Do Fire Trucks, Ambulances and Law Enforcement Vehicles get priority at signalized intersections in Douglas County?
Fire trucks and ambulances associated with the fire districts are equipped with a special strobe light that, when activated, gives them the ability to change the traffic signals to green for the direction that the emergency vehicle is traveling. Law enforcement vehicles and private ambulance companies usually do not have this ability. When a traffic signal that is part of a coordinated corridor of traffic signals is “preempted” by an emergency vehicle, that preemption disrupts the coordination. It can take up to three cycles of each traffic signal (5-6 minutes) for that intersection to get back “in step” with the coordination plan.
