Roundabouts

So, to get things going let's talk a little about roundabouts.

They are, when designed and used properly, a pretty handy way of joining roads together. However, I see far too many close calls on them every day. First of all, whoever got the bright idea of building hills on and planting trees in the middle of them? Surely it is so much better if you have a panoramic unobstructed view of what is happening around the whole roundabout, or am I missing something here? Not just that but untrimmed hedges sticking out at the entrance to many of them, completely blocking the view to the right is soooo dangerous. Why isn't this being tackled?

On a roundabout near my work, there is a straight ahead arrow in the right entrance lane, then a turn right arrow about 20 yards ahead of it. It's not just illogical, it's actually dangerous, causing people to make last second swerves into the left lane, although some don't care either way. I'm quite intruiged by how something like that can actually happen. As far as I can see, when the right lane was changed  into a right turn only lane, they just left the straight ahead arrow there, possibly intending to get around to it at a later date? Maybe they didn't have to equipment to remove the old one at the time? Or is it just a straightforward jobsworth situation?

Maybe somene actually thought the straight ahead arrow was fine because it tells you to go right 20 yards later when you're almost at the roundabout entrance, which is the mind of a nutcase in action if you ask me. Whatever the "reason" the bottom line is that it doesn't make the slightest bit of sense and is a significant hazard to road safety.

Now, it's very apparent that lots of lots of people have no clue how to signal on roundabouts. This is even after the blanket TV campaigns demonstrating how it's done. It's not complicated and makes things a lot easier for them and everyone else. So should you implicitly trust someone elses indicators? No, but using them goes a long way towards better road use for everyone. I'll be adding some video of this particular roundabout later.

Welcome

Welcome to my blog.

The intention is to highlight the numerous dangerous and illogical road layouts and traffic signalling systems in Dublin City and the surrounding areas. From time to time there will also be commentary on standards of driving, another area that is sadly lacking in the country as a whole. Feel free to pitch in with any opinions of your own and suggestions for improvement of our sadly lacking road and traffic facilities or the blog itself.

The primary purpose of this project is as an awareness raising exercise to generate enough collective momentum to get people interested in and concerned about things we see everyday but rarely actually engage in constructive discourse about. Hopefully it can play some small part in effecting a change in attitudes on the part of both the public and relevant authorities because as citizens and taxpayers, we deserve a lot better.