• Journal of Korean Society of Transportation
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• v.33 no.5
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• pp.441-448
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• 2015

This study aims to suggest a reasonable signal operation method for right-turn traffic management. It was found that the right-turn vehicle supplementary signal is currently operated without clear regulations or criteria. It was also analyzed that right-turn supplementary signals are used without consistency, there is a risk of traffic accidents due to the discordance between supplementary signals and traffic signals of forward vehicles, there is a lack of basis for prohibition of a right turn when right-turn vehicle's supplementary signal is red and the flashing red signal is used in a different sense from the law. In order to see the effect of the installed right-turn vehicle supplementary signals on traffic signal violation, a field investigation was conducted. As the result, there was a high proportion of signal violation on the approach lane with right-turn supplementary signals and this means that right-turn supplementary signals hardly influenced the reduction in proportion of signal violation during a right turn. Additionally, a survey was carried out to see if there were differences in driver's interpretation of traffic signals depending on the installation of right-turn supplementary signals. As the result of the survey, there were no differences in interpretation of traffic signals depending on the installation of right-turn supplementary signals or the types of right-turn supplementary signals. A right turn when the signal was red did not lead to serious traffic accidents, so it is thought that there should be a careful consideration of a total ban on a right turn when the signal is red, in order to prevent driver's confusion due to the change of the signal system. Unless there is a disturbance to cars and pedestrians after a temporary stop when the signal is red, there is a need to specify that vehicles must stop temporarily in the Road Traffic Act to facilitate a right turn. What this study finally suggested is to use tri-colored arrow signals for right-turn car supplementary signals to convey a signal to a driver clearly.