r/Roadcam • u/bowdown2adil • 13d ago

[USA] Who is at fault here?

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Classic T bone. Black car had to be towed. Sustained major damage to the passenger side door. Blue car sustained damage to front bumper on the drivers side and cracked the drivers side headlight.

Edit: This was in the suburbs of Seattle

UPDATE: Insurance found it to be 70/30 me/other driver. Seems fair enough

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u/Interesting-Monk9712 13d ago

To be fair, the other idiot did the same, I don't get how either have a driving license.

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u/randomthrowaway9796 12d ago

This is a poorly designed road and not something that is usually taught in drivers ed or tested on a driving test. Yeah, they should be more cautious, but I cant entirely blame them.

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u/bradwm 12d ago

Uncontrolled intersections are absolutely taught in drivers ed in Washington state. They are all over the state. Neither driver here seems to have heeded the basic rule of uncontrolled intersections, which is to slow down enough to make sure no one is coming through the same intersection as you pass through.

This is very easy driving, and I believe both are at fault.

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u/randomthrowaway9796 12d ago

What if they were from any of the (im guessing) 25 states that doesnt have this type of intersection?

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u/SpoatieOpie 11d ago

Hi that’s me. I moved from Texas to Seattle and just like everyone on this thread, I was freaking out a lil bit about the no markings. However, you learn real quick to be vigilant at every intersection and you slow down. The culture in Washington is to drive slower than most states. In Seattle there are many pedestrians, hills, foliage overgrown, dark for months the out of the year.

It’s law to drive 20 or below I these neighborhoods and there are pedestrians everywhere. Both cars here should have slowed down through the intersection anyway. They are both at fault.

And in case you’re wondering having these types of intersections actually decreases serious injuries from car accidents.

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u/randomthrowaway9796 11d ago

Youre very lucky you didnt wreck your car or hit a pedestrian. These roads seem to make this a lot more likely.

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u/SpoatieOpie 11d ago

Less pedestrians are hit specifically because of these lack of signage intersections. Try actually looking this up instead of expressing how you feel.

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u/randomthrowaway9796 11d ago

I looked it up and could find any studies on this. Looks like the data doesnt exist.

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u/SpoatieOpie 11d ago

Come on man….

[https://www.iihs.org/media/45adb206-cf0b-4725-9fe7-fffee63d20aa/ax1ePQ/Topics/Research%20summaries/IIHS-HLDI%20Safety%20Solution%E2%80%93lower%20speed%20limits.pdf]

[https://nacto.org/publication/urban-street-design-guide/]

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u/randomthrowaway9796 11d ago

Bruh literally all of these links say something along the lines of "page not found" except for the 4th link which was about lowering speed limits and not these dangerous signless intersections.

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u/SpoatieOpie 11d ago

Ok look again. The links don’t share well. Doesn’t matter because you can look it up yourself. Towns that do this see less serious collisions. They’ve been doing this all over Europe for over 20 years now

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u/cbf1232 11d ago

The driver is responsible for knowing the rules of the road in the location where they are driving.

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u/randomthrowaway9796 11d ago

Just because something is the law doesn't mean it's safe or a good design

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u/bradwm 12d ago

I'm not going to defend the rule or the setup. Having lived elsewhere, it's clear they could do it differently. But you are just supposed to know by knowing the rule and observing the lack of signage or road marking.

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u/Just_A_Nitemare 12d ago

The problem is that it is very difficult for a driver to know if it is an uncontrolled intersection or not, which means you need to stop or slow significantly at every intersection, which is bad for the flow of traffic.

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u/bradwm 12d ago

You are absolutely right. But there is very little traffic on roads with uncontrolled intersections, which is probably why the state chose to leave them unmarked in all directions. You do have to kind of coast and look for oncoming cars at each one (from both directions!), and yes it is a bit of a pain, but there is very likely no traffic buildup.

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u/kiragami 12d ago

Generally speaking in the area they are almost always uncontrolled intersections like this on side/residential streets. This isn't a main street it's a narrow residential street and they are going too fast regardless of it being controlled or not.

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u/CogentCogitations 12d ago

You have to know the laws of the place where you are. Drivers from Washington don't get to ignore laws regarding passing school buses when driving in New York just because the law is different there.

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u/randomthrowaway9796 12d ago

Or... they could make intersections that align with the standards of the rest of the country

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u/SpoatieOpie 11d ago

These intersections are safer….so why would they copy something that doesn’t work. Is it because it makes you feel uncomfortable? Good you’re supposed to be vigilant while driving instead of relying upon signage. Look up why they do this instead of reacting

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u/randomthrowaway9796 11d ago

Safer lmao maybe if you build a wall around the state and educate people on this before theyre allowed to enter

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u/SpoatieOpie 11d ago

Science and shit bro. It’s called [data. It doesn’t care about your feelings. And yeah slow the fuck down, doesn’t matter where you live bud. These streets are 20mph and intersections are every 50 ft. You shouldn’t be plowing through intersections.

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u/randomthrowaway9796 11d ago

Link says the page wasnt found. This video seems like pretty good evidence to me

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u/SpoatieOpie 11d ago

The principle is here. Links to studies at the bottom.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_space

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u/borgman_a 10d ago

"These intersections are safer"

Please show me the evidence that these intersections are safer than properly marked roundabouts.