Quote:
Originally Posted by darcane
I love roundabouts, and we are starting to see them show up in Washington. Near my old house, there was one traffic light that I had to wait at for about 20 minutes a day as rush hour traffic slowly filtered through it (1+ mile backup every day). Once it was replaced with a roundabout, there was NEVER any delay.
|
^ This ^
On my way to a job I had for a decade there was a light-signaled 6-way intersection. One leg out of 6 was coming from a large mall area 4 miles down the road. Constant turn-off-your-car-and-catch-a-quick-nap waits day and night (or accelerate to 70 to try and catch that infernal green light). Rush hour had mulit-light cycle backups on 4 legs. It was replaced with a relatively small round-a-bout and there is no back up with traffic... ever. The major leg from the mall area has 2 lanes entering the circle and everyone else has no problem getting in natural gaps or where those cars are coming off.
And the larger the circle... the more efficient the round-a-bout. The mythbusters circle was unrealistically small. No way you're getting a fire truck through that in real life, unless that center circle is just a rolled curb onto brick or more pavement. A larger circle can hold more cars and maintains higher speeds.
The ultimate round-a-bout is an interstate ring road around a major city. 50+ mph and no waiting.
