There are a few things that make driving in Michigan unique compared to other states. The most (in)famous, of course, is the Michigan left, but just as befuddling to outsiders is the the flashing red left turn light. Sadly, it looks like this bit of uniqueness is doomed to go the way of the dodo bird, all in the name of FHWA standardization:
In the name of safety, the federal government has issued a mandate to do away with those familiar blinking reds for left turns and replace them with a four-phase system of left-turn arrows.
The arrows will go from red, to flashing yellow, to green, to steady yellow, and back to red. And yes, left turns will be allowed on a flashing yellow arrow, but oncoming traffic still will have a green light - so yield or else.
From a technical standpoint this is the superior solution, as it's pretty much standard practice to treat the the flashing red as a yield instead of the stop technically implied by the red color, not to mention it makes more sense to use an arrow than a ball for a signal head relating to a protected turn. Still, it's kind of sad to see them go, much like it was sad to see Ontario get rid of their flashing green lights a few years back.
