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Re: Alternate Traffic control that is attractive



"James L. Brunson" <jlb> wrote:
>usfmcf3k@ibmmail.com (John Oliver) wrote:

+>>I spent a week in Dunton, England (western suburb of London) a couple of years 
+>>ago, and I was very impressed by the roundabouts.  To me, they seemed to exist 
+>>at intersections where, in the U.S., we would have a 4-way stop or traffic 
+>>light.  The best part about the roundabouts, IMHO, was that if everyone was 
+>>paying attention, NO ONE had to come to a stop!  The 4-way stop requires 
+>>everyone to stop; the roundabout requires no one to stop.  You simply yield 
+>>('give way') to the car that is already in the roundabout.  It seemed much 
+>>more efficient to me.  
>
+>I read somewhere that Vail, Colorado just recently replaced their horrendous
+>4-way stop (leading from the interstate into town) with a roundabout.  The
+>time spent at the 4-way easily climbed into the minutes (speaking from 
+>experience); with the roundabout, the wait is now usually just seconds (haven't
+>experienced it, but from experience w/ roundabouts here, I believe it). 

It works ONLY if the volume of traffic is VERY small.

Here in USA, normally STOP signs will quickly be replaced
with traffic lights due to the growing traffic volume.
If the flow is low, STOP sign won't be needed. Normally,
the volume increase, so the STOP sign were installed
and within six months, traffic lights show up.

Those rotories are beautiful to be attractive. The cost
OTOH is higher, thus hardly attractive.



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