Alternatives to the flashing yellow arrow

[Brandon]

Although yes, the use of a flashing amber at otherwise unsignalized crosswalks (that is, unsignalized for the pedestrians), which I've seen both in Washington and elsewhere, does muddle this quite a bit.  (If you see a flashing amber at a crosswalk, and there's a pedestrian in the crosswalk, you don't have the right of way.)

If there's a pedestrian in a crosswalk, I'm pretty sure the law says you don't have the right of way regardless of what the signal says, so no conflict there.

Even if your signal is green, and their signal says don't walk?  (Keep in mind that saying you have the right of way is not the same as saying you have the right to mindlessly run over pedestrians.)

As far as I'm concerned, if the pedestrian crosses against the light, he/she will get my horn.  I have zero tolerance for red light runners, be they pedestrians, bicyclists, or motorists.  They all get my horn, and maybe a gesture.

[Billy F 1988]

I've been seeing some people run the "Don't Walk" signal in Missoula lately. Geez! That's just asking for a hit and run situation. It just seems that they're not keen to obeying the signals with the pictographs of the orange hand and white walking man. It's really annoying. And I don't think Missoula is going to do a damn thing about that and that's a crying shame. We have some pretty below average drivers here in Missoula, not to say all Missoula drivers are that way. I mean, yeah, it annoys the piss out of me that someone runs the "Don't Walk" signal, but I'm not that stupid to punch the horn at someone or flip the bird at someone.

Moving out of that tangent onto the subject at hand, secondly, my biggest question is that how was it permissible for the city of Missoula to put a stupid FYA, albeit, a "permissive" FYA, at Dore Lane and Brooks Street?! Just...how is that even possible?! It makes more sense to have the standard RYG with protected arrow just like the vast majority of our intersections do have. Why couldn't some knucklehead contractor put an RYG-with-protected-arrow there at Dore Lane and Brooks Street instead of this ridiculous "permissive" FYA? (and I use that term "permissive" loosely, because there isn't anything "permissive" about that flashing yellow arrow at Dore Lane and Brooks Street) Dore Lane is a low volume traffic artery and Brooks Street is a mid-level volume  artery (that's if you want to call it that) and Brooks gets more vehicles per day than Dore Lane. The only time Dore Lane ever sees traffic heading that way is when people turn from 39th Street to Dore Lane over to Cabella's and Boot Barn on the old Kmart property, or from 36th Street to Dore Lane, or from Brooks to Dore Lane across the way. Why does that intersection even NEED a frickin' FYA?!

[corco]

I've been seeing some people run the "Don't Walk" signal in Missoula lately. Geez! That's just asking for a hit and run situation. It just seems that they're not keen to obeying the signals with the pictographs of the orange hand and white walking man. It's really annoying. And I don't think Missoula is going to do a damn thing about that and that's a crying shame. We have some pretty below average drivers here in Missoula, not to say all Missoula drivers are that way. I mean, yeah, it annoys the piss out of me that someone runs the "Don't Walk" signal, but I'm not that stupid to punch the horn at someone or flip the bird at someone.

Hahaha, I actually honked my horn at some douchebag jaywalking on the don't walk signal at Van Buren and Broadway as I was trying to turn right onto Broadway from Van Buren about a week ago.

It's a college town though, people don't respect pedestrian signals in college towns.
https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?action=printpage;topic=13210.0

Moving out of that tangent onto the subject at hand, secondly, my biggest question is that how was it permissible for the city of Missoula to put a stupid FYA, albeit, a "permissive" FYA, at Dore Lane and Brooks Street?! Just...how is that even possible?! It makes more sense to have the standard RYG with protected arrow just like the vast majority of our intersections do have. Why couldn't some knucklehead contractor put an RYG-with-protected-arrow there at Dore Lane and Brooks Street instead of this ridiculous "permissive" FYA? (and I use that term "permissive" loosely, because there isn't anything "permissive" about that flashing yellow arrow at Dore Lane and Brooks Street) Dore Lane is a low volume traffic artery and Brooks Street is a mid-level volume  artery (that's if you want to call it that) and Brooks gets more vehicles per day than Dore Lane. The only time Dore Lane ever sees traffic heading that way is when people turn from 39th Street to Dore Lane over to Cabella's and Boot Barn on the old Kmart property, or from 36th Street to Dore Lane, or from Brooks to Dore Lane across the way. Why does that intersection even NEED a frickin' FYA?!

Because of the new Cabela's, actually. That block (the entire old Kmart property) is in a tax-increment targeted improvement district- Cabela's is the anchor store, but the idea is that there will be even a couple more businesses up right at the edge of Brooks there in what used to be the edge of the old Kmart parking lot. The FYA is there because of what's coming, moreso than what's there. The new signal is among the infrastructure improvements the tax increment is supposed to fund.

The way the parking lot will be configured now, it will be smaller and generate more vehicle trips, so to prevent queuing on Dore Ln, the FYA helps them get more vehicles through that intersection faster at minimal cost to safety, since there's not much oncoming traffic from Dore Ln. Yeah, it's maybe a little bit difficult to make that left turn at times, but if they modified upstream signal timing (which they may have) that's easy enough to fix. Since the smart Missoulian would head down to 39th Street if they are looking to go west on Brooks and out the west end of the shopping center if they were looking to go north on Reserve, there shouldn't even be that many left turns, which is why a protected left turn signal would be a waste of a cycle, most of the time.

[Billy F 1988]

Get out! You visited Missoula a week ago, corco?! Damn, dude. I didn't even know you'd show up otherwise I would have met you somewhere. It's been a crazy week with cleanup and repairs at my place.

Anyhow, I guess I'm still new to this FYA situation in Missoula being that the South Crossing complex is underway in construction. I'm not sure what's going to replace the old Village 6 property. It was sad to see it go. I guess that's going to be a part of the South Crossing development, then again, it may be separate from that. It just confuses me every time I go by Dore Lane and Brooks Street seeing the FYA signal there. It makes me go, "is that meaning cross with caution, yield, what the heck is the permissive FYA supposed to mean?" That was why I had those thoughts earlier.

[KEK Inc.]

Note that where I used to live in Hampton Roads, most fire station signals had red lights with white strobes inside them, and the flashing yellow lights were smaller than the red and solid yellow.

https://www.google.com/maps/@45.7186272,-122.6597458,3a,15y,120.28h,92.58t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1sTQa_6h2pSnlT3MrU0jlnpQ!2e0

Here's one in WA that fits that description.