>
> After 10 months of living in Brisbane Australia a number of years
> ago, and another week last October, I HATE traffic circles. At least in the
> Australian context I found them highly confusing, and dangerous to cars,
> bicycles, and pedestrians. I admit that my reaction might be somewhat
> colored by trying to get used to driving on the other side of the street, by
> the Australians use of the circles at intersections on arterials, and by
> their drivers tendency to try to drive the circles at what I thought was far
> too high a speed. Does anyone have statistics on accident rates at traffic
> circles used in the context of residential street traffic calming?
>
> Joel Hamilton
The traffic-calming circles for residential streets are quite
different from "round-abouts" where arterials join. You can see
their use in Seattle, on Capitol Hill--say, 13th Ave. North of John
Street. There's a very large planter in the middle of the
intersection which forces the cars into a very tight turning radius.
You really have to slow to 5 mph to negotiate the turn. They did a
lot of work on the residental streets to prevent them from becoming
the parallel through routes, alternative to Broadway or 12th.
Ron Force rforce@belle.lib.uidaho.edu
Dean of Library Services (208)885-6534
University Of Idaho fax: (208) 885-6817
Moscow, ID 83844-2350
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