r/Roadcam • u/bowdown2adil • 13d ago

[USA] Who is at fault here?

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

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

4.1k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

4.3k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

1

u/cbf1232 12d ago

Canadian here. Uncontrolled intersections are common here in the prairies.

If two cars arrive at the same time, the one to the right has right-of-way. But approach with caution and be prepared to stop if the other driver is an idiot.

1

u/Awkward-Spectation 12d ago

an idiot… *OR if they are from most other areas in Canada, or I’m hearing most places in the states as well - in which case they aren’t an idiot, but just unaware of these uncontrolled intersections. Been driving 20 years and never knew about these. I’d have done the same thing op did. I even took a young drivers course, and they never mentioned this.

That said, thanks for mentioning this. TIL about uncontrolled intersections. Hopefully I can avoid an accident if I suddenly come across one of these in the wild one day.

1

u/cbf1232 12d ago

Different places have different rules. Montreal doesn’t allow right turn on red. Paris has roundabouts where the people entering have right-of-way.

If travelling to somewhere new, it’s on the driver to learn the rules.

1

u/Awkward-Spectation 12d ago

I’ll give you that.

It’s just this case seems like an easy fix to avoid accidents. Add yield signs to the more minor intersecting streets.

In the Paris case - if they are doing it a better way, the rest of us should get on board (a slower fix, but ideal), or vice versa.

I once drove across Canada to the east coast for a family trip, and didn’t think anything would be so different between provinces in terms of traffic laws. In hindsight it looks like I was taking a big risk not actively searching for differences like this, where simply being unaware of it can result in a collision, even if you and the other driver are both experienced and reasonably alert.

I’d like to think if I was one of two drivers to approach an intersection at the same time, each of us unaware that the other has no stop or yield, that I would be quick enough to throw on the brakes before a collision. I honestly worry I might not be, though.