Set in their ways...

[Kazim]

Start at one of the round spots, draw a line betwen your starting point skipping the next one and continue doing that till you get back to the startingpoint.
if you number them in order 1-5 clockvise then you go to 1,3,5,2,4 and back to 1

[Catwoman2965]

I hate stupid people when driving. I see it every day on my way home. I’ve probably posted about this before, but it bears repeating. I live in NJ; land of the jughandles. So when you want to turn off the main road, many times you can’t just go left or right, you have to go off the road, and then turn left to cross over it, and make a left to get back on in the opposite direction, or if you want to get off, and go right, you take what is essentially a short ramp off, to get onto the road you want to be on.

This is what I do. I get off the main road, which veers right. Then there is a stop sign, and you can go left, to get back on main road going the opposite way, or right, to then make a quick left onto the parallel road.

Now, when you hit the stop sign going right, you then turn, and go about 5 feet, where there is a THREE way stop-for traffic crossing parallel road, or coming straight to then turn onto main road. THREE way means whoever is coming off and bearing right, then left, has the right of way. I cannot tell you how many times I’ve stopped, then turned right, and had to slam on my brakes because someone idjit thinks I have to wait for them. Or had to slam on my brakes because someone in front of me stops, to let the other traffic through. Not only is there a stop sign in each of the 3 ways, but also a blinking red/yellow light.

[Caractacus_Potts]

A few years ago MA opened up the breakdown lanes for regular travel during posted rush hour times. When it first happened a lot of people didn't read the regularly spaced signs stating what times the breakdown lane was open (or were just uncomfortable driving in the breakdown lane) so it was not unusual for there to be stop and go traffic in all the regular lanes and a steady flow in the breakdown lane.

One day some vigilante asshole in a pick-up truck swings halfway into the breakdown lane just as I was about to pass him almost causing me to rear end him. Then Moron just sits there preventing anyone from passing him but not actually driving in the breakdown lane.

I pulled behind him and then next to him in a regular lane. I look over and he is looking at me with this moronic shit ass grin so I yell, "HEY MORON, THE BREAKDOWN LANE IS OPEN FOR USE. READ A SIGN JACKASS!"

I guess he must have followed my advice because after we passed the next sign he pulled back into his lane and let all the people that had piled up behind him in the breakdown lane go by. I just wish I had still been close enough to him to see his shit ass grin turn into a look of hurt bewilderment.

My city's gotten on a big Roundabout kick lately.

My wife, long before I met her, moved to MA where people on the roundabout have the right of way from a state where people entering the roundabout have the right of way. She says for the first few months she was constantly almost getting hit and thought the drivers in MA were completely f-ed up. Then she finally realizes SHE is the one with the yield sign and now understands why everyone she forced her way in front of was honking and giving her the finger.

[wolfie]

My wife, long before I met her, moved to MA where people on the roundabout have the right of way from a state where people entering the roundabout have the right of way.

WTF? Whoever dreamed up the idea of giving the right-of-way to people entering the roundabout? If traffic gets heavy, that's virtually guaranteeing deadlock, since you'll get a case of someone (with the right of way) sticking their nose into the flow of traffic, blocking those in the roundabout from moving far enough for a guy partway around to get to his exit, leaving the rest of the people in the roundabout stuck behind him.

[Chromatix]

Priority on entering is used on the mega-roundabout at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. By all accounts, it's as much of a nightmare as the Magic Roundabout.

But the opposite, which is the rule in Britain and elsewhere in Europe, does have another failure mode - if there is heavy traffic between two roads, and only those two roads, it is possible for traffic from other roads to be completely shut out. Even so, that seems to happen rarely enough in practice for it to not be a concern.

[bunrotha]

There's a very good reason people in the area tend to use other routes if there's a choice. I knew a courier who learned how to drive in central London, and shrugged off Marble Arch. He still wouldn't go near "that f$&*ing nightmare".

There's more than one of those Magic Roundabouts. I spent three years in Colchester, where one of them lurks. Right next to the University campus. After great amounts of trial data, there are two approaches:
1) It's a ring of mini-roundabouts, round about a roundabout. Ignore the middle, drive the mini-roundabouts.
2) BANZAAAAAAAIII (only appropriate in a Honda, in my old Citroen, Allons y! would work?)

I never tried 2. Many near misses stand testament to why.

[crazylegs]

But the opposite, which is the rule in Britain and elsewhere in Europe, does have another failure mode - if there is heavy traffic between two roads, and only those two roads, it is possible for traffic from other roads to be completely shut out. Even so, that seems to happen rarely enough in practice for it to not be a concern.

Hence why quite a few of the roundabouts near me have traffic lights on them as well. Stops that complete logjam you describe.

[wolfie]

But the opposite, which is the rule in Britain and elsewhere in Europe, does have another failure mode - if there is heavy traffic between two roads, and only those two roads, it is possible for traffic from other roads to be completely shut out.

I've run into that problem a few times - of course, it helps that I've got a VERY poor horsepower-to-weight ratio.

Since one of the ways of doing a roundabout has deadlock as a failure mode, and the other fails by starvation, and both routinely fail by 4-wheelers not recognizing "it may be a 2-lane roundabout, but trucks need BOTH lanes", why not put in an ordinary intersection with a traffic light?

[sstabeler]

I've run into that problem a few times - of course, it helps that I've got a VERY poor horsepower-to-weight ratio.

Since one of the ways of doing a roundabout has deadlock as a failure mode, and the other fails by starvation, and both routinely fail by 4-wheelers not recognizing "it may be a 2-lane roundabout, but trucks need BOTH lanes", why not put in an ordinary intersection with a traffic light?

because they make the situation worse, usually. Mainly due to causing massive tailbacks. ( I live near one road that at peak times, it's actually somewhat routine to see tailbacks going the entire length of the road, then you get the roundabout, with tailbacks off the roundabout that I never bothered to figure out how long they were.)

[greek_jester]

Since one of the ways of doing a roundabout has deadlock as a failure mode, and the other fails by starvation, and both routinely fail by 4-wheelers not recognizing "it may be a 2-lane roundabout, but trucks need BOTH lanes", why not put in an ordinary intersection with a traffic light?

Traffic lights cost more to run, since they draw electricity and the cables, lights, etc. need to be maintained.

Roundabouts, once they're in, just need to be repainted or de-weeded every so often.

Plus, many of the UK's older towns are laid down on what, a thousand years or so ago, were livestock tracks. As such, we don't often have the neat right-angles necessary for most traffic light junctions. Roundabouts are just easier to slot into most junctions.

[SongsOfDragons]

Here we go round the roundabout, the roundabout, the roundabout. Here we go round the roundabout, because Housemate missed the lane again!