Four Way Stops Vs. Roundabouts

[DB]

What do the wavy lines mean?

 

If you mean the zig-zags at the edges of the lanes, they indicate that there is no parking allowed. It protects the pedestrian crossings.

 

Normally seen at Zebra crossings in the UK, and in yellow outside schools.. https://www.highwaycodeuk.co.uk/answers/what-do-the-zigzag-lines-at-the-crossing-mean

[Yama]

What do the wavy lines mean?

"Drive somewhere around here-ish".

[Stuart Galbraith]

 

Behold the Magic Roundabout!

 

What the hell is that? Some sort of symbol of the Space Nazis?

 

Yes. Its the reason why they have been beaming back crop cricles all across Wiltshire.

[beans4]

We actually covered them in Drivers Education class way back when, but was about 20 years of driving before I actually came across one at night in Maine. I got off at the first possible right turn, parked, got out and studied the traffic for about 10 minutes before venturing back. I still get off at the first right for unfamiliar circles, especially multi-lane ones.

 

Was driving I-35 in Minnesota a couple of years ago and needed gas. I could see a station about a mile away and so took the off ramp. Had to go through 3 separate traffic circles to get to the station.

[bojan]

 

I think it was especially bad in France, it seemed like there was a roundabout every 1.5 km or so.

 

IIRC they have more roundabouts than rest of Europe combined.

 

Locally I prefer roundabouts - while two idiots with a bad driving habits can fully jam 4-way they will only slow roundabout to a crawl.

Edited January 25, 2020 by bojan

[MiloMorai]

 

Ran into the back of an Audi at a roundabout. Dumb bitched stopped at a Yeild sign because there was a car on the other side of the roundabout.

Sorry, but if you rear ended her you were too close to stop if required. What if a kid had run in front of her and she needed to brake suddenly? It is up to the following driver to maintain a safe distance to stop.

 

Wasn't charged tho expected to be. I was quite far from the vehicle going rather slow in 2cd gear (more than the 10'/mph suggested). I was looking for traffic in the circle and seeing only one car on the other side of the circle and when I looked back at her she was stopped. Hard to stop on a m'bike on pavement covered in road construction dust.

[Nobu]

Add in the increasingly obligatory bicycle access lanes to the roundabouts, and they become even more interesting.

 

I will take traffic light control over them any day.

[EchoFiveMike]

You Euros don't have real truck traffic, wait until some asshat gets a free haircut from a 53ft trailer, right about the shoulder blades, and the whole shitshow is shut down for 3 hrs while they do a scene reconstruction and hose off the gore. S/F....Ken M

[lucklucky]

Nah in Europe there is real truck traffic, specially in Central Europe.

[Jeff]

 

Either doesn't matter if the vast majority of drivers on the road are idiots.

 

Yeah, bad idea here in the States. Strangely there is a rather tight single-lane roundabout (or as we say in 'Murrican, traffic circle) that feeds a nearby Walmart. Might be there to prevent semis from going that way. Haven't seen an accident yet, but I'm sure they are happening.

 

 

It's like having the autobahn in the US, it works well in Germany because they follow the rules, we'd slaughter each other if we tried it here.

[DKTanker]

 

 

Either doesn't matter if the vast majority of drivers on the road are idiots.

 

Yeah, bad idea here in the States. Strangely there is a rather tight single-lane roundabout (or as we say in 'Murrican, traffic circle) that feeds a nearby Walmart. Might be there to prevent semis from going that way. Haven't seen an accident yet, but I'm sure they are happening.

 

 

It's like having the autobahn in the US, it works well in Germany because they follow the rules, we'd slaughter each other if we tried it here.

 

I dunno, there's a 10 mile construction zone between my house and work, and if you're not doing 80 you're getting run over.

[DougRichards]

 

 

Ran into the back of an Audi at a roundabout. Dumb bitched stopped at a Yeild sign because there was a car on the other side of the roundabout.

Sorry, but if you rear ended her you were too close to stop if required. What if a kid had run in front of her and she needed to brake suddenly? It is up to the following driver to maintain a safe distance to stop.

 

Wasn't charged tho expected to be. I was quite far from the vehicle going rather slow in 2cd gear (more than the 10'/mph suggested). I was looking for traffic in the circle and seeing only one car on the other side of the circle and when I looked back at her she was stopped. Hard to stop on a m'bike on pavement covered in road construction dust.

 

Interestingly if it is an incident that only results in damage and not injury, so long as it is reported to the police (which is necessary for insurance purposes anyway) then no charges would result here anyway.

 

If both (or more) drivers involved don't report to police then that driver can be charged with the general charge of negligent driving. That is a fine of about an average of what people get paid for about four hours work.

[Ivanhoe]

It seems that the problems Americans are facing with roundabouts are primarily due to lack of exposure. As they become more prevalent, then people will get better at them.

Maybe. But don't discount the American traffic engineer's ability to create chaos.

 

And the main problem with 4-way stops, IMHO, is that it can be a challenge to get the car with right-o-way to go ahead and cross. Wouldn't hurt the state DOTs to put out some public service announcements periodically reminding people of the rules of the road.

[DougRichards]

 

It seems that the problems Americans are facing with roundabouts are primarily due to lack of exposure. As they become more prevalent, then people will get better at them.

Maybe. But don't discount the American traffic engineer's ability to create chaos.

 

And the main problem with 4-way stops, IMHO, is that it can be a challenge to get the car with right-o-way to go ahead and cross. Wouldn't hurt the state DOTs to put out some public service announcements periodically reminding people of the rules of the road.

 

Whilst it may seem an infringement of 'states rights' and certainly not worth a civil war, how would the states bringing their traffic laws in agreement with each other go?

 

Then again I forgot that counties seem to also want to impose their own laws enforced by their own sheriffs' officers and penalties being imposed by county courts.

 

The patchwork that is law enactment and law enforcement in the USA is a mystery to those not of that country.

[Ivanhoe]

Whilst it may seem an infringement of 'states rights' and certainly not worth a civil war, how would the states bringing their traffic laws in agreement with each other go?

AIUI it tends to be an evolutionary thing. Adjacent states end up aligning things out of necessity, with a few notable exceptions. Right turn on red is the one that comes to mind; legal in most states, but in a few, the default is not legal unless there's a sign for it.

 

The 4-way stop rules are, TMK, pretty universal. But I think a lot of folks don't know the rules, and there are some areas where rules be damned.

[Adam Peter]

You Euros don't have real truck traffic, wait until some asshat gets a free haircut from a 53ft trailer, right about the shoulder blades, and the whole shitshow is shut down for 3 hrs while they do a scene reconstruction and hose off the gore. S/F....Ken M

 

We have plenty, but two things seem different: trucks have top speed 80/70/50 kph motorway/road/city (+10% regularly used on motorways), and daylight they can't take-over, tracking distance must be enough for a smaller car/lorry with safe distances.

[Panzermann]

You Euros don't have real truck traffic, wait until some asshat gets a free haircut from a 53ft trailer, right about the shoulder blades, and the whole shitshow is shut down for 3 hrs while they do a scene reconstruction and hose off the gore. S/F....Ken M

 

 

Nah in Europe there is real truck traffic, specially in Central Europe.

Yup. the Autobahn is full with lorries driving east (or coming from there). Germany is a transit country for freight. The rightmost lane on the important Autobahn routes are a long line of lorries normally. And at night the car parks near the Autobahn are stuffed with lorries parking for the night. And for decades poitics has promised to move more freight to the railways, whike actually increasing road traffic.

 

 

Against "haircuts" it has been mandatory for decades that the sides of trailers must be closed to prevent people getting under them:

 

 

 

Though I dislike the fence type, because those sometimes drag pedestrians with them. A plate is bette r imho and improves aerodynanmics as well.

Edited January 26, 2020 by Panzermann

[DKTanker]

Whilst it may seem an infringement of 'states rights' and certainly not worth a civil war, how would the states bringing their traffic laws in agreement with each other go?

 

 

Then again I forgot that counties seem to also want to impose their own laws enforced by their own sheriffs' officers and penalties being imposed by county courts.

 

The patchwork that is law enactment and law enforcement in the USA is a mystery to those not of that country.

 

In the main the Federal Department of Transportation is the final arbiter. While local authorities can, within limits, control maximum speed limits, enforce fines, and whether or not turning right on a red light is permissible, almost every other traffic law is codified at the Federal level.

[Jeff]

 

Whilst it may seem an infringement of 'states rights' and certainly not worth a civil war, how would the states bringing their traffic laws in agreement with each other go?

 

 

Then again I forgot that counties seem to also want to impose their own laws enforced by their own sheriffs' officers and penalties being imposed by county courts.

 

The patchwork that is law enactment and law enforcement in the USA is a mystery to those not of that country.

 

In the main the Federal Department of Transportation is the final arbiter. While local authorities can, within limits, control maximum speed limits, enforce fines, and whether or not turning right on a red light is permissible, almost every other traffic law is codified at the Federal level.

 

 

If they take federal funding, then they're subject to federal laws for that road. Usually covers at least the interstates.

[Nobu]

What exactly is correct roundabout etiquette, for those of us who do not encounter them frequently? What little I have seen of them has zero resemblance with anything close to etiquette, and more like road bullying.

Edited January 26, 2020 by Nobu

[rmgill]

Having interacted with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration while trying to get my state laws tweaked for Historic Military Vehicles, I learned a few things. I ended up having a number of conversations with a Director at the FMCSA who oversaw compliance of the states laws.

There are Federal Regulations (FMCSRs title 49 https://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/regulations/title49/b/5/3) )governing Interstate commercial traffic (congress's actual mandate). In seeking to make that regular, the feds have worked to get a coherent and equivalent system of Motor Carrier Law across the many states. The carrot is federal funding for DOT projects. They'll review the state laws every year or so and issue a set of code revision recommendations to the state legislatures. If the state refuses over several years, at some point the FMCSA advises congress to suspend the funding which is usually what is required to obtain compliance. The State DOT's generally want the funding so they're able to persuade their state legislature what to change.

What is onerous is that there's not only FMCSA, but also IFTA and IRP, which seeks to garner taxes from all commercial trucking for what ever state they may drive in, proportional to the milage in that state. Which is a giant headache for the trucking companies.

 

I ended up having to have a number of legal arguments with the state over the specifics of what the Federal laws required because they were not allowing me to obtain the license to drive and registration for my M813A1 at the time. In the end a combination of specific questions and citation of the federal laws as well as the state earned me the path through the mess.

[rmgill]

 

If they take federal funding, then they're subject to federal laws for that road. Usually covers at least the interstates.

 

 

Local road laws they can do themselves. Witness New Jersey's Jug-handles. OR California's requirement that ANYTHING with 3 axles is commercial, no matter what it's used for.

[Adam_S]

What exactly is correct roundabout etiquette, for those of us who do not encounter them frequently? What little I have seen of them has zero resemblance with anything close to etiquette, and more like road bullying.

Always give way to traffic already on the roundabout.

[Jeff]

 

What exactly is correct roundabout etiquette, for those of us who do not encounter them frequently? What little I have seen of them has zero resemblance with anything close to etiquette, and more like road bullying.

Always give way to traffic already on the roundabout.

 

 

Always give way to the bigger guy. Physics trumps everything else.

[Adam Peter]

What exactly is correct roundabout etiquette, for those of us who do not encounter them frequently? What little I have seen of them has zero resemblance with anything close to etiquette, and more like road bullying.

 

In Hungary, roundabout entries always have a yield sign, too, so the usual rule of the priority of the right (you have priority if no one is on your right side) does not apply. This way the roundabout's traffic always have priority over the incoming roads. A driver's school video.