4 ms·

I'm from New Zealand where we have lots of roundabouts. My observation is that they work well, even with heavy traffic except some unbalanced conditions that ca

I'm from New Zealand where we have lots of roundabouts. My observation is that they work well, even with heavy traffic except some unbalanced conditions that can happen at rush hours. Imagine this. Driving on the right. Roundabout with four exits. North, East, South, West. Heavy streams of traffic entering from north and west. Most traffic exits at east therefore nothing to slow north enterers. West enterers hopefully get the breaks in north entering traffic. Trying to enter from south is really difficult because north and west enterers keep it full.

angus-g 4y ago
I have seen a few roundabouts with metering traffic lights that are only enabled during peak traffic times to occasionally allow the “blocked” directions in. It seems to be a reasonable compromise.
palmetieri2000 4y ago
Kia Ora, Im from a chunk of Australia known for a tonne of roundabouts and observed the same issue. My theory is that this is actually roundabouts working as intended, despite the frustration of the South-Enterers. Basically, if the flow of traffic is both moving too fast and with too great a vehicle density to allow for safe entry (even if slow, like 1 SouthBound Vehicle for 5x Northbound + 5x Westbound) then the traffic organism is actually distributing resources based on need, rather than convenience. The flow WILL automatically correct itself as the population of vehicles diminishes, the question is if the WAIT time for Southbounders (and the population of Southbounders) is sufficiently large that interfering with their flow is actually delaying more people than the North and West routes, but that is more of an issue of roundabout placement than it is the roundabout itself being inefficient. (^^The above is all 100% observation and guesswork, anyone with some education on the matter want to chime in?)
- jimmygrapes 4y ago
  It's a good load balancer for sure, but that doesn't help the poor sod who is in the minority who has to wait for ages simply for not needing to go the same direction as the majority.

angus-g 4y ago

I have seen a few roundabouts with metering traffic lights that are only enabled during peak traffic times to occasionally allow the “blocked” directions in. It seems to be a reasonable compromise.

palmetieri2000 4y ago

Kia Ora, Im from a chunk of Australia known for a tonne of roundabouts and observed the same issue. My theory is that this is actually roundabouts working as intended, despite the frustration of the South-Enterers. Basically, if the flow of traffic is both moving too fast and with too great a vehicle density to allow for safe entry (even if slow, like 1 SouthBound Vehicle for 5x Northbound + 5x Westbound) then the traffic organism is actually distributing resources based on need, rather than convenience. The flow WILL automatically correct itself as the population of vehicles diminishes, the question is if the WAIT time for Southbounders (and the population of Southbounders) is sufficiently large that interfering with their flow is actually delaying more people than the North and West routes, but that is more of an issue of roundabout placement than it is the roundabout itself being inefficient. (^^The above is all 100% observation and guesswork, anyone with some education on the matter want to chime in?)

jimmygrapes 4y ago
It's a good load balancer for sure, but that doesn't help the poor sod who is in the minority who has to wait for ages simply for not needing to go the same direction as the majority.