Should right-hand turns be banned in the UK?

It’s a question being raised by US academic Vikash V. Gayah. He’s an associate professor of civil engineering at Penn State university in the US.

Leftfield

Turns across traffic should be banned in big towns and cities in order to ease congestion, reduce emissions and prevent accidents. His conclusions come after studying new research using evidence from logistics company UPS.

The comments come in an article for the academic website The Conversation. Gayah noted that 40% of crashes in the US occur at intersections, including 50% of crashes causing serious injury 20% of those causing fatalities. As many as 61% of crashes at intersections in the US involve a left-hand turn — the equivalent of a right-hand turn in the UK.

Studying urban traffic flow for nearly a decade, Gayah believes the ban would improve transport efficiency and safety.

Cars making right-hand turns across traffic can often cause queues. The resulting delays cause delays, raising emissions from idling engines. Driver misjudgement also leads to more crashes. Gayah claims that cutting out unnecessary turns could result in a 2% reduction in annual emissions from motorists. He adds that the benefits of a more even flow of traffic would outweigh the costs of forcing cars to take longer routes to their destination.

Driving down costs

UPS is one of the largest logistics companies in the world. In 2004 it changed delivery routes in order to minimise the number of turns across traffic. In the US, only roughly 10% of the turns it makes are left turns.

The company claims this has saved 10 million gallons of fuel and 20,000 tons of carbon emissions per year. It has also allowed it to make a further 350,000 deliveries.

“If it works so well for UPS, should cities seek to eliminate left-hand turns at intersections too? My research suggests the answer is a resounding yes,” Gayah wrote.

Chip off the old block

Edmund King, President of the AA, told The Times that the system, while sensible in American cities, would not work on the UK’s more eccentric road network. Their road system uses a block/grid system.

“In America if you miss a turn you just take a turn at the next block. That’s not the case in the UK, where cities were developed over time and the road layout is more confusing. If a driver was to try and avoid all right-hand turns here they would soon get lost and it would result in many more miles being driven and CO2 produced.”

In 2020, the average British driver spent 37 hours in traffic. This is down from 115 hours in 2019 due to reduced congestion caused by the coronavirus pandemic. Londoners spent 69 hours in traffic in 2020, a reduction of 53%.