The G1 rules people mix up: parking distances, pedestrian crossovers and demerit points

A pedestrian crossover is a specific thing: a marked place for pedestrians to cross a road that has no traffic lights, usually with overhead yellow lights a pedestrian can set flashing by pushing a button. At a crossover, drivers and cyclists must yield to anyone crossing, and may only move on once the pedestrians, and any school crossing guard, have reached the sidewalk. There is a second rule attached to it that gets its own question: you must not pass any vehicle within 30 metres of a crossover, because the car you are passing may be stopped for someone you cannot see.

A pedestrian crossing is the ordinary crosswalk at an intersection. You stop for people there too, but the law counts the two offences differently: failing to stop at a pedestrian crossover is 4 demerit points, failing to stop at a pedestrian crossing is 2. The test likes this pair precisely because the words are nearly the same. A third situation sits beside them: where a school crossing guard holds up a stop sign, you stop before the crossing and stay stopped until everyone, guard included, has cleared the whole road, and the handbook puts that at a substantial fine plus 3 points.

The parking chapter of the handbook states its distances in one paragraph, and the knowledge test takes them apart one at a time. They are worth learning as a set, because the trap in each question is usually a neighbouring number from the same list.

The regulatory signs that forbid stopping look alike and read alike, and each allows a little more than the one before. A no stopping sign means exactly that: between the signs you may not stop at all, not even for a moment. A no standing sign allows one thing: stopping while passengers get in or out, and nothing else. A no parking sign allows a little more: a brief stop to load or unload passengers or goods, after which you move on.

The question usually turns on goods. Unloading a parcel is allowed under no parking and not under no standing; letting a passenger out is allowed under both and under neither no stopping sign. If you remember that the three signs form a ladder, with stopping at the strict end and parking at the lenient end, the options sort themselves.

At a stop sign or a red light the question is never whether to stop but where, and the handbook gives a strict order of fallbacks. Stop at the stop line if there is one painted on the road. If there is none, stop at the crosswalk, whether it is marked or not. If there is no crosswalk, stop at the edge of the sidewalk, and if there is no sidewalk, at the edge of the intersection. A question that offers every one of them is asking which comes first.

For a school bus the two things to keep apart are the distance and the median. When a stopped school bus has its upper red lights flashing you stop whether you are behind it or coming toward it; from behind, you stop at least 20 metres back. The direction rule depends on the road: with no median, traffic both ways stops; on a road with a median strip, only the vehicles behind the bus must stop. This applies on any road, whatever the speed limit, at any time of day, and the penalty for a first offence is a heavy fine and 6 demerit points. The handbook adds a detail that surprises people: a school bus driver or any witness can report a vehicle that passed illegally, and the fine, though not the points, can land on the registered owner.

At a railway crossing the number is five: if a train is coming, you stop at least five metres from the nearest rail or gate. The traps are about the gate and the lights. You never drive around, under or through a gate that is down, coming down or going back up, and if the crossing has signal lights you wait until they stop flashing, and until the gate is fully up, before you cross. School buses stop at every crossing whether it has gates or not, and without using their red lights, so be ready to stop behind one.

Demerit points are added, never lost: you start at zero and gain them on conviction, and each stays on your record for two years from the date of the offence. What happens as they add up depends on which ladder you are on. With a full licence, 6 to 8 points brings a warning letter, 9 to 14 a second letter, and at 15 or more the licence is suspended for 30 days, after which your record is reduced to 7. As a novice, meaning a G1 or G2 holder, every rung is lower: 2 to 5 points brings the warning letter, 6 to 8 the second, and at 9 or more the suspension is 60 days, after which your record is reduced to 4.

On top of the ladder, novices have the escalating sanctions: a conviction for breaking a graduated-licensing condition, a Highway Traffic Act conviction worth four or more points, or a court-ordered suspension brings a 30-day suspension the first time, 90 days the second and cancellation of the licence the third. The handbook adds the part that confuses people: when a novice gets an escalating sanction for a four-or-more-point offence, the points for that offence are recorded as zero, so the suspension replaces the points rather than adding to them.

Distracted driving is the clearest example of the two systems diverging. A fully licensed driver convicted of holding a phone at the wheel gets a fine, three demerit points and a 3-day suspension for a first offence. A novice driver gets the same fine but no demerit points at all, and instead a 30-day suspension the first time, 90 days the second, and cancellation and removal from the graduated system the third. A question that asks how many points a G1 driver gets for a hand-held device is, strictly, a trick: the answer is none.

Two turns on a red light are legal and one is not, and the test asks about all of them. A right turn on red is allowed after a complete stop, once the way is clear, unless a sign says otherwise. A left turn on red is allowed only from a one-way road onto another one-way road, again after a complete stop. A left turn on red from a two-way road is never allowed, however empty the street looks.

A flashing green light, or a left-pointing green arrow shown with a green light, is an advance green: you may turn left, go straight or turn right from the proper lane, because oncoming traffic still faces a red. The part learners miss is on the pedestrian side. A pedestrian must not cross on a flashing green or on a left-turn arrow unless a pedestrian signal says to, which is why the test frames it from both seats. Flashing red means stop completely and go only when safe, exactly like a stop sign; flashing yellow means slow down and drive through with caution. And when the lights are dark in a power failure, yield to vehicles already in the intersection and to those entering from your right, then treat the junction as an all-way stop.

Who goes first follows two rules that are easy to merge into one. At an intersection with no signs or lights, the vehicle that got there first goes first, and if two arrive together the one on the right goes, so the driver on the left yields. At an intersection with stop signs on every corner, it is the first vehicle to come to a complete stop that goes first, and only if two stop at the same moment does the right-hand rule decide. Turning anywhere, you yield: a left turn waits for oncoming traffic and for pedestrians, a right turn waits for pedestrians, and a car coming out of a driveway or private road yields to everything on the road and on the sidewalk. Signalling never gives you the right of way; it only says what you intend to do.