Korean Job Discussion Forums

earthbound14 · Joined: 23 Jan 2007 Location: seoul

Buses, tow-trucks with sirens, and big black cars with shiny black rims......and of course the manic quick service men and the ja-jangmyung boys all run lights like it was fashionable.

There are countless red lights in this country, it seems like every major insitution, every elderly country home owner, every military base has one....even if it's never used.

Red lights operate 100% of the time, there is no time when they change to a flashing yellow or red (for example on the weekend when no one is going to the university.

Most Koreans seem to run red lights once and a while when there is no traffic and the light is completely useless.

So do you do as the Romans?

eamo · Joined: 08 Mar 2003 Location: Shepherd's Bush, 1964.

I run pedestrian crossings when it's clear no one is crossing. It seems really stupid to sit and wait when it's obivious no one is going to cross.

I don't run the red at junctions.

brento1138 · Joined: 17 Nov 2004

Everytime I'm in a taxi in Korea, I'm pretty damn happy when they go through the red lights late at night when nobody is on the street. Back in Canada, it does somewhat kill me to have to wait... However... I kind of see the point now in NOT going through red lights ever. It's probably fine 99.99999% of the time... but if you get too accustomed to it...too casual about it... there can be a problem that 0.000001% of the time. Once I had to shout to my taxi driver "STOP!!" once a biker was going across a pedestrian walkway, and I knew the driver would just head through the red light (was going way too fast to stop) and hit him.

I think I saved a life! Shocked

crazy_arcade · Joined: 05 Nov 2006

I won't run any red lights blindly.

Useless redlights with no intersection and obviously no traffic--I'll run it.

On a bike sometimes it's necessary to run redlights because you're going through on a yellow and it's not safe to stop on the red.

mrsquirrel · Joined: 13 Dec 2006

nobbyken · Joined: 07 Jun 2006 Location: Yongin ^^

Yellow light-UK, means prepare to stop if safe.
Yellow light-Korea, go faster.

Near our home there is a busy junction, which has flashing orange lights all the time. There are other lights, but they are never on. Always 12 cars and lorries edging forward without any right of way!

discostar23 · Joined: 22 Feb 2004 Location: getting the hell out of dodge

bus ran a red light near my girlfriends school and ran over a kid on a bicycle...killed the kid Crying or Very sad

Kimchi Cowboy · Joined: 17 Sep 2006

Running Reds is so much a part of the fabric of daily life here that I rarely notice it or think about it - except to double-check when I'm stepping into a crosswalk, that is, and that incident a couple weeks ago when I saw a motorcycle courier get creamed by an SUV... Sad

No, it's the refusal to Run Greens that really puzzles me. Specifically, (1) refusing to turn right into a completely empty crosswalk because the little green man is still flashing, or (2) refusing to turn left on a solid green when there's not another car in sight.

maddog · Joined: 08 Dec 2005 Location: Daegu

Traffic signals exist for a reason.

Anyone who runs red lights is a tool. They should face a HEAVY fine and a one year driving ban. Didn't see the red light? Well, that's you own fault for not watching the road.

Anyone who runs a red light as pedestrians are waiting to cross, as has happened to me a couple of times, should face a prison sentence.

How would you feel if one of your children were killed by a motorist running a red light?

MD