Wednesday, December 18, 2002
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

ROAD WARRIOR Q&A: Flag At Your Own Discretion

Flaggers and cracked windshields and bikers, oh my!

This week readers want to know who authorizes work zone flaggers to stop traffic, if signs on the back of gravel trucks relieve them of liability for cracking windshields with their cargo, and if bicycles must travel on the right-hand side of the road.

• A reader asks: I see flaggers all over town. Somebody gives them a stop sign and a slow sign. But who gives them their authority to stop traffic at their discretion?

It requires more than a suntan and an orange vest to work as a flagger in Nevada. Certification by either the Nevada Department of Transportation or the American Traffic Safety Services Association is needed.

That involves going through a four-hour course where they are presumably taught their trademark slow-down motion: extend hand out with palm down, move up and down in an exaggerated fashion.

Certification, however, doesn't give flaggers authority to use their skills at will. State, county or city approval, depending on where the project is located, also is necessary.

"Even though someone is certified, the contractor is still required to submit a traffic control plan to the city for approval," said Debby Ackerman, spokeswoman for Las Vegas Public Works.

At that point they're officially a human stop sign.

Jokes aside, flaggers put their lives on the line to provide an important and potentially life-saving service.

"Flaggers are out there to protect them (motorists) and the crew that they're working for," said All-Pro Traffic Control Inc. President Julie Thomson.

Yet few receive a thank you for doing their job.

"They're the ones who get all the abuse, people saying, `How come this road's torn up?' " said Gerald Denzel, owner of Traffic Control & Safety Devices Inc. "People are just constantly bitching at you, and you have to smile and take it."

• David Lisheski asks: I see signs on large dirt haulers saying to stay back 200 feet as they are not responsible for broken windshields. Is there a law to that effect, and if so, who was silly enough to write it? It seems as though it gives them free reign to be careless with their loads and would contribute to their "get-out-of-my-way-cause-I'm-coming-through attitude."

Over the past few weeks, several readers have pointed out the cheeky signs on the backs of gravel trucks. The signs, warning motorists to stay back and not bother calling if their windshield is cracked, are one indication the haulers have become more aggressive of late in fighting cracked windshield claims, said Nevada Highway Patrol Lt. Jim Peterson.

Yet Peterson doubts the signs give them much cover.

"In my opinion, it does not give them carte blanche and there's nothing in the NRS (Nevada Revised Statutes) to support that either," he said. "I'm not a lawyer, but I doubt it mitigates them from any responsibility for spilling."

Even an official with one of the companies using the signs isn't convinced it does.

"I don't know that it does or not," said Brent Chadwick, safety director for Southern Nevada Paving.

If your windshield is cracked by rocks falling from a gravel truck, Peterson recommends writing down the license plate number, time of day, road and direction of travel, and immediately filing an accident report.

"It is an accident, after all," Peterson said.

• A reader asks: I was always taught that regular bike riders always ride with the flow of the traffic. But Summerlin often has bike lanes only on one side of the street, or the lane starts or disappears in the middle of a block. What is the actual rule, if any?

Bicycles are required to travel on the right-hand side of the road, just as any motor vehicle is, regardless of the location of any bike paths.

"A bicycle has to obey all the rules of the road the driver of a motor vehicle would," said Sgt. Frank Weigand of the Metropolitan Police Department's traffic section. "They're just not supposed to do the things we all see them doing."

In addition to following the rules for motor vehicles, bicyclists are prohibited from interfering with traffic and are required to use a headlight, taillight and reflectors when traveling at night.

If you have a question for the Road Warrior, call 387-2906 or e-mail MSquires@ reviewjournal.com. Please include your phone number.