Worst Intersection (Junction) in the World (video)

[pat grimshaw]

can we find it in Google maps?

 

[swerve]

Roundabouts are especially difficult in a tractor trailer...

Whenever I HAVE to go through one -- it seems like my trailer jumps up onto the sidewalk because I don't have enough room...

 

[swerve]

^Thanks for the link!!!

Um -- yeah -- that is CONFUSING...

And then add on to the confusion by having your steering wheel in the passenger seat and driving on the wrong side of the road...

I'll bet MANY American tourist have troubles there...

 

[winterknight]

*Sigh*

The magic roundabout ain't that confusing, people.

All you need to remember is that THE BIG ISLAND IN THE MIDDLE ISN'T ACTUALLY A ROUNDABOUT. Once you treat it as a normal circular two-way road with five mini-roundabouts to join and leave, it all becomes clear.

(no, I've never been round the one in Swindon. But there is an almost identical one on the A133 in Colchester, which is only about twenty miles from me...)

 

[winterknight]

^ I just can't imagine going through one roundabout inside five or six other ones, though. (Or is it the other way around?)

The whole idea makes my heart palpitate, because I'm a nervous driver, anyway.

It's neither. It's five mini-roundabouts arranged in a circle on a normal two-way street

(and the reason is, of course, to do with traffic management. If the prevailing flow of traffic needs to do a right turn between two specific streets, simply using a regular roundabout would hold up the traffic on the other three. By allowing the right-turn traffic to go "the wrong way" around the central island, this problem is eliminated)

 

[winterknight]

Oh, and if you want a really scary roundabout, you want Place Charles de Gaulle in Paris. In operation it's just a regular roundabout, but it's ten lanes wide, has twelve exits, and has the Arc de Triomphe slap-bang in the middle.

It's so hairy that French car insurance policies typically have a special clause just to cover driving around it.

 

[Harke the Boeotarch]

What do you expect from a country where people drive on the wrong side of the road?

 

[winterknight]

They described it as being more efficient, and cheaper, than a stop-light, for medium intensity congestion. (For heavy congestion, a stop light is necessary.) For some reason, automobile accidents are rare in roundabouts, whereas they're extremely common in stop-light intersections.

If the interval on the lights is set slightly wrong, there can sometimes be quite long periods when no traffic is moving on the junction at all. Using roundabouts avoids this because the very action of traffic flowing across it creates gaps that vehicles in other lanes can utilize.

 

[gsdx]

This has got to be a runner-up.

 

[frankfrank]

I remember something like a triple roundabout, or something similar, in Camden NJ in the 1970's, but it's not there anymore.

(Actually, some people think it would be a better world if CAMDEN was no longer there...?)

 

[quasar]

I guess the problem with me is that I have no depth perception at all, or no 3-D vision, if you prefer.

The whole thing makes my head spin. I'm probably not teachable.

Taking winterknight's explanation one step further, envisage the central circle of land as an island about 2miles wide in the middle of the ocean... suddenly you're just dealing with 5 mini-roundabouts along a circular coast road!

 

[FPNY]

they drive on the wrong side over there so they are f'd up from the git go.....

 

[Esquire0399]

Statistically speaking, roundabouts are considered to be quite a bit safer than their traffic light controlled intersection counterparts, largely due to the perception that they are more dangerous. Interesting, huh? They are more efficient because there is typically very little need for traffic flow to ever stop. As someone already mentioned, there is never any point where absolutely no traffic is moving through the intersection (referred to as the all-red phase) Roundabouts are relatively uncommon in the US primarily because many states which have attempted to implement them have been met with heavy public criticism and lack of willingness of drivers to adjust to something they are simply not used to. Maryland is experiencing the greatest growth in roundabout implementation among all 50 states if I'm not mistaken and it's expected that their use will increase greatly over the next few years as we look into more methods to improve traffic flow and reduce congestion, which is not remotely as simple as someone unfamiliar with the matter might believe.

 

[teadrinker]

Apparently when roundabouts were first introduced (in the UK) there was some discussion as to what they should be named. You should all feel lucky that they are not now called - as was suggested at the time - "gyratory circuses".

-T.

 

[asadoyayunta]

Apparently when roundabouts were first introduced (in the UK) there was some discussion as to what they should be named. You should all feel lucky that they are not now called - as was suggested at the time - "gyratory circuses".

-T.

There is a large junction in Brighton known as the "Vogue Gyratory". Always makes me think of Madonna.

 

[Esquire0399]

^Have you ever used one, Esquire? They're kinda fun, huh?

Yup, I sure have and I think they're great overall. We have a few where I live and I've used the one's in Barbados a few times. I totally support their use in the US and I'll be pushing for that as soon as I finish grad school. We just have to convince everyone else of how awesome they are.

 

[metta]

I have seen that round-a-bout before in photos.

Roundabouts are especially difficult in a tractor trailer...

Whenever I HAVE to go through one -- it seems like my trailer jumps up onto the sidewalk because I don't have enough room...

we have 4 in the city that I live in. The ones in my city are designed so that large trucks can get on the inside of the round-a-bout if they need to. The curbs are low and rounded and the no plants are in the way around the edges. So it is kind of like a speed bump for large trucks. They are designed to slow down traffic and it works.

 

[gsdx]

After the roundabout was constructed, there's literally no backup of cars whatsoever. You don't even have to stop your car.

And they make one-way traffic redundant.

The problem with modern-day traffic in big cities is that street planners think 'bigger is better'. It isn't. They design bigger highways and more of them, and all they do is to invite more traffic. Then they have to design and build even more highways. It's a never-ending circle.

Instead of building more highways, make the ones that are already there more efficient.

 

[hungrybrownbear]

I've seen a few roundabouts before...... Hmmmm

 

[quasar]

What word do they use in France for roundabout?

I once got stopped by a French lorry driver who wanted directions. He didn't speak a word of English, and I was so proud that he understood my French - until I had to describe what to do when he got to a particular roundabout with five exits. I think he probably stopped someone else just before he got to the roundabout!