Octagon on a Stick — Kingshuk Das

With the country split in two, here’s a quick reminder of an odd thing, designed right here in America, that helps us cooperate with complete strangers, in a split second, without even talking.

William Phelps Eno in Michigan. Image: Eno Center for Transportation — William Phelps Eno in Michigan. Image: Eno Center for Transportation

As an immigrant, it’s easy to notice random little things in culture that have become invisible to locals. As a designer, it’s also my job to do so. Driving on our daily commutes, most Americans will not think twice about a unique example of American civility that we take for granted in our everyday lives.

It’s a humble traffic sign that represents the best of America.

Consider the social behaviors enabled by this 2'X2' entropy fighting, civilization enhancing, chaos containment octagon-on-a-stick.

Four cars — a Prius, a monster truck, a beat-up Chevy Cavalier, and a BMW, pull up to four-way stop in Anywhere, USA, from four directions, at the same time.

They are strangers to each other, from different walks of life, education levels, and political convictions.

Here’s a slow-motion breakdown of what usually happens next:

They see a red & white octagon planted in the ground, and they all stop. No policemen around, no cameras, no witnesses. The briefest of eye contact is exchanged among the four, if any.
Our protagonists have a million things on their minds at that moment. Yet in a split-second they negotiate & decide who arrived first. In this case let’s say they decide it was Chevy.
Somehow, Chevy correctly arrives at the same conclusion herself, owns the decision, and lurches forward — at risk of being simultaneously crushed from three directions if the others flout the rules.
They then decide that Prius arrived second, so Prius leaves next. Then Truck, then BMW last. All this without anyone leaving their vehicle, without honking, histrionics or even a single word exchanged.
The process repeats itself silently, millions of times every day, in millions of intersections across the length & breadth of the United States. It’s a beautiful thing.

For its time, the four-way stop was a brilliant work of design.

I first saw one in action for the first time when I moved to the US in my mid-twenties. I had grown up in India. There are many amazing things that the world can learn from my country of birth. But the habit of following rules in public spaces is not one of them.

It would be clear the first time you try to board a bus, a plane, or expect to wait in an orderly line for any other service. A queue is a mini riot. A traffic light is a mere suggestion. Turn signals are decorations. And lane markings outright jokes. It makes traffic in Manhattan feel like a Red Square parade.

The usual romantic narratives around America are about freedom and individualism. Which are awesome things. Many immigrants are indeed fleeing places lacking in freedom— places with authoritarian, repressive regimes that try to control every aspect of public life.

But some of us have actually moved here from places that can feel quite the opposite — where the lack of rules & accountability can actually lead to a perception of greater individual freedom in daily life. Places where government infrastructure and institutions are so dysfunctional that it’s all up to individuals (and their family/community networks) to succeed or fail, by hook or by crook. Where laws can be bent or broken if you have money, power, or connections. Where most social improvements are driven by private investment or charity. Where at best it’s about survival of the fittest, at worst, the law of the jungle. Weirdly enough, these places are in many ways a libertarian’s ideal of individual freedom made real, and untethered.

A working four-way stop, in a place like that, would be an impossibility.

By now, I’m sure many of you are thinking of the dozens of reasons STOP signs suck, and all the arguments for improving or replacing them. That’s not the point. The question is, what’s made them work as well as they have, for over a hundred years?

What can the STOP sign tell us — about ourselves and how we might co-exist in the future?

Image: Stop sign in Ruby Valley, Nevada; Famartin, Wikimedia Commons

A crude attempt at articulating the obvious, hiding in plain sight:

The STOP sign is egalitarian without being overly restrictive. For a moment in our deeply uneven society, it equalizes, erases entitlement and neutralizes privilege. It doesn’t matter what you look like, how much money you make, or who you know. Every one slows down & stops for the other.
It provides constructive, just-enough structure. First-in, first-out. A simple rule that sets us free. A cooperation-unlocker that we can use to self-regulate & self-organize without the need for further technology or authority figures.
It’s based on simple, shared trust. Common decency every day. The whole thing would fall apart if you couldn’t trust strangers to follow the rules. If might was always right. If everyone felt compelled to take advantage of the system at every turn. If self-interest (or family, or religion, or in-group) was the only thing.

That last bit is proprietary, America.

It’s our IP. You can replicate the form, but not what makes it work. The integrity of the United States is based on a mindset — a delicate one that’s always teetering on the edge of being thrown out of balance.

What sets us apart is not just freedom. It’s the ability of strangers to trust and actively work with each other based on a shared code of conduct.

That’s not an app. No fancy technology, AI, VR, or venture capital is needed for it. Heck, it doesn’t even use the electrical grid. It’s invisible, intangible. It slips through your fingers if you try to grasp it.

The net result is a culture that’s co-created and co-maintained.

Fragile magic that takes decades to build, but just days to undo.