Goonhammer report from Historicon 2025

[Ian61]

Notes from the Provinces:

Roundabouts: These are also starting to appear in California touted as a traffic safety device. I can't see how that's going to help. I doubt that the same drivers that can't safely navigate a well marked intersection won't be able to navigate the roundabout.

Small normal roundabouts slow the traffic down a bit to negotiate them. I used to be fairly smug about the Americans not understanding this and building big ones that were deathtraps as they were big enough to allow speed to build up too much. However in recent years there has been a tendency to build bigger roundabouts here that generate just this problem and also several new local roundabouts are so badly lane marked and cambered that I feel it is only a matter of time before there are serious accidents at them.
I have often wondered what future archaeologists would make of our bizarre traffic arrangements and then wonder if they will survive long after us anyway as they seem so poorly laid.

[RichT]

Small normal roundabouts slow the traffic down a bit to negotiate them. I used to be fairly smug about the Americans not understanding this and building big ones that were deathtraps as they were big enough to allow speed to build up too much. However in recent years there has been a tendency to build bigger roundabouts here that generate just this problem and also several new local roundabouts are so badly lane marked and cambered that I feel it is only a matter of time before there are serious accidents at them.

Yes, agree. Roundabouts work well when they cause approaching traffic to slow, so that traffic on all approaches gets a chance to pull on. But a lot of roundabouts now are planned or built or end up as being slightly curved fast roads from one direction, and long term parking in other directions. There's one near where I used to work where the bus I took routinely queued for 30 minutes or more on a hundred metre stretch of road while traffic tried to get onto one of these mono-roundabouts.

But if we want to talk about tricky traffic systems, the US four way stop always blows my mind. With low traffic, works fine. With cars approaching simultaneously from four directions, doesn't work at all, so far as I can see.

Anyway nothing to do with ancient history, wargaming etc so I will stop ranting...

[Imperial Dave]

Nowt rong wi a good rant

[Nick Harbud]

...and one wonders how this blogger might cope with the Finchampstead Playground junction.

 

[Imperial Dave]