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Repercussions of Not Using a Turning Signal

Kenneth N. Cornwell

Arizona State University

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Repercussions of Not Using a Turning Signal

It is a normal Monday morning while driving to school. My friends and I carpool to

school and we switch off on who drives. Today is my turn to drive. Even using the HOV lane,

traffic is still bad but not quite stop and go traffic. I am still able to drive around 65mph. Though

it is still bumper to bumper traffic everything is flowing smoothly. As we drive down loop 101

we can see the other lanes are at a dead stop, but the HOV lane is still moving. As we approach

and start passing other vehicles in the lane closest to us, who are stopped; all the sudden a driver

pulls out of the stopped lane. They did not use a turn signal to notify me they wanted to come

into my lane. As they pull out I try to react; I slam on the brakes and try to swerve by moving

closer to the median wall that splits the both sides of the highway.

The driver continued coming over into my lane. We collide. Their vehicle forced mine

into the median wall. My vehicle hits their driver door and pushes their vehicle two hundred feet

further down the lane. My door is pinned to the wall. I look around dazed from hitting my head

on the steering wheel and the side of the door. All my friends were wearing their seat belts, so no

one was thrown out the window, but the airbags activated and smashed my friends face up and

her nose is now non-existent. The other two are banged up but responsive. Several witnesses

block off the area and helps us get out.

I run over to the other car to check on the driver of the other vehicle. They were not

wearing their seatbelt, so they were flung forward into the windshield which did not break from

the force of their head hitting it. I could tell even in my dazed state that they were not responsive.

They were dead.

This whole accident happened due to the other driver not using a turning signal to give

me a fair warning that they wanted to come over, but instead trying to squeeze in between me
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and the car in front of me. Now I must live with the constant guilt and mental fight of did I kill

this person or did their lack of proper use of a turning signal cause the accident that killed them?

Put yourself in my shoes, how would you feel? How would you react? Would you become an

avid person fighting for people to use their turn signals properly?

Though the scenario above is just a fictional scenario, it is a very high percentage of a

likely scenario that could or has happened. Does it have you start thinking about how you use

your turn signal and how they should be constantly used? I am sure we have seen people not use

turn signals and cut people off. Remember your reaction to witnessing that and the scenario

above as we discuss why people who can drive, should properly use their turn signal because

they cause accidents, as well as being illegal to not use them, and cause injuries or even death.

Car accidents and near close accidents like the story above happen more often than you

realize. I have known for a while, through my own observations of driving an hour to ASU

Tempe/downtown campuses, that quite a lot of people do not use their turning signals when

changing lanes or making an actual turn. But the results of a study done by SAE International

(Society of Automotive Engineers, one of the founders being Henry Ford) blew my mind in that

48.35% of the people who were observed making lane changes did not use a turning signal

(Ponziani, 2012).

Almost half of the people did not use their signal when turning or lane changing. Even

more surprising, is that up until this study, which was done in 2012, there was no actual study

done on the usage of the turning signal. This study proved the neglect of the turning signal

causes more crashes both minor and major ones than distracted driving which includes texting,

taking calls, putting on make-up, etc. Yet these actions have received national acknowledgement

and laws created against them, along with a war waged against them, like drunk driving. Though
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the lack of turning signals cause 2 million crashes each year compared to the 959,000 crashes

caused by distracted driving according to this study which got the distracted driving statistic

from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration on page 8 (Ponziani, 2012).

Though in this 2017 Motor Vehicle Crash Facts for the State of Arizona, Arizona

Department of Transportation (ADOT) do not name specifically failure to use a turning signal as

one of their statistic on table 5-11 (see below), one can deduct which ones can be caused by said

failure; which are made up of improper turn, unsafe lane change, failed to keep in proper lane,

and aggressive driving.

Table 5 – 11
Driver Violations
Number of Drivers
Type of Violation
Percent In Fatal Percent In Injury Percent In PDO Percent
or Behavior Total
of Total Crashes of Fatal Crashes of Injury Crashes of PDO

No Improper Action 124,012 49.78% 532 37.23% 38,230 50.77% 85,250 49.45%
Speed too Fast for Conditions 43,653 17.52% 173 12.11% 13,603 18.06% 29,877 17.33%
Exceeded Lawful Speed 1,041 0.42% 32 2.24% 422 0.56% 587 0.34%
Failed to Yield Right-Of-Way 21,981 8.82% 101 7.07% 8,154 10.83% 13,726 7.96%
Followed Too Closely 7,794 3.13% 8 0.56% 1,995 2.65% 5,791 3.36%
Ran Stop Sign 1,136 0.46% 10 0.70% 510 0.68% 616 0.36%
Disregarded Traffic Signal 5,555 2.23% 30 2.10% 2,516 3.34% 3,009 1.75%
Made Improper Turn 5,003 2.01% 13 0.91% 1,278 1.70% 3,712 2.15%
Drove in Opposing Lane 1,242 0.50% 72 5.04% 484 0.64% 686 0.40%
Drove Left of Center Line 7 0.00% 1 0.07% 2 0.00% 4 0.00%
Passed in No-Passing Zone 100 0.04% 2 0.14% 26 0.03% 72 0.04%
Unsafe Lane Change 8,513 3.42% 13 0.91% 1,165 1.55% 7,335 4.25%
Failed to Keep in Proper Lane 5,335 2.14% 73 5.11% 1,382 1.84% 3,880 2.25%
Crossed Median 2 0.00% 0 0.00% 2 0.00% 0 0.00%
Aggressive Driving 1 0.00% 0 0.00% 1 0.00% 0 0.00%
Other 7,341 2.95% 64 4.48% 1,787 2.37% 5,490 3.18%
Unknown 16,407 6.59% 305 21.34% 3,750 4.98% 12,352 7.17%
TOTAL 249,123 100.00% 1,429 100.00% 75,307 100.00% 172,387 100.00%

Which category depends on how the police wrote up the ticket (another possible category

it could be listed under though not on the chart is reckless driving). When you add up these

categories of how many crashes Arizona had, it comes out to be 18,852 crashes in 2017 that the
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cause could be due to not using a turn signal (Arizona Department of Transportation, 2018). Of

the 18,852 crashes 99 of them where fatal crashes, where one or more people died. The injury in

crashes of the 18,852 there was 3,826 injury crashes. This means that 20.82% of the 18,852

crashes either resulted in death or injury. This is needless suffering, and crashes that could have

been prevented with the simple use of a turning signal, like the death of the driver in the scenario

above (of course this probably jumps several percent if we were to add reckless driving in the

equation).

Some of the reasons why people do not use their turn signals are: some believe it is

optional, some believe they think they will be cut off or not allowed into the lane they want, and

they are lazy (Tai, 2015). The first reason, being optional, is so baffling to me due to the fact

when you study for your permit test it is right there in the study guide, in which it says you are

required to use your turning signal and how and when to properly use it. Obviously, if you are

driving, you passed that test to get your permit and later your license. So, at one point you read

and knew that you legally had to use it. The law for Arizona pertaining to the use or improper

use of the turn signal is as follows:

A person shall not turn any vehicle without giving an appropriate signal in the manner

provided by this article [turn signal or use of hand and arms as signals] … a signal of

intention to turn right or left when required shall be given continuously during no less

than at least one hundred feet traveled by the vehicle before turning. (United States of

America, Arizona Legislature, 2017)

Not using a turn signal is classified as reckless or aggressive driving and is a class 1

misdemeanor, it can be stacked upon other charges such as an unsafe lane change or “failure to
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yield the right-of-away” if it caused an accident then the police officer can stack it upon any

charges that pertain to accident (United States of America, Arizona Legislature, 2017).

The second reason, of being afraid of not being let into a lane so you don’t use your

signal, is not a good thought process. Guess what if you shove your way in between two cars in

another lane, if that person is riding the other car in front of them, then you have not given said

person, enough time to react and you get rear-ended or worse. Which just delays you from where

you were going in such a hurry. And the big kicker is, it will be your fault because you shifted

into another lane you did not have a right away to. Lastly, being too lazy to use a signal when it

barely takes any effort is baffling. If you are that lazy then you should not be driving and should

stay at home where you can be lazy without putting others in danger.

Now that you see how easily the horrible scenario of losing a loved one or killing

someone in a car accident just because someone decided not to use their turn signal, you may be

wondering how can we fix this urgent problem? One solution is increasing the punitive action,

such as use the three-strike rule and on the third ticket one receives on not using a turning signal

it becomes a felony. Another solution would be to increase the monetary fine, as well as, or

instead of monetary fine,15 days automatic jail time. This will cause people to re-examine their

risk management outlook on not using a turn signal and ask themselves, is the gain of not using it

worth the possible repercussions? Just as we, as a society, increased the penalties for drunk

driving and not wearing a seatbelt of which the numbers of accidents have decreased. We can

apply the same method to not using a turn signal and see after 2-3 years if it has made an impact.

Another possible solution is already in development by SAE International which is a

smart turning signal. In over a half a century the turn signal has not been improved upon even

though every other aspect of vehicles has advanced alongside technology but, yet the turn signal
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has not really been upgraded (Ponziani, 2010). The smart turn signal, the same article talks

about, would incorporate the new technology and sensors that are already installed in the vehicle

to sense how long to keep the turn signal on and use the lane-departure to acknowledge a lane

change or a full turn and if the operator does not use their signal several times in a row a message

flashes at you saying “USE YOUR TURN SIGNAL NEXT TIME”. It will continue to do this

until a certain amount of properly used turn signals are used then the message will go away. The

only addition they should add to it, by using those same sensors to either turn on and off the turn

signal automatically for you, should not allow lane-departure until the signal has been on for 100

feet or it will not allow you to change lanes or turn until you turn on the turn signal unless it

senses you are swerving to avoid a collision. But what they have developed is a step in the right

direction to stop the crashes and road rage caused by people not using a turn signal.

One other item that needs to be investigated along with increase of punitive action is how

often do police officers enforce the turn signal laws as a preventive measure, instead of an after

the fact car crash that the officer just throws the non-use of turn signal onto the ticket? Again,

just like with the distracted driving and using seatbelts, an increase of the actual enforcement of

the laws that were already in place has reduced the amount of accidents and/or fatalities in

accidents because people wore their seatbelt.

Lastly, we could look into starting a campaign in all media platforms to inform and make

people aware of the risks involved with not using a turn signal or using it improperly. This

approach seems to be quite effective with drunk driving, smoking/vaping, seatbelt usage, and

chewing tobacco. Something needs to be done about the neglect of turning signals, whether it be

policy changes/enforcement, educating the public, or developing better turn signal technology

and applying it to new vehicles.

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References

Arizona Department of Transportation. (2018, July 31). 2017 Motor Vehicle Crash Facts for

the State of Arizona. Retrieved February 8, 2019, from

https://www.azdot.gov/docs/default-source/mvd-services/2017-crash-facts.pdf?sfvrsn=2

Ponziani, R. (2010). Smart turn signal technology - Advancing crash prevention and

combating distracted driving with control algorithm enhancements. SAE

International,1-11. doi:10.4271/2010-01-0744

Ponziani, R. (2012). Turning signal usage rate results: A comprehensive field study of 12,000

observed turning vehicles. SAE International. doi:10.4271/2012-01-0261

Tai, A. (2015, January 24). 7 Reasons Why Drivers Don't Use Turn Signals. Retrieved February

8, 2018, from https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/andrew-tai-/turn-signals_b_6211352.html

United States of America, Arizona Legislature. (2017). Arizona Criminal and Traffic Law

Manual(2017-2018 ed.). Park City, UT: Blue360 Media. ISBN:978-1-947146-74-7