Is New Jersey going in circles? What is he talking about, well I am talking about roundabouts being built instead of traffic signal controlled intersections.
A roundabout is “designed as small as possible, 16 to 180 feet wide, and operate at 15 mph to 25 mph. The design of roundabouts forces drivers to slow as they approach them, then limits drivers’ circulating and exit speed. It is difficult to pass through a well-designed roundabout above these design speeds.” A circle – “Traffic circles are circular or elliptical islands, with a central island 300 to 600 feet wide. They are designed for vehicles to enter, merge, circulate, change lanes and exit at relatively high speeds — 30 to 50 mph.”
Well to me a roundabout is just a smaller circle and comes with all the inherent problems of its bigger brother. People just do not know or even understand how to properly navigate their way through them. A signal controlled intersection is easy to understand and actually takes less room than a roundabout, something that is important here in our very crowded state. Plus if the center of the roundabout is grass, I can easily see the grass getting too high to cause drivers from seeing properly to merge safely. Look around you when driving on a state highway here in New Jersey and you will see that the state does not cut the grass very often.
I can not for the life of me understand how a roundabout is better than a signaled intersection. Yes they in many cases can be better than a stop signed intersection. But what happens when the winter comes and snow and ice cover the roadway. Mayhem is what is going to happen, your car or truck will be sliding around and many collisions can occur.
While the speeds are considerably lower in a roundabout, it does have the benefit of fewer deaths when the inevitable accidents do occur. The flow of traffic is choked by them however and thus the lower speed design of them is negated by the fact that they can not handle large amounts of traffic.
Someone is going to have to realize that bringing back a smaller form of the accident prone circle is a bad idea in the long term. And you have to realize that all the safety concerns that traffic engineers are concerned about will be mute in the not too distant future when self driving cars become the predominate mode of transportation. Then it will not matter what the intersection is controlled by anymore.
That is my opinion- Jumpin Jersey Mike
