Posted on 07/21/2009 6:58:18 PM PDT by Arec Barrwin
Don't Be So Square Why American drivers should learn to love the roundabout.
By Tom Vanderbilt Posted Monday, July 20, 2009, at 6:54 AM ET
Here is a narrative that has been playing out over the last several years in any number of American towns: Traffic engineers notice that a particular intersection has a crash problem or is moving traffic inefficiently. After a period of study, the engineers propose a roundabout.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
No kidding! and more and more are popping into the Prescott/Chino Valley area. The one on 89 at Willow Creek is a comedy.
Diverging Diamond Interchanges is something else for drivers to get used to.
I guess they are okay in the big cities but out here in Arizona, they are a very, very dumb and dangerous idea. Somebody could get killed. Somebody probably already has.
When in Germany I found roundabouts everywhere. Stop signs were almost nonexistent. Traffic flowed well. This in contrast with the jerky stop-and-go of stopsigns here, which lead to drivers living the “rolling stop”.
We got one of those suicide bridges on I-494 in front of Best Buy’s headquarters.
Modern Roundabout in Payson, AZ
Yea that looks like a good idea...
Don’t try coming on that mess at around 10:00 p.m., pitch black and pouring rain. It gets ugly fast.
LOL...I bet!
Drivers always complain about the timing of traffic lights. It looks like a no brainer to set the lights for your car, but the traffic engineer has to also accommodate the traffic in the opposing direction as well and cannot violate the laws of physics.
They probably work where they are needed. The one we’re talking about in Payson, Arizona is at the end of a 2 lane, very mountainous country road as you come into town. You better know it’s there.
Traffic circles are generally more efficient than lights at moving traffic through an intersection, up to a point. When you have extremely high volumes of traffic, a traffic signal does a better job. However, motorists must be taught how to properly drive a traffic circle.
Another “Roundabout” song:
English Roundabout - XTC (from English Settlement)
People rushing round with no time to spare.
I’m so dizzy I’m neither here nor there,
in this traffic jam I just want to shout
let me off o’this english roundabout
english roundabout
and all the the horns go ‘beep! beep!’
all the people follow like sheep
I’m full of light
and sound making my head go round, round.
everyone is cursing under their breath
I’m a passenger, I feel close to death
hopeless situation I have no doubt
stop the madness,
english roundabout english roundabout
and all the cars go’brum! brum!’
and in my ears I feel a hum
the neons blind my eyes
all those tempers rise, rise.
cars and buses go, puffing out their smoke
roll my window down, I begin to choke
I have had enough, I just want to get out
let me off o’ this english roundabout
english roundabout.
True, but the main road can be set. At least if you can hit most of the green lights, it would make traveling surface streets a lot more enjoyable than hitting every single red light. I commute 4 miles along surface streets - a pretty main road. Some days it takes me half an hour to go 4 miles because I hit every single red light. On a good day, I can make it in 13 minutes.
Roundabouts are the perfect solution for indecisive drivers like my wife; they needn’t stop, turn, nor choose a direction.
if we based our acceptance of any innovations and technokogy upon the vrry worst and misguided application of samw, we wouldnit only not be living incaves, we woukd have outkawed fire.
this thread tells me much about today’s americans.
it was a really great country once.
I love them. Single lane only though.
I agree. I love roundabouts. When they're single lanes they make a lot of sense. They really move the traffic along and give you quick access to several different directions. Two-lane roundabouts are a little crazy.
Ugh...
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