Ever been hit or almost hit by a driver on a crosswalk, even though you had the crosswalk signal? In BC, drivers are allowed to turn right even when facing a red light. Right-on-red (RoR) serves to make car trips slighter faster at the expense of safety of people outside of cars. BC needs to ban it and let people cross the street safely.

Why Ban RoR?

RoR means that our right-of-way to cross the street is violable by drivers. More importantly, RoR leads to more driver crashes and people outside of cars pay the price (1, 2).

Under BC law, drivers must stop and yield to people crossing and to drivers facing the green light before performing RoR. But in practice, RoR incentivizes drivers to roll through crosswalks without stopping first or stop on crosswalks. Drivers not stopping first risk crashing into people or cutting them off. Drivers encroaching on crosswalks push people closer to moving car traffic. Although some people can walk around stopped cars more easily, this is a greater burden on people moving with a walker, wheelchair, white cane or crutches or those carrying a heavy load.

When attempting RoR, drivers mostly pay attention to car traffic on the left, waiting for a gap, paying far less attention to people trying to cross. This is a dangerous time to cross because as soon as there is a gap in traffic, drivers would accelerate immediately to turn.

RoR is also bad for drivers. First, RoR is a cognitively demanding manoeuvre and imperfect human drivers will make errors. In contrast, simpler is safer: red means stop and only stop. Second, drivers would also make RoR into the path of another driver moving straight through an intersection.

Our goal

Although RoR can be prohibited on individual intersections by municipalities, systemic traffic safety needs consistent policies so drivers behave predictably. Our goal is to remove the privilege of RoR from the so-called BC Motor Vehicle Act.

How can I help?

The stroad to safety is long. Banning a privilege that drivers are accustomed to at the provincial level is hard. First, we need to build popular support for banning RoR. Here are some ways you can help:

• Talk to other people about RoR. Not everyone, especially a non-driver, is aware of it or has formed strong opinions.
• As a driver you may choose to not make RoRs. Talk to other drivers about it.
• Had an incident with a RoR driver? Tell your story on social media.
  • Where applicable use the hashtag #BanRightOnRedBC
  • Also tag politicians. They need to see banning RoR is popular!
    • Ministry of Transportation & Infrastructure (@TranBC and @Rob_Fleming on Twitter)
    • Your MLA