One of the great things about bike commuting is the ability to make a personal connection with drivers on the road. Not having that metal shell encapsulating you leaves you vulnerable, yes, but also allows you to interact with drivers in ways you'll never get to do from inside a metal shell. Here is a case in point.

Coming from the West, I needed to turn left (Northbound) onto a four lane divided highway with a nice wide median (and a bike lane!) The Southbound lane cleared so I rode out into the median and stopped there to wait for the Northbound lane to clear.

There was a car on the opposite side also waiting for the Northbound traffic to clear. He had no turn signal on, and I couldn’t tell if he wanted to come straight across to go left (South), or if he wanted to turn right and go North. I didn't want to turn left only to find him turning right into me when that Northbound lane cleared.

So I looked over at him as we were waiting for the traffic to clear, and I pointed left, then right, then left, and so on, letting him know that I was just a bit curious as to which way he intended to go.

Now, my pet peeve is people who don’t use turn signals - drives me nuts. This was a great opportunity to point out to someone that their lack of using a turn signal was actually leaving another person (me) in doubt and ill at ease.

He figures out what I’m asking, and with his finger he points to his right. And then I’m muttering under my breath “great, now how about using your TURN SIGNAL!” and just as I’m muttering that he wakes up and puts on his right turn signal.

At this point I smile and give him an OK sign, as if to say “Yeah! You got it! You have a TURN SIGNAL! And now you know you should use it, and I know which way you are going! Good job!” That was fun.

What I run into is this: I'll be waiting in the right lane to go straight, and a car will pull up behind me. IF his blinker is on, I'll try to pull up and to the left enough to let him make the right on red. No blinker? I don't budge. I've considered a sign-language approach to asking whether they are turning but I think there's too much of a risk of miscommunication which would be worse than no communication at all in many cases. So I just watch for the blinker and leave it at that.

I'm not sure which is worse, not signaling or signaling two or three streets before the one that they're actually planning on turning onto. I was almost hit once as a pedestrian when a driver turned left while signaling right. Now when I'm riding, I always assume they're going to turn into me, signal or not. That way there are no "surprises."

If the driver had intended on going straight, your "right, left, right, left" pointing routine would have gotten tedious real fast.

I didn't think BMWs had turn signals! Oh...you didn't say he was driving a BMW did you? I just assumed since I have never seen one of those blink a signal yet.

Well. Was it a BMW?

Here in Michigan, the turn signal means "I'm halfway through a turn in this direction."

Seriously, many, maybe more than half of the drivers don't put their signal on until they're already starting the turn. I figure if they don't signal well in advance, they can't expect any consideration from me like trying to position myself to be out of their way so they can complete a right turn on red or something.

Ever notice that the level of immunity to common sense rises with the sticker price of the car?

In the DC area however using a signal is paramount to divulging secret information....

Yeah, that did occur to me just after I started my prompting routine. I took a chance there. Good thing I was right, leaving me with a good smug attitude instead of embarrassingly nodding "Ah... OK".

turn signals are handy, but I wouldn't trust my life to one!

...or a Toyota Prius or Dodge Ram pick-up or Lexus SUV or....

Even when I am driving, I don't trust turn signals unless I see concrete action demonstrating that the signal is actually signaling the drivers intention. If the signal says you are making a left turn, I'll wait at the intersection until I see that you are slowing down to make that turn (which means I will often be waiting longer than if I just assumed that left signal=left turn, but it also means I won't get T-boned). I have seen it happen way too often where people are signaling for many miles (or blocks) without making a turn or a lane change, or people not signaling at all (although, I have been guilty of these things on occasion myself). At the end of the day, in my mind turn signals are an indicator of what a driver MIGHT do.