Keeping to the right — Texas Permit Test
Keeping to the right on the Texas permit test — 5 rules, each with the reason behind it and a question on it while it is fresh.
The rules
A driver must never drive on the left side of the road within 100 feet of an intersection or railroad crossing, or while crossing one.
A car on the wrong side at an intersection meets everything that turns into it. The hundred feet is the approach as well as the crossing.
Never drive on the left side of the road when: 1. Pavement markings or signs prohibit driving on the left (a “No Passing Zone” or solid lane lines) 2. There are two or more traffic lanes in each direction 3. Within 100 feet of or crossing an intersection or railroad crossing
A driver must never drive on the left side of the road within 100 feet of a bridge, viaduct, or tunnel.
There is no shoulder to escape onto in any of these. Meeting an oncoming car there leaves nowhere to go.
Never drive on the left side of the road when: 1. Pavement markings or signs prohibit driving on the left (a “No Passing Zone” or solid lane lines) 2. There are two or more traffic lanes in each direction 3. Within 100 feet of or crossing an intersection or railroad crossing 4. On a hill, curve, or any other place where vision is limited 5. Within 100 feet of a bridge, viaduct, or tunnel
A driver must never drive on the left side of the road on a hill, a curve, or anywhere else vision is limited.
The oncoming car appears with no warning at all in these places. There is no version of this that gives enough time.
Never drive on the left side of the road when: 1. Pavement markings or signs prohibit driving on the left (a “No Passing Zone” or solid lane lines) 2. There are two or more traffic lanes in each direction 3. Within 100 feet of or crossing an intersection or railroad crossing 4. On a hill, curve, or any other place where vision is limited
A driver must never drive on the left side of the road where markings or signs prohibit it, or where there are two or more traffic lanes in each direction.
On a road that wide, the far side is oncoming traffic. Nothing about it is a passing lane.
Never drive on the left side of the road when: 1. Pavement markings or signs prohibit driving on the left (a “No Passing Zone” or solid lane lines) 2. There are two or more traffic lanes in each direction
A driver keeps to the right except when passing on a two- or three-lane street, driving on a one-way street, or where the right side is blocked.
Three situations, and every one of them is temporary. Outside those the right side is where the car belongs.
Always keep to the right side of the road except when: 1. Passing another vehicle on a two- or three-lane street 2. Driving on a one-way street 3. The right side of the road is blocked
On the test
How close to an intersection may a Texas driver not drive on the left side of the road?
Within 100 feet. A car on the wrong side at an intersection meets everything that turns into it. The hundred feet is the approach as well as the crossing. Texas Driver Handbook, p.38: “Never drive on the left side of the road when: 1. Pavement markings or signs prohibit driving on the left (a “No Passing Zone” or solid lane lines) 2. There are two or more traffic lanes in each direction 3. Within 100 feet of or crossing an intersection or railroad crossing”
How this works
Most practice tests hand you a bank of questions and leave the manual somewhere else. This one puts them together.
You read one law and the reason behind it, then answer a question on that law while it is still fresh. Get it right and you move on; get it wrong and you have found the gap while it is cheap to fix, not on the morning of the exam.
Learning one rule at a time, and proving it immediately, is what turns a manual you skimmed into something you actually know — and it makes studying feel like getting somewhere rather than like waiting to find out.
What it costs
- One payment, once — not a subscription. Nothing renews and there is nothing to cancel, for an exam you sit one time.
- Free to start: a 10-question test and the first section of cards. No sign-up and no account.
- Paying opens the rest of the cards, unlimited full-length practice tests, and retests built from exactly the questions you got wrong.
- Every level up to Prepared — 3 tests passed in a row.
- Do the work, fail the real exam, and we refund you.
Where these come from
Every rule here is checked against Texas Driver Handbook, published by the Texas Department of Public Safety, and against the state code itself. Last checked 2026-09-16.
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/TX.pdf (Texas Driver Handbook, form DL-7, Revised January 2026, Texas Department of Public Safety, retrieved 2026-09-14 from dps.texas.gov)
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/TX.pages.txt (plain pdftotext over that PDF; sha256 pinned in SOURCES.json)
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/SOURCES.json (sha256, folio offset 6, nonLawPages, the four extraction traps and the extraction flag, each with its measured basis)
- docs/plans/texas-exam-shape.md (the search that established that no official source states the question count, and the two decoys it disposes of)