Yesterday was not the first time I’ve sat stopped in a Miata in front of a police car with its light bar strobing for this same issue. The previous time was quite a while ago, might have even been in an earlier Miata, back before they kept track of warnings by filling out a form.
I was making a left from the two lane Price Avenue onto the five lane Whiskey Road. This intersection is atypical in that cross traffic have segregated turns at crossing and or entering Whiskey Road. This means that when it is your turn to turn left, you get a green arrow. I was a ways down the road when the light went green and the two cars who triggered the signal were long gone by the time got to the intersection, so I barreled through without slowing and entered the rightmost lane because in about a 1/4 mile I was turning into Kroger’s parking lot.
Sure enough, there was a city cop sitting at the head of the line pointed in the direction I was going. When his light went green he hit his flashing lights and caught me half way to my destination. I got a warning about how I should enter the left most lane when turning left onto a multiple lane road.
What both these incidents have in common is the car I was driving and the manner I was driving it, more so than the actual lane entered. In my humble opinion, had I been piloting a Toyota Camry with in a Camry-esque way, neither LEO would have bothered me.
This is from the South Carolina Drivers Handbook: A left turn often takes more preparation than a right turn. …Then turn into the lane nearest and to the right of the center line. This, anyone can understand, so perhaps that particular section 56–5-2120 should be written more like this.
I still probably won’t obey it in situations like this one or yesterday because of the impending right turn though.