Overview
A junction is created when one segment is connected to another segment. At this junction there are controls for how Waze will navigate through this junction between the segments. These controls appear in the Waze Map Editor (WME) as red and green arrows depending upon whether a particular direction of travel is allowed through that junction. These settings are called turn restrictions.
Before continuing to review the information below, be sure you are familiar with the basic information on setting turn restrictions. Then return here for this more detailed information on how different turn restrictions operate.
Where the road segments remain as imported from the base map all turns are soft restricted. Turns may be enabled automatically when wazers drive through the turn; such turns are soft enabled.
Key terms
Restricted Turn - 
- Indicated with a red arrow. Used to indicate that routing from one segment to another through that junction is prohibited.
Enabled Turn - 
- Indicated with a green arrow. Used to indicate that routing from one segment to another through that junction is permitted.
Soft Turn - - The Waze Map Editor indicates a soft turn with a purple question mark next to the arrow. Original base map imported junctions not set manually by an editor will be soft restricted.
Hard Turn - - The Waze Map Editor distinguishes between hard and soft turns, by removing the question mark when a turn is manually set by an editor as either a restricted or enabled turn.
These conditions are combined to form four different states shown in the table below.
| Arrow | Turn State | Restriction Penalty | How to Set | More Information |
|---|---|---|---|---|
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Hard Restricted | Very High | When an editor clicks on an arrow to change it from green to red or from red to green to red again | Waze will generally not route through this turn |
|
|
Soft Restricted | High | Cannot be added. | Cannot return to this state |
|
|
Soft Enabled | Low | Automatically set by Waze when traffic flows through Soft restricted turns enough times | Waze will not override a Hard restricted turn due to traffic flow against that direction |
|
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Hard Enabled | Very Low | When an editor clicks on an arrow to change it from red to green or from green to red to green again | Also set when selecting a junction and pressing the Q then W shortcut keys |
Related shortcuts
On the left side of the screen you will see action links for the selected node (or junction). Depending on the current state of the junction, one or both of the buttons Allow all turns or Disallow all turns will appear. For example, if all turns are currently allowed, then only the Disallow all turns link will appear.
Alternately you can use the keyboard shortcut W to Allow all turns and the shortcut Q to Disallow all turns.
Other helpful turn arrow keyboard shortcuts are:
- Shift+z - Toggles between: 1) showing the enabled and restricted turn arrows for the selected segment, and 2) showing all restricted turns (red arrows only) for every junction on the visible map (up to zoom level 4 or 500 ft in the lower left map legend).
- a - Toggles between making the turn restriction arrows directly selectable (opaque) or transparent. Transparency enables selecting objects below the arrow on the map.
- s - Toggles between separating turn arrows so they don't overlap or leaving them overlapping. This can also be used to refresh the screen when you have toggled visibility for all restricted turns, and you are modifying turn restrictions.
To see all keyboard shortcuts, press the ? on the keyboard.
Best practices
After creating a new junction, first be sure to set the one-way and two-way traffic direction on all connected segments. Then manually set any necessary individual restricted turns by selecting each segment one at a time and set the needed arrow to red.
Time restricted turns
The Waze Map Editor and routing engine supports scheduled restrictions (time of day, day of week, turns, traffic flow direction, vehicle type, etc.).
Please see the Partial restrictions page for full documentation on this feature.}
Route calculation
For those interested, there is an article covering How Waze calculates routes for more information on this topic.