Are emergency vehicles such as police cars and ambulances allowed to put their sirens and lights on to pass through red traffic lights even when there is no emergency?

If there is truly not emergency - the answer is NO WAY!

ABSOLUTELY NOT. But who's gonna argue with a uniformed cop?

Ambulances and fire engines are far less likely to abuse this.

I also have a handful of cop friends.

They could have gotten a call when they were in route someplace...so you never know if there is an emergency or not. You can't assume that there is no emergency.

The general answer is no.

However, most police departments have very restricted policies regarding when they can use the lights and siren. Most people when they call the police want them there right away. An emergency to the citizen may not be an emergency to the police administration, so the policy forces the officers to obey the traffic laws. If someone is stealing your car is that an emergency to you? To the police, it is just a property crime and the policy may not allow the officers to use the lights and siren. So the officers are forced to do the best they can and sometimes break the rules to help the citizens.

The question is, when you call the police, do you want them driving slow and taking 10-15 minutes to get there. Or do you want the right now??

The general answer here is no.

But, how do you know what type of call the officer may be on?

How do you know there is no emergency?

I think they do abuse it to a point. I almost got blind sided at a traffic light because of a speeding tahoe police SUV. I want to note that I have just one moving violation in my 18 years of driving and I was late for work so I would say that I am a safe driver. The State of IL even sends me periodic safe driving certificate's thanking me for my law obiding driving. So with that said... Just as I was approaching a somewhat blind left hand turn while I had the light this copper comes flying outta nowhere at almost 3x the speed limit. I slammed on my breaks and he just missed slamming into me. Once through the intersection his lights went off and so did he. I was super pissed and I came to find out it was a neighbor of mine but he never admitted to the misuse of his lights...No kidding...

No, that's against policy for obvious reasons.

Yes, I'm sure there are some who abuse the policy, but keep in mind that sometimes a priority call goes out and then is downgraded, or cancelled, or another agency is going to respond for jurisdictional reasons, or a closer unit just radio'd that they were closer and would respond.