Musings on Traffic

[c9]

A letter to the editor in the Herald today, not written by gueny, reminded me that the Armdale Rotary (a.k.a. weirdest traffic circle on Earth) is changing its rules. It will be acting like most other rotaries, rather than the surreal, prisoners'-dilemma-esque yield-and-proceed arrangement.

First, soma haikus about the Armdale Rotary.

Next, here's someone who claims that he's never, in thirty years, seen a single accident on the Rotary. I only used it once every couple months over four years and I've seen a couple!

Apparently, rotaries merge-on-entry, whereas roundabouts yield-on-entry. The things you learn when you're supposed to be working.

Finally, here's a fun page that the Regional Government of Waterloo put together. We're getting roundabouts here, and while it's not obvious, I'm sure everyone's in total shock over it. At least, that would be the traditional Maritimer approach. :) There are even ads on the buses telling people about them. Anyway, on this page there are Flash demos of how you're supposed to act in a roundabout! What fun.

Comments

[disasternat.livejournal.com]

the only problem with the change in design is that the Armdale Rotary has five entrances, whereas a traditional round-about has four... also the Roundabout idea is doomed to fail based soley on the fact that its not the Rotary itself that is the problem, but rather the arterial roads.. Quinpool Rod, Chebucto Rd, St. Margaret's Bay Rd. Herring Cove Rd and Joseph Howe Drive.

The Herring Cove and St. Margaret's Bay Rds are two roads which cannot handle the amount of traffic coming in and out of them on a daily basis... which means in order to ideally fix the problem with traffic problems thats all teh change is really for - not stopping accidents cause they will happen in the new configuration - is to develop a development plan for the area directly affected by the Herring Cove and St. Margaret's Bay Rds. However the City being in total wisdom has neglected and is allowing more and more condos and high rise apartment buildings to be built on arterial roads that can't handle it.. and hence the bottle neck that is the Armdale Rotary.