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Comment by iwr | Hacker News Reader

Don't underestimate the idiocy of traffic planners. In my town we have roundabouts and stoplights on the roads leading in.

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Yep, we have them over here too in The Netherlands. This roundabout in my hometown scores very high on my dangerous-situations-you-rather-avoid list:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/KeizerKar...

Traffic lights for getting on and off the roundabout, and traffic that enters the roundabout actually has precedence over traffic that's already on it, contrary to common roundabout rules. Lots of accidents happen because of it, and I have no idea what made people think this was a good idea.

That's not a roundabout, it's a traffic circle. The article calls them monstrosities and not without reason (although they aren't all that bad).

A large number of larger roundabouts in the UK have traffic lights at the entrances and exits. What do you find idiotic about it? Works extremely well to keep traffic flowing.

Lights by their design will stop traffic and reduce road capacity (they are ostensibly for safety rather than road use).

The point about a roundabout was to keep traffic moving, not stop it. If there are lights, there is no difference between a roundabout and a circular intersection.

Not really, the lights on large roundabouts are pretty dynamic. You have lights to stop people going further round the roundabout, coupled with lights to stop people coming on to the roundabout. But traffic flow is pretty continuous.

When setup well, it couples the good points of a roundabout with the good points of a basic intersection.

They're usually seen though where you have maybe 7 or 8 roads coming together. If you didn't have stop lights, people from the smaller roads would never be able to enter the roundabout.

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