For those of you who do not know, my uncle worked for NJ DOT for many years and the number one thing he complained about was a lack of respect from drivers on the road. He would tell me how most drivers see the yellow flashing lights on the top of a truck, even a plow, and dismiss them because they know that DOT can not arrest them and they are not as important as the red/blue/white combination that emergency vehicles such as police and EMT's.
While this may not seem like a big issue, it can be. Just this Friday, 9/21, a DOT worked was killed in Missouri while helping direct traffic around a previous accident. The article can be found here. The worker was hit by a drunk driver with a BAC of .184. While this clearly was a result of drunk driving it brings up the issue of visibility, especially at night, of construction or emergency detours. In my opinion I think that if the detour had the red and blue flashing lights, the drunk driver would have noticed these lights and recognized them faster. This would also apply for sober drivers. Drivers associate the red and blue lights as a more important and official disturbance in traffic and generally react faster in my opinion.
What do you think? Do you think using red and blue lights with more DOT projects and emergency traffic changes would be effective or damaging?
While this may not seem like a big issue, it can be. Just this Friday, 9/21, a DOT worked was killed in Missouri while helping direct traffic around a previous accident. The article can be found here. The worker was hit by a drunk driver with a BAC of .184. While this clearly was a result of drunk driving it brings up the issue of visibility, especially at night, of construction or emergency detours. In my opinion I think that if the detour had the red and blue flashing lights, the drunk driver would have noticed these lights and recognized them faster. This would also apply for sober drivers. Drivers associate the red and blue lights as a more important and official disturbance in traffic and generally react faster in my opinion.
What do you think? Do you think using red and blue lights with more DOT projects and emergency traffic changes would be effective or damaging?
Why I agree it would make it more noticeable it could also lead to traffic stopping when people move over to make way for an ambulance that isn't there.
ReplyDeleteWe've been conditioned to respond to red and blue flashing light as a sign to either stop or make way, not be careful. I think a side effect of adding the last part would be less respect for ambulances and police cars as people will start associating it with road work and not someone's life hanging in the balance.
You pose an interesting question but I agree with Avi, I think police and emergency vehicles should remain the only ones using the traditional white, red, and blue. I think the flashing yellow found on DOT and construction vehicles do enough to attain greater attention from other drivers on the road. At my internship this summer there were construction vehicles all over the place and the flashing lights were turned on mainly when entering/leaving a construction zone because often times the entrance/exit was concealed. There would be a large amount of confusion if suddenly all these construction vehicles had police/emergency flashing lights all throughout the day and I agree that it would lead to a decrease in respect for actual emergency vehicles whose quick and unobstructed travel is much more important.
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