Why are there so many stop signs on American streets?
Why are there so many stop signs on American streets?
I'm from the UK where in general there's only a stop sign if it's needed, such as a junction where you can see absolutely nothing on one side. Otherwise usually there's a give way line instead, to let people slow the car right down to look, but not need to stop if it's unnecessary.
Whenever I see a video of an American street, it seems like there's a stop sign everywhere I'd expect there to be a give way line. Surely this is inefficient as stopping and starting increases emissions, and stops the flow of traffic.
Is it really just the American government doesn't expect drivers to look properly? Is it so the police can give people tickets for not quite stopping but still doing the junction completely safely?
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On top of what others have said, I think there's some basic differences in road and vehicle design.
Most of the US is connected by vast stretches of mostly flat nothingness that go hours at a time. Accordingly, cars are built with a huge amount of noise deadening, decent horsepower and huge support pillars (a/b/c-pillars) to support a rollover crash at speed - not to mention the huge popularity of crossovers, trucks and SUVs due to their relative safety and ability to move a lot of things. US Roads are also wide as, outside the east coast, they've had the space to evolve to meet the needs of car centric infrastructure.
All of this, however, means that US cars have big deadzones in their vision, particularly 45 degrees to the front and the entire back. They also easily go above 40mph or so if you're not paying attention, as the roads are wide enough to give a sense of ease and the cars don't give you much feedback at low speed in order to be not annoyingly loud at high speed.