OT: Roundabout and 4way stop confusion

No they don?t with that last.

Bullshit.

Never seen one that stupidly done.

You can't leave when the traffic flow is continuous on a highway, coming at you and you need a break to get across. There is no law here in NJ that gives the right of way to those in the circle, so the traffic just continues flowing. To them, they are moving 40 mph on a major highway and continuing on their way, they think they have the right of way. You're sitting there stopped and screwed. That's how it works here.

Not when the leaving road has stationary cars in it.

That is what they did in Auckland. They could meter cars going into the roundabout but it did not help if the cars still had not cleared the roundabout when the light turned green. It just packed it tighter. The problem was caused by another "lighted" intersection a half mile away that had the main exit road blocked.

Which leads to another thing that annoys me and leads to confusion and accidents. That's people who have the right of way at intersections, but won't use it. Instead, they sit there waiting for you to go or some wave you on or blink their lights. What's up with that? It just leads to more confusion.

Reminds me of a guy I worked with years ago. He had a teenage son who had recently got his license. He was coming out of a small strip mall onto a street with two lanes in each direction and a light a hundred feet down the street. Traffic was slowing down, almost stopped in the lane closest to him, so a driver stopped leaving him room to get out and make a left. The driver waived him on, so he pulled right on out, across the lane where the guy had stopped and left him an opening, right on into the adjacent lane, where he was T-boned by a car in that lane who was still moving. It totaled the car. I think part of the problem was that the light had probably changed already, so that driver saw an open lane and green light, so they weren't slowing.

I remember seeing a similar case in the news, where someone like that was suing the person who waived them on, trying to hold them responsible. Made me think about waiving people on, giving them signals. And I can see how the kid, new to driving, would see some adult waiving them on and misinterpret what that means. In that kind of situation, I will leave a space and look at the other driver, but not waive them on, I let them do what they want. If you're the only cars possibly involved, then I guess signalling isn't a bad idea. But if there is another lane, bad things can happen.

You don't see that in Canberra because it was designed from scratch with roundabouts so there are no lights on the exit roads.

Out in the countryside the roundabouts have entrance ramps like a freeway but in the city, land cost and other issues make that harder to do. If you have ever tried to get on I95 in the afternoon you will still see the same problem tho. No matter how graceful the ramp is, if the road is stopped up, you are not entering. Assuming land is free roundabouts are OK on fairly lightly loaded roads but once they get overloaded, you need lights regulating flow in. Once you do that, you are blocking the road upstream of the light and the upstream roundabout fails. I suppose with enough lights and a computer system coordinating them you can make roundabouts work in high traffic areas but if those intersections are full now, they will still be full and I am not sure total traffic count would improve.

There are idiots here who say a roundabout would fix this intersection. I am guessing the picture was shot at 7AM on Sunday in August because in the middle of the day in season, all lanes will be full as far as the eye can see.

There is another intersection just like this less than a mile in any direction. The one to the west was fixed with a "flyover" separating 4 most common turn lanes with a side ramp or elevation.

Yes assuming ALL of the out bound roads are clear. If one road is blocked, what does a car do if they can't get out on the road where they need to go? They either stop or they go around again. You either have a grid locked intersection or it is just a racetrack with everyone trying to enter, waiting for those people to get out. If I am going across on the less traveled road, I know I can just wait for my light and I can go (it is illegal here to stop in an intersection)

This is one of the big "circles" in DC Lights protect each crosswalk (white hatched areas) and limit traffic flow into the circle. You can see there are also 2 tunnels under it (red and blue lines). Again they must have shot this on Sunday morning. During the day during the week that will be packed particularly at morning and evening rush hour.

Perhaps Canberra's road system kept up with the population growth but Auckland is a mess. There are also 5 times as many people in Auckland.

Roundabouts/circles can't exist without the law about who has the right of way. It has been that way in DC forever. (at least back until when it was horses and wagons anyway). I think L'Enfant established that rule when they laid out the city.

It is a YIELD, not a stop - so you follow the rules for a YIELD With no traffic you are not required to STOP - and there is no "oncomming" traffic and no "traffic from the right (or in the UK case, from the left) Should be no confusion at all Know where you are going, get into he proper lane before entering the roundabout, never overtake in a roundabout, and signal your intentions when leaving to the right.

Here "roundabout" and "traffic circle" are the same.

The conversion here has resulted in a short-term increase in fenderbenders at several bad intersections, but a 100% reduction in fatalities and very close to100% reduction in personal injuries.

Downtown Goderich ontario is one huge roundabout with City Hall in the center. Was built that way over 100 years ago.

Most in the TriCities area (KW-0Cambridge) have a good sized "island" in the middle - a very few are small enough to rewire a low profile island to allow busses and trucks to traverse "over and around"

In fact that part of the road system didn't change at all as the population more than doubled. It was designed right from the start to handle the volume of traffic it now has and there are no lights involved there at all.

In that case due to traffic lights on the exit roads from the roundabout which have enough traffic on them so that the lights can see the traffic backed up far enough so that you can't leave the roundabout.

That's a completely stupid way to do a roundabout.