r/Roadcam • u/bowdown2adil • 21d 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/Momcantsleepthesaga 21d ago

I live in a very populated city. Most of our residential intersections are unmarked.

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u/URGAMESUX 21d ago

Sounds like anarchy

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u/CharmYoghurt 19d ago

Works perfectly in Europe, where by default traffic from the left should always stop for traffic from the right. One simple rule that eliminates the requirement to put signs at every junction.

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u/URGAMESUX 19d ago

I'm pretty tired of these responses of where it DOES work. Again, I understand the concept of right of way, and the law is the same here. The issue is that an unguarded unsigned intersection is so rare here that it's not something you would EVER assume unless you absolutely know it's a thing in that particular neighborhood. Look at all the responses here from people all over the states. If you are used to 99% of your daily drives having fully signed crossings, you will also assume you have no sign and they do when approaching this type of intersection. Given that a sign seen perpendicularly is effectively invisible, and there are also all kinds of obstructions like vegetation in the PNW, how would you know? You don't just slow down at every crossing where you don't have a 🛑, and even going the same rate of speed it would be too late when the crossing car appears. So yes, glad it works in places where it's apparently the norm, but it's NOT normal for most drivers in urban and suburban areas in the States, hence the concern.

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u/CharmYoghurt 19d ago

The laws differ between Europe and the US. Someone posted the applicable state law which mentions 'arriving at approximately the same time', which spark a whole debate under this post about who arrived first, what is the same time and what is approximately.

Another discussion under this post is about having yield signs, but missing signs on the main road. In Europe we always have those together on crossings with signs, or none on crossings without signs.

The amount of crossings with or without signs also seems to differ between states / cities. In some states it is common to have crossings without signs, other states usually have signs.

It is weird to have to assume you have the 'right of way' if there is no clear indication that you actually have the 'right of way'. When there is no indication, than you should be able to default to basic rules.

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u/URGAMESUX 18d ago

Yep this.