest a shallow rise, the signal head hanging over your lanes is completely dark - no red, yellow, or green - and so is the mast arm on the far side. A line of four eastbound cars is creeping through the intersection one at a time. Your passenger says the whole block has been without power since dinner. You want to turn right onto the cross street, and you can see a marked crosswalk on that street plus a pedestrian in a hooded jacket standing on the near corner. No officer is directing traffic, and the streetlights are out for half a block. A pickup is close behind you, and the driver ahead of you has just nosed into the intersection to claim a gap.
1. What does a completely dark signal require of you, and in what order do you handle the right turn?
Read the worked answer
Treat it as an all-way stop. A dark signal is not permission to coast through on the assumption that cross traffic has a green - every approach must stop, and the intersection is then negotiated in arrival order, with ties going to the vehicle on the right.
Sequence:
- Full stop at the limit line or before the marked crosswalk, not out in the crossing.
- Yield to anything already inside the intersection. The four eastbound cars are doing the same thing; watch that each one actually stops rather than following the car ahead.
- Signal the right turn, then re-check the crosswalk on the cross street and the traffic you are turning into.
- Turn only when you can complete it without stopping again in the middle.
Do not follow the car ahead of you into the intersection just because it moved - that is exactly how dark-signal intersections produce T-bone crashes.
2. The pedestrian on the corner has not stepped off the curb. Must you wait before turning right?
Read the worked answer
Your legal duty runs to pedestrians in the crosswalk, and a person standing on the curb is not yet in it. But that is only the floor, not the whole answer.
Consider:
- Position and cues. The pedestrian is facing the intersection, hood up, at a corner with no working signals and no streetlights. That is a person who is about to cross, and this is a wet, dark, low-visibility corner.
- Your path. A right turn puts your vehicle directly across the crosswalk they will use, and your attention is split between the mirror, the cross traffic and the crossing.
- The cost. Waiting costs you three seconds. Guessing wrong costs a pedestrian a hospital stay.
Practical rule: if the pedestrian shows intent - steps to the curb edge, turns their body, has a cane, dog or stroller, or starts to lean forward - hold the turn. If they clearly wave you on and stay planted, proceed slowly, but keep your eyes on the crosswalk until you are clear of it.
3. A driver in the eastbound line waves you through the intersection. Do you go?
Read the worked answer
No - a hand wave transfers nothing. It tells you one thing only: that driver intends to wait. It says nothing about the other eastbound lane, the southbound approach, or the pedestrian on the corner, all of which are hidden or partly hidden from your seat by the wet glass and the dark.
Correct response:
- Acknowledge with a nod or a brief hand raise, but do not commit.
- Creep forward a few feet to buy sight lines, stopping short of the crosswalk and short of the other driver's path.
- Clear each conflict separately - near lane, far lane, crosswalk, then the lane you are turning into.
- Go only when your own eyes confirm the way is clear, and do not enter if the far side of the cross street is backed up; blocking the crossing on a dark night is worse than waiting one more cycle.
A wave is a courtesy, not a right-of-way. If a collision happens, "he waved me through" will not fix the report.