The fact is that you must not run enter the intersection on a red light. If a green changed to red abruptly, it would be impossible not to do that.
The purpose of yellow, with a decent interval, is to make it possible to stop on a red, provided a vehicle is in good condition and not egregiously speeding, and the driver is sober and alert
Word semantic games about how that is expressed in the language of the traffic code do not change how it works.
"STOP but grace if you can't" wording makes it appear as if under some circumstances, it is a violation to enter the intersection on yellow. It creates incentive for police to bust people who go through yellow lights, on the premise that the judgment of what is an acceptable way to proceed through a yellow light is some objective standard that can be accurately policed.
I got a yellow light ticket by a cop who went through the same light, some 15-20 meters behind me! I remember thinking, "I was totally okay, but that driver behind me was pretty late; was it still even yellow?" Then that car put on police flashers.
I took it to court and prepared the defense that, if a vehicle A has time to stop on the yellow, then any vehicle B that is behind it must have even more time to stop. If the driver of B judges that he has no time to stop and proceeds, but claims that A ahead of him had plenty of time to stop, that is an inconsistent, double standard. (Actually, that was my back-up argument; my main argument was that I didn't want to be rear-ended by the car behind me, which clearly intended to proceed. And I would call as the witness the driver of that car who happened to be fortuitously present in the courtroom.)
I never got to present my argument, because that officer testified as having no evidence, so the case was dropped.
Anyway, sure, people will only change their behavior, but only due to being worried for being ticketed for going through a yellow in a manner that some officer doesn't like.
Here is a thought: if you are certain you do not have time to stop, and you're below the legal speed limit, why shouldn't you accelerate, if you feel like it? Say I'm doing 35 km/h in a 50 km/h zone (maybe I just left a parking spot, or turned a corner), and I'm 1 meter from the intersection which is green. It turns yellow. Why wouldn't I accelerate, or continue accelerating? Accelerating, by itself, doesn't prove that you had time to stop.
The purpose of yellow, with a decent interval, is to make it possible to stop on a red, provided a vehicle is in good condition and not egregiously speeding, and the driver is sober and alert
Word semantic games about how that is expressed in the language of the traffic code do not change how it works.
"STOP but grace if you can't" wording makes it appear as if under some circumstances, it is a violation to enter the intersection on yellow. It creates incentive for police to bust people who go through yellow lights, on the premise that the judgment of what is an acceptable way to proceed through a yellow light is some objective standard that can be accurately policed.
I got a yellow light ticket by a cop who went through the same light, some 15-20 meters behind me! I remember thinking, "I was totally okay, but that driver behind me was pretty late; was it still even yellow?" Then that car put on police flashers.
I took it to court and prepared the defense that, if a vehicle A has time to stop on the yellow, then any vehicle B that is behind it must have even more time to stop. If the driver of B judges that he has no time to stop and proceeds, but claims that A ahead of him had plenty of time to stop, that is an inconsistent, double standard. (Actually, that was my back-up argument; my main argument was that I didn't want to be rear-ended by the car behind me, which clearly intended to proceed. And I would call as the witness the driver of that car who happened to be fortuitously present in the courtroom.)
I never got to present my argument, because that officer testified as having no evidence, so the case was dropped.
Anyway, sure, people will only change their behavior, but only due to being worried for being ticketed for going through a yellow in a manner that some officer doesn't like.
Here is a thought: if you are certain you do not have time to stop, and you're below the legal speed limit, why shouldn't you accelerate, if you feel like it? Say I'm doing 35 km/h in a 50 km/h zone (maybe I just left a parking spot, or turned a corner), and I'm 1 meter from the intersection which is green. It turns yellow. Why wouldn't I accelerate, or continue accelerating? Accelerating, by itself, doesn't prove that you had time to stop.