Turning right on red is such a common traffic rule in the US that most American drivers don’t think twice about it, but many foreign visitors are confused and honked by the practice.

The rule has been the law of the land in the US since the 1970s, when it was encouraged as a means of saving gasoline in an energy crisis. States were forced to adopt this rule in order to qualify for federal aid.

As a general rule, as long as there is no “No Right Turn on Red” sign, motorists may turn right after stopping at a red light, provided that oncoming traffic or pedestrians are not crossing the street.

However, the law is under review due to claims that it is linked to accidents involving pedestrians and cyclists. Cities like Washington DCAnn Arbor, Michigan and Berkeley, California seek to prohibit traffic.

In Germany, turning right on red was considered a “socialist right turn” and was eradicated throughout the Eastern Bloc after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Washington Post feature with time.

A Los Angeles city clerk places a right turn sign on red in 1946. The law was passed in California and most other western states in the 1930s

In Europe, at most bus stops, drivers must wait for the light to turn green before turning.

The law has been passed in California and most other western states since the 1930s, and in 1980 it was passed nationally.

The idea behind the move was that by disabling the right-turn points, drivers would save precious seconds at each stop, which would also reduce emissions.

“I don’t want to move to a city where the only cultural advantage is being able to turn right at a red light,” says Woody Allen’s character Alvy Singer about moving to California from New York in Annie Hall’s Oscar-winning film.

Manhattan has almost no right turns at red intersections, but there are more than 300 right turns at red intersections across the Big Apple, most of which are in Staten Island, the borough with the lowest population.

New York is currently the only city in the country where books are banned. Canada’s second-largest city, Montreal, has a similar ban.

Left turns on red are also allowed in most areas of the US.

The most common misconception about the law is that drivers do not have to stop before turning. This leads to accidents, according to experts. The turn is also not mandatory, but rather at the discretion of the driver.

The relevance of the law, cited for reasons of efficiency, has been called into question with the rise of electric and hybrid vehicles.

In 2022, transportation engineer Bill Schultheis told Slate that repealing the rule might be a “minor inconvenience” for drivers, but would be “a small step in creating an urban environment that’s more conducive to walking, biking, and transit.”

In accordance with Governor’s Traffic Safety Association, Traffic fatalities in the U.S. have increased by 13 percent over the past ten years, while pedestrian fatalities have increased by 54 percent.

Pedestrian deaths hit a 40-year high in 2021 and rose again in 2022.

Cars lined up during the 1970s fuel crisis, which prompted the right to red law to be legal across the country

As the city with the most pedestrians in the country, New York has no red light turns

Washington State has a law that prohibits turning right on red in any area that is 1,000 feet or less from a school, daycare center, public park or playground, recreation center or facility, library, public transportation center, hospital, senior center or any other high foot traffic facility.

Between 2017 and 2021, 1,400 of the 5,000 pedestrian crashes in Washington involved a driver making a right turn, according to KOMO News.

However, in San Francisco, running a red light is believed to cause only one percent of accidents. Despite this, officials believe that the ban on queuing in certain areas of the city has reduced the number of “close calls”.

“Allowing right turns on red has always been a dangerous idea, so when the first traffic lights and traffic rules came out, it was banned. It’s no coincidence that in New York, the city with the highest number of pedestrians in the US, running a red light has long been and is largely prohibited,” said safety expert Jessie Singer. Los Angeles Times.

In the nation’s capital, where right turns are already prohibited at about 100 intersections across the city, human rights activists are calling for a complete ban by 2025.