Brown says, “No Left Turns”
How much gas money would you save if you didn’t have to make a lot of left turns?
UPS, the delivery people, decided to re-structure the delivery routes taken by drivers to eliminate as many left turns as possible. Now that may sound weird, but how long have you sat in a left turn lane waiting for oncoming traffic to pass, and how many times have you dreaded crossing into oncoming traffic?
The results have been dramatic. UPS says its 95,000 vehicles shaved nearly 30 million miles off its deliveries in 2007, saving the cost of 3 million gallons of gasoline and reducing truck emissions by 32,000 metric tons.
Makes sense to me. Sally and I both plan our drives with right-hand turns in mind, rarely adding an inch to the overall length of the drive, and feeling a lot safer.
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April 7th, 2008 at 7:04 pm
The NASCAR approach. Turn right. Turn right. Turn right. Turn right.
April 7th, 2008 at 7:42 pm
Why do we focus on taking left or right turns, when the actual problem, as John Feeney points out in his latest interview, is overpopulation:
http://www.corrupt.org/act/interviews/john_feeney
?
April 7th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
I always plan my trips to avoid left turns. For one thing I find that in this little rural /tourist area that I live in people will go out of their way to make sure that you can’t make left hand turns out of driveways and parking lots. You know when even though they can see that they can’t really go anywhere, they pull ahead and block the driveway. I always try to let at least one person make a left turn out of a parking lot even when I have the right of way. The tourist traffic is so bad that often I have to make a right turn out of my driveway down to a turnaround to be able to go into town.
April 7th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
This is a great idea. The headline sounds like an April Fool’s joke but I can see that it is real. I suspect that the insurance risk also dimishes for UPS by doing this. The less you cross over other lanes, the less likely you are to collide with others. As I’m from Ireland, I read this as “No Right Turns’.
I suspect there is a similar logic that could be applied to traffic light technology in general.
Ditto I would like to see other states and countries adopt the turn right on red method used in the US. This saves a lot of waiting on lights where you can safely see and turn onto another roadway. If there are a lot of pedestrians around or cyclists, this turn on red metod can be annoying for the pedestrians and cyclists.
April 7th, 2008 at 8:47 pm
That just sounds amazing…something as simple as that can do that much. Go UPS. ;D
April 7th, 2008 at 9:44 pm
Interesting. Though where I live the great majority of streets (especially main streets) have left turn lights. So it’s probably just as dangerous to turn left on red after stopping, pulling into traffic, as it is to turn left.
April 7th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
hybrid car engines turn off while stopped or idling and switch to electric power so this gas is saved all the time and the route is shorter bc you dont have to go past something to turn the right way…. just pointing out that these little tips etc arent actually helping the world but prolonging the switch to an actually sustainable world
April 7th, 2008 at 10:50 pm
Nascar only turns left, not right.
April 8th, 2008 at 12:49 am
Uh, they should have already been doing that…uh, wait, maybe I know why they weren’t. Let me explain. I used to drive for FedEx, who sell routes to independent subcontractors. These guys then hire drivers, whom they typically pay a daily wage. So it is in the drivers’ best interest to plan their routes to save *time* (thus, they try to eliminate left hand turns, crossing heavy traffic, etc.). Now, UPS is union and they pay their drivers *by the hour*. Maybe it’s cynical of me, but I assume that’s why they weren’t already doing this.
April 8th, 2008 at 3:52 am
Yeppers. “Go fast, turn left.”. IIRC, LeMans is right turns….
April 8th, 2008 at 3:02 pm
In the UK we have lots of roundabouts which pretty much eliminates the problem anyway.
April 15th, 2008 at 6:38 pm
Maybe it’s just me.. but how does idling at an intersection waiting for traffic to pass “shave off nearly 30 million miles” of travel?
I can understand it saving time, but how does it save mileage if you’re NOT MOVING?!? Maybe I’m just missing something, haha. I’m only half paying attention at work.
April 23rd, 2008 at 12:00 am
nascar drivers turn left
May 19th, 2008 at 5:18 am
Been driving for UPS for 4 year and the only people I ever hear this from is customers. The system that sets up our deliveries in the morning usually doesn’t remove left turns.
I work just north of San Francisco. If you work in the big city I can certainly understand the policy.
July 9th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
Yet another reason for the adoption of roundabouts!! Not only are roundabouts proven to be safer (see NHTSA tests converting some of the nations’ more fatal intersections into roundabouts), but as traffic is constantly flowing, cars are not sitting idle waiting to turn left.
April 10th, 2009 at 8:01 am
Not everyone drives on the wrong side of the road.
January 11th, 2010 at 8:22 am
Do Hybrids use fuel while waiting to make left turns? With the rising price of gasoline will the fee for home deliveries make this luxury obsolete? Less used? America is changing before our very eyes – just look at the “Detroit Auto Show” this year for proof!