Navigation app Waze is helping drivers avoid difficult intersections which are often stressful. The Google-owned app will be rolling out the feature in Los Angeles in an effort to prioritize driver safety over time.
"Turning left or going straight becomes a stressful scenario that requires crossing multiple lanes of oncoming traffic. The situation is significantly worse when traffic peaks at rush hour, making it tense and often very difficult to cross or turn," said Waze in an official blog post. "The goal of the feature is to reduce the amount of these intersections, not completely eliminate them."
Waze's "Difficult Intersection" function is automatically enabled for LA-based users offering the best route possible for an efficient expected time of arrival without having to go through dangerous intersections with few or no traffic lights at all, steady stream of traffic, limited visibility. For drivers who don't mind passing through the complicated junctions may choose to turn off the function in the app's settings. The feature may soon be rolled out in New Orleans too before being launched globally.
"These intersection are legal. But especially in Los Angeles, it involves crossing six lanes of traffic or crossing without a stop sign or guard," said Julie Mossler, Waze's head of brand and global marketing, as quoted by City Labs. "So those really are the intersections we're most interested in.
The company collaborated with the city government of Los Angeles in order to map out the so-called troublesome areas that put its users at risk and provide safer alternative routes.
According to a report by CNET, poorly-managed left turns account for about 500, 000 crashes and hundreds of traffic-related deaths every year. Moreover, left turns also prove inefficient. UPS, for example, started banning left turns for its truck drivers back in 2004 to reduce air pollution which resulted from burning more than 10 million gallons of fuel.
Formerly called Freemap, the company started out as an Israel-based startup company that was later acquired by Silicon Valley giant Google back in 2013. The navigation app runs on internet-based mobile devices like smartphones and tablets offering users real-time info as well as travel time updates and route details submitted by other users.
