Safe Speed Forums

Hi there.

Was driving in Chelmsford today and there had been a bad accident in the town aso traffic was heavily blocked up in many directions.

Anyway I was turning right at a junction near Riverside it has 2 lanes one for left n straight and one for right.

It was heavily raining and windows were steamy.

There junction has lights at it and my lights went green, and the person behind me had beeped me to go so thinking 'oh you can go into box junctions when turning right' I slowly moved forward and turned to the right but then realised the traffic jam had stopped me from exiting the box junction, so then I was stuck in the box junction but technically it looked like I couldve just come from straight over rather than turning from the right. Anyway I was stuck in there for about 30 seconds, there were other cars some from straight over that had also got stuck in it.

Anyway nothing happened, but I was worried afterwards, can you get cameras for these kind of things and would it be a punishable offence with regards to what I did?

I was told afterwards when I asked that you can only turn right when the right exit is clear, but because of the weather it was hard to tell how clear it was. They told me that if you qwasnt pulled over nothing would come of it, but I know how obsessed over some of these things people are.

What do people here think will happen?

You may enter a box junction if you are turning right, providing that you are prevented from leaving by oncoming traffic. You may not wait in the box if you are going straight, because you would have entered the box before it was clear.

So my opinion is you were in the right, but the oncoming traffic was not, since they were going straight, and not allowing the box to clear before entering. Providing I have understood your explanation correctly.

what had happened ( if I can try to explain it in grater detail) imagine a 4 way junction I was coming to it from direction south.

Cars going straight over from west to east and cars going from the previous time the lights were green had blocked the exit turning right ( east) I missed this and when my lights went green turned right (east). Upon turning my wheels and setting car in a position now pointing east I was still in the box junction, so it may not be apparent I had even come from the south.

There were other people who had done more wrong than me ( such as the people going straight over who blocked it) but it was a huge jam going up for miles.)

Seeing as noone was pulled over for it, is anything likely to come of it, or are factors such as a major accident taken into account on occasions like this. Im not 100% sure I made a mistake, but if I had it was one that caused no harm and was an honest error, Im just worried I would get something for it? There are no gatsos or truvelos etc on that junction.

Just to clairfy the traffic that blocked me was not oncoming as in coming from the north, but coming from the west. (left)

IIRC, it is only London which has dispensation for automatic (i.e video) enforcement of yellow boxes. In all other areas I believe enforcement still rests with the local roads policing unit.