EVER WONDER: Where's my blinking yellow light?

At the intersection of North Academy and Flintridge, the left turn light on North Academy does not allow a left turn except on a green arrow.  There are many times during the day, especially weekends, when wanting to make a left turn off Academy, when there is little, if any, traffic that you must sit there waiting for the light to go through all the cycles before being allowed to make a left turn.  There are many intersections throughout the city where the left turn arrow flashes yellow during the green light cycle. The wait at this intersection appears to be especially long early Sunday mornings.
 — Robert Oyer

ANSWER: Here you go from the city traffic engineers: “The left turn at Academy Boulevard and Flintridge Drive was changed from a protected permissive left (left turn allowed on a green ball) turn to protected only (left turn on green arrow) due to an unusually high left-turn accident rate. The left-turn accidents were not concentrated at a specific time of day or day of week.  To address such a scattering of accidents, the decision was to restrict left turns at all times.

“The City of Colorado Springs Traffic Engineering is in the process of gathering information on the use and citizen acceptance of the flashing yellow arrows. The Colorado Department of Transportation has implemented the flashing yellow arrow at many of their locations.  Although the City is looking at the option to use the flashing yellow arrow, the application will be evaluated at each intersection.  Dual-protected-only left turns and single-left-turns warranted by accident history or sight distance restrictions will remain protected only and not utilize the flashing period.  The option of using the flashing to replace the traditional five section left turn head will be evaluated in the next several months for future traffic signal rebuilds. “