I don't know how else to describe it bon, except to say that the intersections out here are designed so that there's an indeterminate space in the middle of the intersection that allows traffic behind to go around you (if it's one lane and they're not turning) but does not put you into the line of oncoming traffic.
It can be anxiety provoking if you're not used to it, but if you're simply sitting at the greenlight waiting for your chance to take a left turn, you're backing up traffic severely behind you for blocks. The flow of traffic depends on you getting up into the intersection - just not into the lane of oncoming traffic.
My driver's ed teacher taught us to do left turns as Hec describes. Sometimes I still hear Coach Dickinson saying, "Creep to the point of no return" as I edge out into the neutral zone.
Hey, when I was 15 and 3 days into my license, I hit a bicyclist making a left turn! Considering my dad had been creamed not a few weeks earlier on his bike (landed on his head, skidded 6 feet on his face, meatburger face, plastic surgery, broken hand, ultimately a rebreak of his broken hand,) I'm still cautious about left turns. To the point of multiple right turns, though I'm not quite that freaked anymore.
The policeman who arrived at the scene was Officer Heart. I recall fixating on that.
It's true in LA that you have to pull as far into the intersection as possible to take the left just as the light turns yellow (and sometimes red), because no one will let you go, ever. And you need to pull up as far as you can so that you can take the dude behind you with you.
This is my standard method of turning left. It unnerves The Boy, but if I don't do it, I can end up sitting at a goddamn red light for long enough to read a book.
As much as Hec is wrong about absolutely everything else, for the left turn, you have to do that here, or you'll very rarely get anywhere. You haven't started the left bit of your turn, but you've done all the forward possible without it. That means at least two cars per light, on average, get to go, with the timing of the orange.
Dinner is popcorn tonight. I finally got off my arse and bought a popcorn maker. Sadly bacon salt is verboten--it has wheat.
I'm watching a show called This Food That Wine and it's the porniest food show I think I've seen. The camera spends time on fingertips, lips, and shoots upwards from below glass bowls. And women keep laughing warmly together, swirling wine around their glasses and stressing words like "gooey."
All right, I give. You are all right! I am underestimating the amount of time it takes to get from the c/w to the center of the intersection.
Most of the lights are timed so you can do that around here. And I am a timid driver, and I can do it. Happily there are less of them down here than then there are in sf or oakland
Wrod on the left hand turns.
Timid and/or slow drivers on the freeway infuriate me. It's a FREEWAY, not your suburban street! IMHO, slow drivers are the most dangerous people on the road because they force otherwise normal drivers to do dangerous things just get around them.
bon, I think the moving into the intersection on a left turn, IMHO, doesn't matter so much for the first car but is a courtesy to the second. The first car is going to get through anyway, it's the second that won't.
That being said, I too think that being angry about those who don't inch forward is sort of overblown.
