Q: What am I supposed to do when the person who has the right-of-way is “polite” and tells me to go? If something goes wrong won’t I be responsible? I’d rather they just go.
A: A few years back a PEMCO insurance commercial captured what you and many other folks have felt about the too-polite driver. You might remember it; two deferential drivers at an intersection alternating between gesturing to each other to go and inching forward after accepting the other driver’s offer. To really drive home the point, it ends with a jogger getting to the crosswalk, where they all have a three-way polite-off. The title of the ad: “4-way stop you go, no you go, no you go guy.” Maybe you’ve been there. Maybe that’s you.
Yes, of course it’s good to be polite. But can it be illegal? To answer that we need to understand right-of-way. To keep things simple, let’s consider a four-way stop. The law states that when two drivers approach an intersection at approximately the same time, the driver of the vehicle on the left shall yield right-of-way to the vehicle on the right.
Curiously, neither the Revised Code of Washington nor the Washington Driver Guide include a definition for yield. Despite not finding a definition in two key sources, plenty of traffic attorneys have written about yielding, and they consistently define it along the lines of allowing other road users to proceed before you.
Let’s say you approach the stop line after the person on your right, but they wave at you to go. If you accept their offer, have you violated the law by failing to yield? Let’s test how you’d answer that by taking it to the extreme. Imagine that the other driver is not only waving for you to go, but standing in front of their car with the hood up, steam pouring out. Are you going to wait until they get running again before you go? I’d argue that when a driver waves for you to go, they’ve yielded back to you. However, getting the wave is not the same as receiving a promise that the coast is clear. That driver might be fine with you going next, but you still have the responsibility to make sure you’re not obligated to yield to another road user. Yes, it can get a bit confusing.
Many of our traffic laws are for inherently dangerous behavior; things like impaired, reckless or distracted driving have consequences based on the action. Other traffic laws are for keeping traffic organized and safe. We agree to drive on the right side of the road, not because it’s safer than driving on the left side, but because we all need to agree on one side to make driving work. Same with right-of-way.
We used a four-way stop as an example but right-of-way extends to many situations, and I can think of at least one scenario where you hope that the other driver gives it up for you: Lane changes. The law puts the primary responsibility for safety on the driver changing lanes. One of the greatest feelings in heavy traffic is when you need to make a lane change, so you signal, and a car in the lane you want to get into slows down and waves for you to get in. It’s one of those moments when you feel like it’s safe to believe that there’s still hope for humanity.
Politeness is not a crime, but if you’re inclined to wave other road users on, just make sure your kindness doesn’t also create confusion.
This article saved the best for last. Yielding right of way when it is not required creates confusion, and that results in things not working as well as they could. If people know and stick to the rules situations tend to work out better.