Roundabouts are hostile to pedestrians. At a 4-way stop, cars actually stop, and they are forced to pay attention. A roundabout is just a vortex of confused dri

Roundabouts are hostile to pedestrians. At a 4-way stop, cars actually stop, and they are forced to pay attention. A roundabout is just a vortex of confused drivers who are paying as much attention to what's behind and to the side as they are to what's in front of them. Much better would be to expand the roundabout and straighten its sides until it's a square block with one-way streets -- and so, no longer a roundabout. The centers of roundabouts are typically overgrown wastes of scraggly grass mixed with litter. Each a tiny sacrifice zone. They remain that way because nobody goes there on foot. We just see the mess from our cars. A roundabout takes what could have been a village green and turns it into something just barely less terrible than a highway cloverleaf. ... So I actually read the article and am not really proven wrong. They do this insipid > Making a roundabout for everyone thing, like laying pavement is the Civil Rights Movement, but "everyone" seems to only mean "vehicles", a word I see several times, together with "drive", but never "walk". I see no crosswalks, no pedestrian flashers, and no bike lanes. And the center island has been designed so larger vehicles can drive over it; I understand their reasons, but that also means it provides less protection to anyone seeking refuge there as they try to get across. Sometimes traffic isn't a problem to be solved. It's the universe telling you that there are already too many cars.