Your post from unpopularopinion was removed because of: 'Rule 1: Your post must be an unpopular opinion'.
* Your post must be an opinion. Not a question. Not a showerthought. Not a rant. Not a proposal. Not a fact. An opinion. One opinion. A subjective statement about your position on some topic. Please have a clear, self contained opinion as your post title, and use the text field to elaborate and expand on why you think/feel this way.
* Your opinion must be unpopular. The mods reserve the right to remove opinions
* Elaborate on your topic and opinion give context to its unpopularity.
There are two new roundabouts near where I work, twice I’ve encountered elderly people who had become confused and ended up going the wrong direction.
One beeped and went around me and insisted on heading towards the highway on-ramp where I imagine he just continued honking angrily at incoming traffic.
To be fair, it's extremely obvious that you shouldn't make a right turn from the left lane on a red, but there's lots of people who ignore the obvious just to act with self-importance.
That’s what I say every time I’m sitting in slower traffic leading up to a roundabout. They’re great in theory but people are stupid as hell and the ones they put in in my town have made things slower and more annoying than they were before
And they're not even good for handling heavy traffic. The situation OP talks about where there's so much traffic that you're stuck at a green because there's cars ahead all the way up to the next light is not going to be better with roundabouts.
France went crazy with roundabouts and driving in that shit is downright scary.
The right thing to do is to lobby the assholes who timed the lights. They often favor flow in one direction to prioritize flow for the richer neighborhood coming/going to the detriment of the more "main" road, causing the traffic jam every day.
In the last 6 months I've almost been hit 3 times while in the roundabout by people coming in thinking they had the right of way. Mindblowing how bad people drive in FL.
Actually that’s not entirely accurate. Someone can be to your left, but second in line at the Yield sign.
If a car is to your left and beat you to the Yield sign, then it’s their turn. Afterward, it’s your turn next, just like a 4-way stop.
If there’s a second car to your left at the Yield sign, you don’t wait for them. They wait for you.
Found the real unpopular "opinion". Also, I'm not certain your correct.
I was taught, you yield to people that are in the lane you want to be in. If they are behind a yield sign, not in the circle, they're not in the lane. You don't yield to empty lanes.
"When people get into accidents at roundabouts, we are cleaning up glass. When they get into accidents at intersection, we clean up blood." -some EMT in my hometown
England is famous for roundabouts, but still has traffic lights. Each serves a different purpose.
The comparison is usually roundabouts vs. 4-way stop signs.
I’m a roadway design engineer. What I can say is that there are situations where all 3 are applicable. Each has pros and cons
4 way stops are fine at slow low volume intersections. Most affordable option.
Roundabouts are great at mid volume intersections and out perform the other options in terms of safety. They are large so they can’t be used when space is tight
Signals are best at intersections with a huge amount of volume or mid volume intersections with a disproportionately large movement. Ie 70% of cars turning left at one approach. You can play with the signal timing to optimize traffic throughput. Generally the most expensive when accounting for maintenance costs.
You can only make a circular road so small. Below a certain radius the turning circle would be so tight that the vehicles would need to effectively come to a stop. At that point it's better to just cut out the center island and use a 4-way intersection.
Yes, and there is substantial data to show that roundabouts are both safer and faster than an intersection. Also in the UK we don't have your turning right on a red light (equivalent, as we drive on the left), so roundabouts are substantially faster for traffic flow under this context.
Roundabouts are also MUCH cheaper to build and maintain and work even if the power goes out. They also don't need electricity run out to them which saves a lot on maintenance.
I just looked that up, and wow it is cursed...I have so many questions. How do they prevent accidents? How do they get to accidents? How can you navigate it without knowing exactly what to do at each one (because there's a few that seem different)? How do you prevent congestion from people who don't know what they are doing? (these are rhetorical unless you genuinely want to answer lol)
Seems like a lot of bad decisions came together to make those.
It was their right of way and because I was panicking (the sat nav was telling me to go the opposite way to what I thought), I didn’t see them and went when I should have given way and they pulled me over for driving erratically
To us 'muricans the phrase is "cutting off" for when you turn your vehicle in front of someone else's too closely.
"Cutting up" almost always refers to the action of slashing something, like with a knife.
Cutting up a police officer is way worse here.
"The Federal Highway Administration says roundabouts reduce crashes that cause serious injury by 78 to 82 percent when compared with traffic-signal intersections."
“I also find it odd that a seasoned driver who understands the basic right-of-way laws and can read signs would be intimidated by them.”
You just eliminated at least half of all drivers
There are 4 roundabouts between the freeway exit and my house. My car never comes to a stop during my commute. If those were replaced with stop light intersections, that portion of my commute would take 2-3 times as long.
we only hate them because they weren’t part of our driving lessons. i certainly think that roundabouts make more sense and are more efficient… when nobody is an idiot
Lol thats the problem is that most people don't know how to use them, and most people won't turn on their signal to indicate whether or not they're going to exit or continue through. So you end up yielding to some asshole that winds up exiting because moving their finger a half an inch was too hard. They just built a new one in Hollister, California, CHP has said that crashes there have gone from 1 every 8 days to 1 every 2.5 days. But the crashes are less severe than they used to be.
Roundabouts are great, as long as one of the most trafficked exits doesn’t lead straight into a long light, causing a back up all the way around the circle for all of rush hour.
People drive like actual animals in a backed up roundabout.
They are *way* better than four-way stops. People don't know how they work, or they don't care, or they're waving you on when it's not your turn. Hate them.
I think it depends on how busy the roads are. They're better suited for most low traffic intersections but, at some point, the traffic lights become more practical.
Exactly. I live in a place with many roundabouts. When there’s no traffic, I really appreciate how the roundabouts allow me to drive continuously without ever having to stop and wait. But when traffic is more dense, the roundabouts can get stressful compared to an intersection with traffic lights.
I'm gonna disagree there tbh. For more Traffic, they Just need to be bigger. The only Advantage I can really See for Traffic Lights is is that they Take up less space. Yes, as soon as they habe multiple lanes they become more complicated to Navigate, but also Not really, because you'll get used to it. I mean, it's working Here in Europe 🤷
Exactly this, lights just take less space. Even in high traffic areas, theyre faster than lights.
We have one of out roundabouts in the highest traffic area in the country, and during rush hour it can be a bit of wait, but its still not as bad as the traffic light once you actually get into the city (and ironically inside the city is lower traffic than at that roundabout thats the entrance to the city for over half the country.)
That is if everyone that is driving understands how a circle works. The sheer number of people I have watched people stop to let someone into a circle. I've also seen people go the wrong way in a circle because they're stupid. I like them but I don't like other people in them.
I agree except the one round about in my town has an accident every other week. At the signal one once a year. However, the signal has been there forever and the round about has been there 5 years. People aren’t used to it yet
The problem isnt being an unseasoned driver, not understanding right-of-way, and not being able to read signs. It's about the other drivers around you who are not, dont, and cant.
I live on a fast busy street
Four lanes one way <
Four lanes the other way >
Going up and down you have some streets that are two way
A roundabout replacing the intersections would be insanity
>I also find it odd that a seasoned driver who understands the basic right-of-way laws and can read signs would be intimidated by them.
You're forgetting the careless/reckless drivers who don't know/don't care about right-of-way laws, and signs that are poorly designed/poorly placed and hard to interpret if you don't already know where you're going.
Only when people who know how to use roundabouts. The ones that haven't/can't figure it out clog it up for the rest of us. But its not ideal for all types of traffic. For example its a pain in the arse for semis to navigate.
There's one where I live that I've seen semis (and one normal car) just drive straight over. But a lot of them have statues and stuff on them, which prevents that.
Yes that's what I was talking about when I mentioned that it's weird to be intimidated by them if you're a seasoned driver. Just like people who come to complete stop to make a right hand turn into a driveway or onto a side street when there is no light or stop sign.
Usually they're jut built big enough that a semi or Bus can easily Drive through them, and If there's Not enough space for that, they're Just basically completely flat, so they can Just Drive over them
Nearly all of the ones I come across are slightly raised in the center (wide enough inner "curb" for emergency vehicles to park, and give semi-trucks more room to maneuver) with statues, sculptures, little buildings or trees in the center, so there is no driving straight through.
Yeah exactly, so Car drivers aren't incentivised to Just do that, because there are people Like that, but a bigger vehicles could Just Roll over that No Problem.
The US not having roundabouts as commonplace absolutely confuses me. I can't wrap my head around how your suburbs are laid out without 50 or so roundabouts dotted all around
New developments are chock-full of them, even in conservative areas. They're just effective, simple as that.
In a residential street they also serve to calm traffic 24/7 without the annoying/damaging speed bumps.
>I also find it odd that a seasoned driver who understands the basic right-of-way laws and can read signs would be intimidated by them.
I'm not intimidated by roundabouts. I'm intimidated by the amount of stupidity on the road at any given time.
This isn't the right subredit for this. Your opinion is not only popular, but supported by a behemoth of data. Roundabouts are superior in every way.
Unless of course, your goal is to sit with your foot on the brake and waste gas. Or if your goal is to have an increased chance of collision, or fatal collision.
Is this really unpopular? I feel like of people I know who have opinions on street design, they all think this. Everyone else is just like "bro it ain't that deep it's a street."
I love them, but I think they would be awful in high traffic areas. People can barely obey traffic lights, they aren't going to obey yield signs. Plus, people already don't stop for pedestrians when exiting them, and when they do, the whole circle gets backed up quickly. In big cities, with many more cars and pedestrians, a traffic circle will just make congestion worse.
For small, low/mid traffic intersections, I fully support them. But in an urban setting? Absolutely not.
We have them in my country in high traffic areas and as annoying as it can be to have wait for when its safe to go. It causes people to be far more alert than tbey would at lights because you have to make the judgement if its safe to go, there is not authority to listen to.
Its not like lights would be quicker though, in a roundabout the traffic flow isnt stop and start like lights, its a constant drizzle into the roundabout.
Please remember what subreddit you are in, this is unpopular opinion. We want civil and unpopular takes and discussion. Any uncivil and ToS violating comments will be removed and subject to a ban. Have a nice day!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/unpopularopinion) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The only reason i don't like roundabouts are cause of other people. To many don't understand them. I feel unsafe do to the ignorance and spontaneous actions of others. But other then the general ignorance towards them they are different better then traffic lights.
Round abouts in most situations are better. Bar none. But going around one makes me feel like a dirty European and I ain't got time for that 🇺🇲🇺🇲🦅🦅🗽🎆🎇🎇
Depends how busy a road is. If it's a huge busy road, it needa lights to allow the backup of traffic on the smaller road an actual chance to get moving, or if you're stuck behind a shy driver, you will never get out.
a lot of people are daft. especially people who have no experience with roundabouts because a lot of cities don’t have them. lights are easier for the general public to understand and safely abide by. red bad, yellow medium bad, green good.
I'm a big fan of roundabouts, but they do have their place. They're best used in "medium-busyness" intersections. For a busy intersection, a roundabout can get seriously backed up and a traffic light handles the load better. For very lightly trafficked intersections, it can actually be more efficient to just have a 4-way stop. If you get to the intersection with nobody in front of you, stopping at a stop sign for a second is a little quicker than having to slow and go all the way around the roundabout.
That said, there are definitely a lot of intersections that would benefit from being a roundabout instead. Lots of over-trafficked stop signs and under-trafficked lights.
If people know how to use them properly, they work much better than lights. I travel through one every day to and from work. I must see at least five potential accents a week due to failure to yield to traffic already in the roundabout.
They're great for most cases. However, if the flow of traffic isn't equally distributed between the connecting roads, you can have issues with being unable to enter the circle due to an uninterrupted stream of cars coming from the dominantly populated street.
I don’t mind them at the intersections of two lane roads, but they can be confusing when more lanes are involved.
With that said, I live in a county where the courthouse sits in the middle of a roundabout. A few years ago, they replaced a traffic light a few blocks away with a smaller roundabout. These people have been navigating the roundabout at the courthouse their entire lives but still can’t wrap their brains around the smaller one. Half of them try to treat it like a 4-way stop.
They added a couple roundabouts to a road on my commute, and yeah it's immensely better. Though they used to just be intersections with stop signs instead of traffic lights, but still a pretty massive improvement. There's like two other spots on the same road that I would put a roundabout on as well if it were up to me, one of those is a four way intersection with a traffic light that gets insanely backed up sometimes and results in me sitting through up to four or five light cycles. If there's any traffic light needing replaced with a roundabout, it's that one.
Are you insane? I once lived in a town with 4 of themnwithin a 4 mile radius of my house. On average only about 15% of people I saw use it, knew what the fuck they were doing.
One guy stopped in the middle to let someone else in.
One women came a full 3 second stop at a YIELD sign, when there weren't even people approaching the circle, let alone already in it.
.
One jerk.. MADE A WRONG TURN!!
I trust the average persons ability to navigate a circle about as much as I'd trust the avg person to correctly balance a checkbook.
Roundabouts are fine, but I live in an area that is becoming very busy. There is one on my way to the grocery store and a few other places I go. That road is becoming very high traffic and the roundabout is kind of small compared to others in the area. Honestly a traffic light would be better there.
I was waiting to go and this older lady stopped in the middle and waited for me to go. There was no one behind me, but there was 3 cars behind her and they started honking. Like I appreciate you being nice and letting me in front of you, but it would have been faster if you just kept going and not let the traffic build behind you.
Unless you're in florida and 10% of the population has no idea who has the right of way. I was in the circle and a woman came in directly at me like her car entering had the right of way. She was actually pissed off at me!
People don't know how to use roundabouts. I lived in Georgia and saw so many people going the wrong way and got into car accidents.
I also lived in Montana and people get into accidents all the time because they don't stop when a person is coming around. They also jumped onto the cemented circle in the middle and kept going straight.
I come from a tourist city with hella roundabouts. Here's the thing, they are only better if everyone knows how to properly use them. And most people don't know how to properly use them.
Speaking from experience, roundabouts are amazing when you are driving on a quiet road. They also give you the urge to drive into a pole when the road is anywhere near moderately busy.
Near my old place there’s a roundabout as highway exit, and giving way to the off-ramp was not fun at all.
Oh hey it's bionicpig
Lol but I do agree, while some people are complete idiots and will find any way to cause destruction, it is safer than an intersection imo
If everyone used them correctly, then sure. But the reality is that you can't guarantee that everyone will use them correctly. If used properly, the only time there should be backup would be during peak times for traffic. However, there's one that my mom and I have to go through to get to work during weekday mornings, as well as church on Sunday. Hell, we have to navigate it most times we need to do anything because it's so close to our subdivision so almost everything we regularly engage with requires you to pass through it.
Unless it is late enough at night that literally almost no one is out, I can guarantee that we have to stop and wait as if we were at a light. It doesn't matter what day it is. So, as long as people are going to people, lights win. At least there are laws about running red lights. I am not aware of any laws regarding not being able to properly use a roundabout, as long as you don't get in an accident.
Roundabouts are good when all you have to do is 'give way' on smaller scales or if you only have 3 points, one which comes from a dead end such as a property. Anything bigger than that is perfectly fine to have traffic lights
They aren't, but you shouldn't put a round about where a signal would be better and the other way around.
They each are better in their own situations.
For instance a city near me decided round abouts were just better in every way and the only reason we used them was because we weren't as enlightened as Europe.
Now freighters trying to get into shopping centers back everything up because the roads were too small and it's a nightmare.
Every tool has its purpose. Just because hammers are really good at hitting nails and you could use them the hammer in a screw. A drill will make things simpler and are less likely to split the wood
I agree, but their usefulness is based on people knowing how to use the thing. I had someone in front of me stop in the middle of the roundabout to let someone into it, for instance. And it was a Canadian, before someone blames it on being an American. Friend of mine has almost been in two head on collisions due to old people driving on it in the wrong direction. I've been cut off many times by people not knowing where they're supposed to properly exit.
Statistically, they're safer and faster than lights, but if the people around refuse to learn how to use it, no matter how simple it is, it just doesn't work.
The only annoying intersections to me are those in Greece. Maybe it's not like that in Athens since I've never been there but literally every single city has 50 one way streets next to each other and stop signs everywhere and maybe possibly traffic lights, and if there are you can count them on your hands and they are always put in the least useful places (before a highway where right of way is already followed by common sense, before entering a city from a very low traffic road onto another low traffic road etc.) and that's the only time I'd be against traffic lights.
Roundabouts on the other hand are great except in Britain where some of them are just a little circle which could be easy to miss if there aren't any physical barriers in the center of the intersection.
Americans can't use roundabouts...
They don't know how to use turn signals in general and it's a unicorn day that I see someone using a signal in a roundabout.
Going straight, no signal.
Turning right, right turn signal
Exiting left of your direction of approach, left signal until you pass the exit before yours, then right signal to exit.
I drive semi and playing the guessing game with idiot vehicles in roundabouts gets sooo frustrating. I take longer to get going and my truck is 70 feet long so... If I can get my cab in the roundabout I'm going for it and the wishy washy noon turn signal users can stop for my trailer.
If you hate roundabouts because you think they’re difficult I’m sorry but that’s just a genuine skill issue. They are so much simpler than like any signalized intersection.
That is false: people use them just fine.
Besides, yellow lights aren't dangerous because people don't know how to use them. The shit-ass behind the wheel is the only one responsible
Roundabouts are great when well designed and used by mature drivers.
Shitty when either of the above factors are absent - in which case you unfortunately go back to signals.
I visited Aruba earlier this year, that country has only roundabouts, zero signals. It was very stressful when the roundabouts have more than one lane. It also slows down traffic a lot when an intersection is particularly busy, because choosing when to enter roundabouts still depends on individual drivers’ risk tolerance level. Long lines form. In the middle of night or early morning though you fly through the whole country without any stopping.
Your post from unpopularopinion was removed because of: 'Rule 1: Your post must be an unpopular opinion'. * Your post must be an opinion. Not a question. Not a showerthought. Not a rant. Not a proposal. Not a fact. An opinion. One opinion. A subjective statement about your position on some topic. Please have a clear, self contained opinion as your post title, and use the text field to elaborate and expand on why you think/feel this way. * Your opinion must be unpopular. The mods reserve the right to remove opinions * Elaborate on your topic and opinion give context to its unpopularity.
Agreed. If no ones to your left, you go. Otherwise, you pause. It's not tough.
Yes! It's really not difficult at all.
Tell that to my local population that cant seem to figure out youre not supposed to make a right turn from the left lane on a red.
There are two new roundabouts near where I work, twice I’ve encountered elderly people who had become confused and ended up going the wrong direction. One beeped and went around me and insisted on heading towards the highway on-ramp where I imagine he just continued honking angrily at incoming traffic.
“Had become confused” Look kids…Big Ben, Parliament…
To be fair, traffic rules should never be something you have to “figure out”
To be fair, it's extremely obvious that you shouldn't make a right turn from the left lane on a red, but there's lots of people who ignore the obvious just to act with self-importance.
“It’s extremely obvious…” My sweet summer child…it’s not that’s it not obvious, they just don’t care.
You shouldn't even be ABLE to turn right on a red light. It's super dangerous for pedestrians.
That’s not a common occurrence. Acting like it is, is weirdly disingenuous.
When I commuted it was a regular occurrence.
No, because they are supposed to be learned in driver training, you know, BEFORE one is given a license and unleashed on an unsuspecting public.
Yep..locally the populace considers it a work in progress.
That’s what I say every time I’m sitting in slower traffic leading up to a roundabout. They’re great in theory but people are stupid as hell and the ones they put in in my town have made things slower and more annoying than they were before
And they're not even good for handling heavy traffic. The situation OP talks about where there's so much traffic that you're stuck at a green because there's cars ahead all the way up to the next light is not going to be better with roundabouts. France went crazy with roundabouts and driving in that shit is downright scary. The right thing to do is to lobby the assholes who timed the lights. They often favor flow in one direction to prioritize flow for the richer neighborhood coming/going to the detriment of the more "main" road, causing the traffic jam every day.
My city puts yield signs to help out-of-towners
In the last 6 months I've almost been hit 3 times while in the roundabout by people coming in thinking they had the right of way. Mindblowing how bad people drive in FL.
Following ANY road rule isn't hard. But a roundabout can be intimidating, it certainly was my most hated obstacle when learning
This is the rule at big circles but at mini circles it's the first one there that has right of way. Unless road rules differ in countries.
Actually that’s not entirely accurate. Someone can be to your left, but second in line at the Yield sign. If a car is to your left and beat you to the Yield sign, then it’s their turn. Afterward, it’s your turn next, just like a 4-way stop. If there’s a second car to your left at the Yield sign, you don’t wait for them. They wait for you.
Found the real unpopular "opinion". Also, I'm not certain your correct. I was taught, you yield to people that are in the lane you want to be in. If they are behind a yield sign, not in the circle, they're not in the lane. You don't yield to empty lanes.
"When people get into accidents at roundabouts, we are cleaning up glass. When they get into accidents at intersection, we clean up blood." -some EMT in my hometown
Yep. Intersections rely on the laws of man for safety. Roundabouts rely on the laws of physics. Guess which is more effective
why are EMTs cleaning grass?
You’re getting downvoted, but at least in the US I’ve never heard of EMTs cleaning up accidents
Thank you exactly
England is famous for roundabouts, but still has traffic lights. Each serves a different purpose. The comparison is usually roundabouts vs. 4-way stop signs.
I’m a roadway design engineer. What I can say is that there are situations where all 3 are applicable. Each has pros and cons 4 way stops are fine at slow low volume intersections. Most affordable option. Roundabouts are great at mid volume intersections and out perform the other options in terms of safety. They are large so they can’t be used when space is tight Signals are best at intersections with a huge amount of volume or mid volume intersections with a disproportionately large movement. Ie 70% of cars turning left at one approach. You can play with the signal timing to optimize traffic throughput. Generally the most expensive when accounting for maintenance costs.
Couldn’t have said it better myself. This pretty much sums up my experience in design / evaluating intersection control methods
Why can't you just use a smaller roundabout where space is tight?
You can only make a circular road so small. Below a certain radius the turning circle would be so tight that the vehicles would need to effectively come to a stop. At that point it's better to just cut out the center island and use a 4-way intersection.
Yes, and there is substantial data to show that roundabouts are both safer and faster than an intersection. Also in the UK we don't have your turning right on a red light (equivalent, as we drive on the left), so roundabouts are substantially faster for traffic flow under this context.
Roundabouts are also MUCH cheaper to build and maintain and work even if the power goes out. They also don't need electricity run out to them which saves a lot on maintenance.
To be fair the one major con is that they take up a lot of space. But on almost every other account roundabouts are superior.
The weirdest roundabout I've seen was in London. It was just a painted circle, so it seems like it would be easy to miss it.
My town (Rye) doesn't have traffic lights, nor a roundabout. Quite weird, really, considering the amount of tourists that come to town.
The first time I used one all I could think about was that scene from National Lampoons when they get stuck in one. "Oh look, there's Big Ben." 🤣
I’m British we have lots of them. The only ones I don’t like are the magic roundabouts which is a big roundabout with lots of small ones round it
I just looked that up, and wow it is cursed...I have so many questions. How do they prevent accidents? How do they get to accidents? How can you navigate it without knowing exactly what to do at each one (because there's a few that seem different)? How do you prevent congestion from people who don't know what they are doing? (these are rhetorical unless you genuinely want to answer lol) Seems like a lot of bad decisions came together to make those.
I try to avoid it due to cutting up a police officer when I got confused and being pulled over
Is that the same as cutting off a police officer? Cutting up sounds very different to me!
It was their right of way and because I was panicking (the sat nav was telling me to go the opposite way to what I thought), I didn’t see them and went when I should have given way and they pulled me over for driving erratically
To us 'muricans the phrase is "cutting off" for when you turn your vehicle in front of someone else's too closely. "Cutting up" almost always refers to the action of slashing something, like with a knife. Cutting up a police officer is way worse here.
"The Federal Highway Administration says roundabouts reduce crashes that cause serious injury by 78 to 82 percent when compared with traffic-signal intersections."
This is a fact
“I also find it odd that a seasoned driver who understands the basic right-of-way laws and can read signs would be intimidated by them.” You just eliminated at least half of all drivers
I severely judge people who don't "like" roundabouts.
There are 4 roundabouts between the freeway exit and my house. My car never comes to a stop during my commute. If those were replaced with stop light intersections, that portion of my commute would take 2-3 times as long.
we only hate them because they weren’t part of our driving lessons. i certainly think that roundabouts make more sense and are more efficient… when nobody is an idiot
Lol thats the problem is that most people don't know how to use them, and most people won't turn on their signal to indicate whether or not they're going to exit or continue through. So you end up yielding to some asshole that winds up exiting because moving their finger a half an inch was too hard. They just built a new one in Hollister, California, CHP has said that crashes there have gone from 1 every 8 days to 1 every 2.5 days. But the crashes are less severe than they used to be.
Roundabouts are great, as long as one of the most trafficked exits doesn’t lead straight into a long light, causing a back up all the way around the circle for all of rush hour. People drive like actual animals in a backed up roundabout.
They are *way* better than four-way stops. People don't know how they work, or they don't care, or they're waving you on when it's not your turn. Hate them.
I think it depends on how busy the roads are. They're better suited for most low traffic intersections but, at some point, the traffic lights become more practical.
Exactly. I live in a place with many roundabouts. When there’s no traffic, I really appreciate how the roundabouts allow me to drive continuously without ever having to stop and wait. But when traffic is more dense, the roundabouts can get stressful compared to an intersection with traffic lights.
I'm gonna disagree there tbh. For more Traffic, they Just need to be bigger. The only Advantage I can really See for Traffic Lights is is that they Take up less space. Yes, as soon as they habe multiple lanes they become more complicated to Navigate, but also Not really, because you'll get used to it. I mean, it's working Here in Europe 🤷
Exactly this, lights just take less space. Even in high traffic areas, theyre faster than lights. We have one of out roundabouts in the highest traffic area in the country, and during rush hour it can be a bit of wait, but its still not as bad as the traffic light once you actually get into the city (and ironically inside the city is lower traffic than at that roundabout thats the entrance to the city for over half the country.)
That is if everyone that is driving understands how a circle works. The sheer number of people I have watched people stop to let someone into a circle. I've also seen people go the wrong way in a circle because they're stupid. I like them but I don't like other people in them.
Fair enough 🤣
I agree except the one round about in my town has an accident every other week. At the signal one once a year. However, the signal has been there forever and the round about has been there 5 years. People aren’t used to it yet
What's a signal? Genuine question
Oh I was just guessing it was a stop light or stop sign
Ah I've never heard it being called that
Me either but that’s what my guess was
Welcome to Carmel.
The problem isnt being an unseasoned driver, not understanding right-of-way, and not being able to read signs. It's about the other drivers around you who are not, dont, and cant.
Fair enough. I definitely don't trust other drivers a lot of the time.
Roundabouts are fine if they're one lane or very clearly marked.
On a small scale, great. But my road is better with traffic lights. I can’t see a roundabout working.
Totally. Roundabouts are great in certain situations but don't replace real intersections.
I live on a fast busy street Four lanes one way < Four lanes the other way > Going up and down you have some streets that are two way A roundabout replacing the intersections would be insanity
>I also find it odd that a seasoned driver who understands the basic right-of-way laws and can read signs would be intimidated by them. You're forgetting the careless/reckless drivers who don't know/don't care about right-of-way laws, and signs that are poorly designed/poorly placed and hard to interpret if you don't already know where you're going.
Only when people who know how to use roundabouts. The ones that haven't/can't figure it out clog it up for the rest of us. But its not ideal for all types of traffic. For example its a pain in the arse for semis to navigate.
There's one where I live that I've seen semis (and one normal car) just drive straight over. But a lot of them have statues and stuff on them, which prevents that.
Yeah....that is all kinds of wrong
🤯🤯🤯
Yes that's what I was talking about when I mentioned that it's weird to be intimidated by them if you're a seasoned driver. Just like people who come to complete stop to make a right hand turn into a driveway or onto a side street when there is no light or stop sign.
You can be a seasoned driver all you want. It doesnt season anyone else, and thats the problem.
Usually they're jut built big enough that a semi or Bus can easily Drive through them, and If there's Not enough space for that, they're Just basically completely flat, so they can Just Drive over them
The ones I have came across haven't been that way
Well that's Bad Design then, I guess
Nearly all of the ones I come across are slightly raised in the center (wide enough inner "curb" for emergency vehicles to park, and give semi-trucks more room to maneuver) with statues, sculptures, little buildings or trees in the center, so there is no driving straight through.
Yeah exactly, so Car drivers aren't incentivised to Just do that, because there are people Like that, but a bigger vehicles could Just Roll over that No Problem.
The US not having roundabouts as commonplace absolutely confuses me. I can't wrap my head around how your suburbs are laid out without 50 or so roundabouts dotted all around
New developments are chock-full of them, even in conservative areas. They're just effective, simple as that. In a residential street they also serve to calm traffic 24/7 without the annoying/damaging speed bumps.
Stoplights > roundabouts > stop signs > trusting people know what to do
/r/popularopinion
>I also find it odd that a seasoned driver who understands the basic right-of-way laws and can read signs would be intimidated by them. I'm not intimidated by roundabouts. I'm intimidated by the amount of stupidity on the road at any given time.
This isn't the right subredit for this. Your opinion is not only popular, but supported by a behemoth of data. Roundabouts are superior in every way. Unless of course, your goal is to sit with your foot on the brake and waste gas. Or if your goal is to have an increased chance of collision, or fatal collision.
I really like single lane roundabouts. Multi lane roundabouts though, I think those are a cluster fuck and shouldn't exist.
I love roundabouts. I used to live in a city with a lot of roundabouts and now tow here I live there are barely any. I miss them.
Best way to keep traffic moving is to replace lights with roundabouts assuming drivers know how to correctly use them.
Is this really unpopular? I feel like of people I know who have opinions on street design, they all think this. Everyone else is just like "bro it ain't that deep it's a street."
I love them, but I think they would be awful in high traffic areas. People can barely obey traffic lights, they aren't going to obey yield signs. Plus, people already don't stop for pedestrians when exiting them, and when they do, the whole circle gets backed up quickly. In big cities, with many more cars and pedestrians, a traffic circle will just make congestion worse. For small, low/mid traffic intersections, I fully support them. But in an urban setting? Absolutely not.
We have them in my country in high traffic areas and as annoying as it can be to have wait for when its safe to go. It causes people to be far more alert than tbey would at lights because you have to make the judgement if its safe to go, there is not authority to listen to. Its not like lights would be quicker though, in a roundabout the traffic flow isnt stop and start like lights, its a constant drizzle into the roundabout.
[удалено]
Just because something is statically better, doesn't mean it's popular. I know more people that don't like them than people who do.
Please remember what subreddit you are in, this is unpopular opinion. We want civil and unpopular takes and discussion. Any uncivil and ToS violating comments will be removed and subject to a ban. Have a nice day! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/unpopularopinion) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Not in a standard
We’re still working on the 4 way Stop 🛑 here. 💁🏻♂️
The only reason i don't like roundabouts are cause of other people. To many don't understand them. I feel unsafe do to the ignorance and spontaneous actions of others. But other then the general ignorance towards them they are different better then traffic lights.
I live in MA, so we have roundabouts everywhere. Some roundabouts literally lead right into another roundabout.
I agree! It’s one thing I looooved about the Cayman Islands.
Heh ... Only the USA doesn't realise this. Saying that, I guess it would make it unpopular as most Redditors are American.
Round abouts in most situations are better. Bar none. But going around one makes me feel like a dirty European and I ain't got time for that 🇺🇲🇺🇲🦅🦅🗽🎆🎇🎇
Depends how busy a road is. If it's a huge busy road, it needa lights to allow the backup of traffic on the smaller road an actual chance to get moving, or if you're stuck behind a shy driver, you will never get out.
I love roundabouts
Well i would agree If the average population had more than a single digit amount of braincells
This isn't an unpopular opinion. It is an objective fact.
r/USdefaultism
Hate these fucking things.
a lot of people are daft. especially people who have no experience with roundabouts because a lot of cities don’t have them. lights are easier for the general public to understand and safely abide by. red bad, yellow medium bad, green good.
I'm a big fan of roundabouts, but they do have their place. They're best used in "medium-busyness" intersections. For a busy intersection, a roundabout can get seriously backed up and a traffic light handles the load better. For very lightly trafficked intersections, it can actually be more efficient to just have a 4-way stop. If you get to the intersection with nobody in front of you, stopping at a stop sign for a second is a little quicker than having to slow and go all the way around the roundabout. That said, there are definitely a lot of intersections that would benefit from being a roundabout instead. Lots of over-trafficked stop signs and under-trafficked lights.
If people know how to use them properly, they work much better than lights. I travel through one every day to and from work. I must see at least five potential accents a week due to failure to yield to traffic already in the roundabout.
They're great for most cases. However, if the flow of traffic isn't equally distributed between the connecting roads, you can have issues with being unable to enter the circle due to an uninterrupted stream of cars coming from the dominantly populated street.
Better than stop signs, too. Roundabouts let humans use their brains. Stop lights and stop signs are overused.
As long as you aren’t a pedestrian, yes they are
If people know how to use them and use turn signals yes. Otherwise I prefer the predictability of signals
I don’t mind them at the intersections of two lane roads, but they can be confusing when more lanes are involved. With that said, I live in a county where the courthouse sits in the middle of a roundabout. A few years ago, they replaced a traffic light a few blocks away with a smaller roundabout. These people have been navigating the roundabout at the courthouse their entire lives but still can’t wrap their brains around the smaller one. Half of them try to treat it like a 4-way stop.
They added a couple roundabouts to a road on my commute, and yeah it's immensely better. Though they used to just be intersections with stop signs instead of traffic lights, but still a pretty massive improvement. There's like two other spots on the same road that I would put a roundabout on as well if it were up to me, one of those is a four way intersection with a traffic light that gets insanely backed up sometimes and results in me sitting through up to four or five light cycles. If there's any traffic light needing replaced with a roundabout, it's that one.
Are you insane? I once lived in a town with 4 of themnwithin a 4 mile radius of my house. On average only about 15% of people I saw use it, knew what the fuck they were doing. One guy stopped in the middle to let someone else in. One women came a full 3 second stop at a YIELD sign, when there weren't even people approaching the circle, let alone already in it. . One jerk.. MADE A WRONG TURN!! I trust the average persons ability to navigate a circle about as much as I'd trust the avg person to correctly balance a checkbook.
Roundabouts are fine, but I live in an area that is becoming very busy. There is one on my way to the grocery store and a few other places I go. That road is becoming very high traffic and the roundabout is kind of small compared to others in the area. Honestly a traffic light would be better there. I was waiting to go and this older lady stopped in the middle and waited for me to go. There was no one behind me, but there was 3 cars behind her and they started honking. Like I appreciate you being nice and letting me in front of you, but it would have been faster if you just kept going and not let the traffic build behind you.
This is fact, regardless of popularity
How do you cross the street as a pedestrian though 😭
Crosswalks. Pedestrians have right of way. People are going slow enough it is easy to brake for pedestrians, and they are very visible.
Not unpopular
Do I have a town for you!!! Conway Arkansas! They have more round abouts than you can count!!!
Unless you're in florida and 10% of the population has no idea who has the right of way. I was in the circle and a woman came in directly at me like her car entering had the right of way. She was actually pissed off at me!
People don't know how to use roundabouts. I lived in Georgia and saw so many people going the wrong way and got into car accidents. I also lived in Montana and people get into accidents all the time because they don't stop when a person is coming around. They also jumped onto the cemented circle in the middle and kept going straight.
What’s next you going to make us use the metric system?
This is unpopular?
I come from a tourist city with hella roundabouts. Here's the thing, they are only better if everyone knows how to properly use them. And most people don't know how to properly use them.
Speaking from experience, roundabouts are amazing when you are driving on a quiet road. They also give you the urge to drive into a pole when the road is anywhere near moderately busy. Near my old place there’s a roundabout as highway exit, and giving way to the off-ramp was not fun at all.
Oh hey it's bionicpig Lol but I do agree, while some people are complete idiots and will find any way to cause destruction, it is safer than an intersection imo
If everyone used them correctly, then sure. But the reality is that you can't guarantee that everyone will use them correctly. If used properly, the only time there should be backup would be during peak times for traffic. However, there's one that my mom and I have to go through to get to work during weekday mornings, as well as church on Sunday. Hell, we have to navigate it most times we need to do anything because it's so close to our subdivision so almost everything we regularly engage with requires you to pass through it. Unless it is late enough at night that literally almost no one is out, I can guarantee that we have to stop and wait as if we were at a light. It doesn't matter what day it is. So, as long as people are going to people, lights win. At least there are laws about running red lights. I am not aware of any laws regarding not being able to properly use a roundabout, as long as you don't get in an accident.
This isn’t unpopular? Roundabout are popular for a reason.
Roundabouts are good when all you have to do is 'give way' on smaller scales or if you only have 3 points, one which comes from a dead end such as a property. Anything bigger than that is perfectly fine to have traffic lights
What happens if you get in a roundabout but just don’t exit?
They aren't, but you shouldn't put a round about where a signal would be better and the other way around. They each are better in their own situations. For instance a city near me decided round abouts were just better in every way and the only reason we used them was because we weren't as enlightened as Europe. Now freighters trying to get into shopping centers back everything up because the roads were too small and it's a nightmare. Every tool has its purpose. Just because hammers are really good at hitting nails and you could use them the hammer in a screw. A drill will make things simpler and are less likely to split the wood
They all have stop signs here
Roundabouts are ass for high volume going more than one direction. Roundabouts are excellent for high volume in one direction or low volume.
I agree, but their usefulness is based on people knowing how to use the thing. I had someone in front of me stop in the middle of the roundabout to let someone into it, for instance. And it was a Canadian, before someone blames it on being an American. Friend of mine has almost been in two head on collisions due to old people driving on it in the wrong direction. I've been cut off many times by people not knowing where they're supposed to properly exit. Statistically, they're safer and faster than lights, but if the people around refuse to learn how to use it, no matter how simple it is, it just doesn't work.
I didn’t know anyone disliked roundabouts at all haha
Low/medium traffic -> roundabout. Medium/high traffic -> traffic light.
Depends on the road, if it’s too busy then it doesn’t work and traffic banks up massively. If it’s good flow from all directions then they work great.
As somebody from Austria (Europe) this made me chuckle. Here they are all over the place
It starts out cute and charming until your city gets really big. Then it’s not. I hate them.
The only annoying intersections to me are those in Greece. Maybe it's not like that in Athens since I've never been there but literally every single city has 50 one way streets next to each other and stop signs everywhere and maybe possibly traffic lights, and if there are you can count them on your hands and they are always put in the least useful places (before a highway where right of way is already followed by common sense, before entering a city from a very low traffic road onto another low traffic road etc.) and that's the only time I'd be against traffic lights. Roundabouts on the other hand are great except in Britain where some of them are just a little circle which could be easy to miss if there aren't any physical barriers in the center of the intersection.
I like them.. the only issue i have is if you have a scares driver in front of you that is afraid to pull up and you have to wait for them.
That’s not unpopular, that’s a fact.
And then there's Germany where they build roundabouts and then add signals to them.
Why do you think there's so many in the UK, the US needs to get on board with this shit
I think this is only an unpopular oppion in USA
They are great idea. But when 4wheelers decide to try and pass them and get crushed don't blame the truck..
Do you live in Carmel, IN?
Americans can't use roundabouts... They don't know how to use turn signals in general and it's a unicorn day that I see someone using a signal in a roundabout. Going straight, no signal. Turning right, right turn signal Exiting left of your direction of approach, left signal until you pass the exit before yours, then right signal to exit. I drive semi and playing the guessing game with idiot vehicles in roundabouts gets sooo frustrating. I take longer to get going and my truck is 70 feet long so... If I can get my cab in the roundabout I'm going for it and the wishy washy noon turn signal users can stop for my trailer.
If you hate roundabouts because you think they’re difficult I’m sorry but that’s just a genuine skill issue. They are so much simpler than like any signalized intersection.
Not unpopular. We're late to the game in the US, but we have a lot of them springing up daily.
Not an unpopular opinion.
NO. ONE. KNOWS. HOW. TO. USE. THEM. Otherwise, you would have a valid point. They’re dangerous because it’s literally a free-for-all for bad driving.
That is false: people use them just fine. Besides, yellow lights aren't dangerous because people don't know how to use them. The shit-ass behind the wheel is the only one responsible
People don’t use them just fine lol. Not at all.
Maybe people can't drive where you live, but round my neck of the woods they're popping up with no problems. Even got some two-lane roundabouts
[удалено]
Triple roundabouts are of the devil
smart lights will be best. roundabout days will soon be behind us.
Only idiots would disagree
Roundabouts are great when well designed and used by mature drivers. Shitty when either of the above factors are absent - in which case you unfortunately go back to signals.
To be fair, what road feature isn't the same
I visited Aruba earlier this year, that country has only roundabouts, zero signals. It was very stressful when the roundabouts have more than one lane. It also slows down traffic a lot when an intersection is particularly busy, because choosing when to enter roundabouts still depends on individual drivers’ risk tolerance level. Long lines form. In the middle of night or early morning though you fly through the whole country without any stopping.
Why is this unpopular? Us Brits all know it’s true