Too many stop signs everywhere!

[NJ]

Am I the only person who is sick and tired of all the unnecessary stop signs everywhere in America when many of those could be replaced with yield signs? In Europe, stop signs are rarely used and yield signs are extensively used unlike in North America where stop signs are common and seen everywhere. 

[roadman]

In most local communities, stop signs are known as the "poor man's speed limit."  As such, they have nothing to do with the actual need to assign right of way at a given location.

[Brandon]

Am I the only person who is sick and tired of all the unnecessary stop signs everywhere in America when many of those could be replaced with yield signs? In Europe, stop signs are rarely used and yield signs are extensively used unlike in North America where stop signs are common and seen everywhere. 

Yes, especially when the stop sign in question controls a merge such as a RIRO or a right turn.  Those should all be yield signs.

[NJ]

Am I the only person who is sick and tired of all the unnecessary stop signs everywhere in America when many of those could be replaced with yield signs? In Europe, stop signs are rarely used and yield signs are extensively used unlike in North America where stop signs are common and seen everywhere. 

Yes, especially when the stop sign in question controls a merge such as a RIRO or a right turn.  Those should all be yield signs.

MUTCD should be contacted... hopefully they change it when providing them feedback.

[Pete from Boston]

Am I the only person who is sick and tired of all the unnecessary stop signs everywhere in America when many of those could be replaced with yield signs? In Europe, stop signs are rarely used and yield signs are extensively used unlike in North America where stop signs are common and seen everywhere. 

Yes, especially when the stop sign in question controls a merge such as a RIRO or a right turn.  Those should all be yield signs.

MUTCD should be contacted... hopefully they change it when providing them feedback.

Here, please familiarize yourself:

http://mutcd.fhwa.dot.gov/knowledge/faqs/faq_general.htm#genq1

The MUTCD is not a "they," it's a manual.

[1995hoo]

Am I the only person who is sick and tired of all the unnecessary stop signs everywhere in America when many of those could be replaced with yield signs? In Europe, stop signs are rarely used and yield signs are extensively used unlike in North America where stop signs are common and seen everywhere. 

Absolutely. Driving in Europe is like a breath of fresh air in that respect. But it's a totally different approach to driver responsibility that is unlikely to take hold in the litigious USA. Here it's assumed you won't know what to do without a billion signs telling you everything. There it's often assumed you will both know and act accordingly unless a sign tells you otherwise.


(Edited on December 1 to fix the busted quote tag and a typo)

[AlexandriaVA]

Absolutely. Driving in Europe is like a breath of fresh air in that respect. But it's a totally different approach to driver responsibility that is unlikely to take hold in the litigious USA. Here it's assumed you won't know what to do without a billion signs telling you everything. There it's often assumed you will both know and act accordingly unless a sign tells you otherwise.

You make it seem like better driving is manna from heaven. That's disingenuous because the US could have better drivers if it wanted.

Two factors:
1) More stringent licensing and education standards. Here in the US, you effectively get a license by asking for one and passing a test that you'll never have to re-take ever again. My guess is that the automobile reliance in this country makes for an implied understanding that everyone must have a car, and that making it hard to get and keep a license is tantamount to denying job prospects.

2) Stronger restrictions on distracted driving (such as cell phone usage) and other factors (strict DUI enforcement versus the mild enforcement here).

[1995hoo]

"Disingenuous"? What's got you wound up? That's a rather insulting word that indicates you think a person is being intentionally misleading.

[AlexandriaVA]

I just feel like the post I was replying to made it seem like a litigious society and lawyers was to blame for our over-signing of roads. Lawyer-blaming is always too easy (Shakespeare in Henry VI, for example).

I believe that the answer is much tangible, namely that getting a license in Europe requires significantly more training and education than here in the United States. It would follow that more training and education along with stricter standards would result in a better-educated pool of motorists in the road.

[NJ]

I know it well but there are still individuals who design, add/change signs etc.

Am I the only person who is sick and tired of all the unnecessary stop signs everywhere in America when many of those could be replaced with yield signs? In Europe, stop signs are rarely used and yield signs are extensively used unlike in North America where stop signs are common and seen everywhere. 

Yes, especially when the stop sign in question controls a merge such as a RIRO or a right turn.  Those should all be yield signs.

MUTCD should be contacted... hopefully they change it when providing them feedback.

Here, please familiarize yourself:

http://mutcd.fhwa.dot.gov/knowledge/faqs/faq_general.htm#genq1

The MUTCD is not a "they," it's a manual.

[jakeroot]

I know it well but there are still individuals who design, add/change signs etc.

The FHWA is the body responsible for the MUTCD. Some states produce their own version.

[roadfro]

The FHWA is the body responsible for the MUTCD. Some states produce their own version.

...which has to be in substantial conformance with the national version, and still approved by the state's FHWA division office.

[english si]

Here it's assumed you won't know what to do without a billion signs telling you everything. There it's oftenassumed you will both know and act accordingly unless a sign tells you otherwise.

Indeed. I also suspect that this difference between the "we will assume you all to be stupid morons because we let stupid morons drive" and the "we will assume you know how to drive because if you don't know how to drive, what are you doing driving?" approaches is what is driving the "we don't want none of that picture mcgubbins that requires us to learn what three or four signs where the picture isn't great actually mean, give us verbose signs instead" stuff in the thread about the US having more diagrammatic signs.

The 'driving school' at Legoland Windsor (aimed at Elementary school kids, and, back then at least, more complex than the Californian or Floridian ones, but actually, similar points would apply there) is a bit of both. European: you have 10 minutes of being told what the rules of the road are, as well as how to accelerate, steer, brake, etc, then you are on your own, expected to follow them, with one person dealing with 30 cars driven by kids and telling them not to do it again if they behave dangerously (like going round a roundabout the wrong way right in front of him, like I did*) - assuming that they would know the rules of the road. American: everyone (unless they have been really dangerous - some other friends managed to see people taken off before it ended) gets a 'licence' at the end of a short run around.

If 5 year olds on an amusement park ride in England can be expected to spot a sign (or a road layout like a roundabout), understand what they need to, and then do it, then why can't American adults? Most junctions were yield ones, with many not signed (merely marked on the road itself), though (of course) there was a stop one, and one with traffic lights. Now, sure, I'm thinking back 20 years ago, but out of ~100 kids I saw on the road (either while queueing, watching out of the window bored as they explained everything that I already knew, driving, or waiting for the second half of my group), not one broke the rules unknowingly: everyone stopped, yielded (and understood the difference), etc as they were meant to, or did something celebrating their sticking it to the man when they didn't. That Legoland only put one employee supervising suggests that dangerous driving was not a big problem.

Obviously real roads are much more dangerous, more complex, etc - as are real cars, but adults are more able to comprehend.

*All my friends went round the one way system the wrong way, but I could never time it right that it was clear, so needed to do something else to show that I was a part of this "we're 9-years-old and above this kiddy ride's stupid rules" and not stopping at the 'toad crossing' wasn't going to cut the mustard as only the 5 or 6 year old girls stopped at it, and I was running out of time. One or two of the others got told off for their going round the one-way system backwards, but most people didn't get told off as they all went as a group while the guy was busy telling the boy who dd it first not to do it again.

[1995hoo]

I just feel like the post I was replying to made it seem like a litigious society and lawyers was to blame for our over-signing of roads. Lawyer-blaming is always too easy (Shakespeare in Henry VI, for example).

....

Obviously you have no reason to know this, but I am an attorney 

In my mind I was focusing more on how liberating, for lack of a better word, it feels to me when I drive in the UK. The litigious society thing wasn't where my thought process was focused. I do think it's a reason for American over-signage, though. It's not the only reason, of course, but it's one reason.

[NJ]

I know it well but there are still individuals who design, add/change signs etc.

The FHWA is the body responsible for the MUTCD. Some states produce their own version.

So FHWA should be contacted then for suggestion/questions?

[Pete from Boston]

I already stop every 50 feet or so, just to be on the safe side, so I hardly notice the signs.

[UCFKnights]

I already stop every 50 feet or so, just to be on the safe side, so I hardly notice the signs.

I'm very confident you live in my community 

[Pete from Boston]

I already stop every 50 feet or so, just to be on the safe side, so I hardly notice the signs.

I'm very confident you live in my community 

In all seriousness, stop signs have a negligible negative effect on my life.  Partly because city driving a) requires a lot of them, and b) is slow to begin with, and partly because I just don't care that much that I have to stop at stop signs.

[vdeane]

Meanwhile, NY has a bare pavement policy, so one can always see the pavement markings here except in a storm.

[Revive 755]

In regards to the original topic:  Yes, stop signs are way overused.  After encountering during the past week signs indicating that two intersections where minor, dead end residential streets intersect with an overloaded collector (which should be classified as an arterial) will become all way stops, I am of the opinion the 2018 edition of the MUTCD needs to upgrade the 'stop signs should not be used for speed control' to a shall statement.  Additionally, IMHO, there should be a stronger push for removing unwarranted stop signs tied into either the MUTCD or the federal aid process for road improvements (as in a city has to check and remove unwarranted stop signs or pay for any improvements on that road without federal funding).

[Buffaboy]

If about 65% of the stops signs in my town were replaced with yield signs, I could get around 1000% more efficiently.

[vdeane]

Perhaps they could change it to a shall statement and then tell the states that all federal funding will be withheld if they don't whip their towns into compliance in X years.

[Pete from Boston]

Perhaps they could change it to a shall statement and then tell the states that all federal funding will be withheld if they don't whip their towns into compliance in X years.

Remind me again what "shall" means to engineers that isn't what it means to the rest of the world.

[jakeroot]

Couldn't an agency easily fabricate some traffic study that claims the four-way stop was installed because of heavy side-street traffic (if their new four-way stop is called into question)?

[PHLBOS]

You might want to look at these two older, but still active, threads on this subject:

Stop signs that make no sense

and

Yield Signs Instead of Stop Signs?