Finally – some roundabouts

A story here says that the province is putting in a roundabout at the intersection of Highways 8 and 22 on the southwest side of the city. It is about time. Right now it is a T-intersection with a stop sign for people traveling west on Highway 8.

Roundabouts just make sense. They are not hard to navigate. In North America, you yield to traffic approaching from the left (or even more generally, traffic in the circle takes priority over traffic merging into the circle). When there is a space, you go. And use your turn signal to indicate when you are getting off. It is not complicated.

I note the story says the roundabout will cost $8M (peanuts for road construction) and be done by October – very fast. Compare this to some of the interchanges the city has built recently. Glenmore and Elbow – over 2 years of construction at $110 million. Crowchild and Nose Hill – 2 years. In a paper here, the authors “conclude that roundabouts are the safest and most effective type of intersection traffic control available today”

I am sure people will say “those are much bigger intersections, more lanes and more traffic”. Bah! the principle is the same and they work elsewhere. Arc de Triomphe in Paris? Roundabout. Piccadilly Circus in London? Roundabout. When I was in Qatar several years ago, there is a roundabout there with at least 6 lanes of traffic feeding in at each intersection (perhaps even 7 or 8).

Until now, roundabouts in Calgary have been limited to one lane in low traffic, low speed residential areas (and few of them at that). Good to see that changing.