Roseville is speeding up traffic with flashing turn signals. Are Elk Grove, Sacramento next?

There you are: Stuck at a red-light arrow turning left while oncoming traffic, with a green light, is nowhere to be seen. Roseville, and several other Sacramento municipalities, feel your frustration and are employing new signals to give you the green, err, yellow light.

In the left turn lane at four intersections along Foothill Boulevard, Roseville will install flashing yellow arrow signals by the week of Jan. 21. When drivers approach a blinking yellow arrow, they are allowed to cautiously enter the intersection when there are no cars coming and it’s clear of pedestrians and bicyclists.

“We’re always looking to make traffic more efficient,” said Roseville spokeswoman Helen Dyda. “Changing current signals to provide options just helps reduce delays and save people time and money.”

The lights will be installed on Foothills Boulevard at Albertsons Drive, Misty Wood Drive and the driveways off the HP/FedEx and McKesson offices. Those intersections were selected because they have low traffic volumes and they’re along a straight road with good visibility, Dyda said.

The city was the first in the Sacramento region to use a flashing yellow left turn arrow when it installed the new traffic signal at the intersection of Industrial Avenue and Freedom Way in 2016. That signal has been “very successful,” Dyda said.

The cost of the new traffic signals in Roseville is about $10,000, and was built into the city’s fund this year for routine signal upgrades, officials said.

What are flashing yellow arrows?

Flashing yellow arrows, while still foreign to most Californians, have been around for more than a decade in the state. In 2009, the federal government released formal guidance on the use of flashing yellow arrows for streets and highways.

Since then, hundreds have been installed across Nevada, and several cities in California have installed them such as in Burbank, Thousand Oaks, Santa Rosa and San Jose.

Unlike the usual three-bulb system, traffic signals with a flashing yellow arrow have four bulbs.

Currently, a solid yellow arrow is a protected left turn warning to drivers that their signal is about to change to red. But once a driver misses the green or yellow arrow, they must wait for the traffic signal to cycle through lights for all the other directions.

With a flashing yellow arrow, it warns drivers that although oncoming traffic has a green light, they can turn left after yielding to pedestrians, bicyclists and cars.

Studies have found that flashing yellow arrows can reduce the probability of collision and improve safety for left-turning cars.

New signals in Elk Grove

By June, Elk Grove will be the next city in the capital region to install the flashing left turn signals.

Three new signals will be installed at the intersections of Harbour Point Drive and Renwick Avenue, Harbour Point and Galen drives, and Big Horn Boulevard and Lewis Stein Road.

City traffic engineer Ryan Chapman said the city has been looking into installing the signals for the last 18 months. If the city deems the signal improves intersections, Chapman said the city would install them in additional places.

The total cost for construction, design and equipment for each signal is $40,000 to $50,000, Chapman said, because the city has to upgrade its old controllers to program the new signals. The cost of the first three upgrades were planned as part of this year’s city budget, Chapman said.

Sacramento, county still years away

Sacramento County has been looking into using blinking left turn signals for years, and has already installed a flashing yellow right turn signal on Howe Avenue near the J Street bridge.

But it’ll be a “long time” before flashing left turn signals will be installed along county roads, said county spokesman Matt Robinson.

The county has previously announced the locations of future flashing yellow left turn arrow signals at the following locations: Lincoln and Manzanita avenues, Garfield and Marconi avenues, Wright Street and Marconi Avenue, Fulton and Northrop avenues and Kiefer Boulevard and Tallyho Drive.

The county Department of Transportation is still studying the implementation of specialized lights, including how much it’ll cost and where is it best to install them, Robinson said.

“This is something brand new for Sacramento DOT, and they’re really not ready to turn the lights on just yet,” Robinson said.

As for the city of Sacramento, flashing yellow turn signals are “a part of ongoing conversations” by city traffic engineers, but there’s no timeline for installing them, said city spokeswoman Grace Nunez.

This story was originally published January 10, 2020 at 5:00 AM.