Circle is about 8 feet in diameter. Signs, painted hash marks. Electric flashing light.
We weren't careful and it looks like we are getting what someone wished for. It looks like the town of Tecumseh is the first out of the gates to test "traffic calming" on Riverside Drive. There is no wonder why residents of Riverside Drive have taken legal action to curb this insanity. This will definately leave the Drive aesthetically challenged. Yellow hash lines, white lines everywhere, lots and lots of signage and a flashing yellow beacon. Yeah...Everybody wants one of those in front of their home. The calming effect of this is maddening. Similar to the mazes we find in todays shopping plaza parking lots. If you are not a Type A personality going in, you will be coming out. This is a strange planning science which needs serious reconsideration.
The safety of this is highly suspect. Riverside Drive is so narrow, these circles have to be tiny as well. Will they slow traffic down? Maybe. Will Riverside be any safer? Who wants to answer that? Put this out to the local bookie and the odds will probably favour a higher incident of accidents. Salvador Dali would be pleased to see the signage all warped and bent from kissing bumpers and fenders.
What do local residents around this test bed think? They are not happy. Several said it totally ruins their neighbourhood. All agree that it will only be a matter of time before there is a first accident there. Several driveways lead into this thing, Southport Yacht Club feeds into the Drive just feet from the circle along with one other residential side street. Cars have to back out of their drives into the circle (hopefully in the right orientation) and then get on their way. Hopefully oncoming traffic will catch the play. Residents were also quick to remind that this section of Riverside Drive has been shut down to all but local traffic. It is literally barricaded at both ends until construction is completed. What will happen when the tap is opened to transient traffic? (CLICK ON IMAGES TO ENLARGE)
Maintenance is also going to be a problem. Already this thing has proven to be treacherous for snow removal. Plough trucks had to be very ginger navigating around it. In the end it proved to be quite a nuisance with snow piled in the center of the street forcing traffic to actually navigate the wrong way around the circle.
This is not the proper solution for Riverside Drive. This is not the street for such measures. Riverside Drive is too small with no place else to go and these circles will only cause confusion and heartache. Imagine cars and bikes using these things for u-turns. What car has a turning radius that tight?
If the Bicycling community thinks that this is their answer then they are sadly mistaken. With cars and bikes weaving in and out of these things there can only be a higher degree of risk. The proper solution for all on Riverside Drive is probably the simplest one. It doesn't include ugly traffic lines, hashing, flashing lights, divets, traffic circles or curbs. Everybody involved in that planning was thinking so hard their heads must be turning in circles. All that needs to be done is to widen Riverside Drive by six feet. Three feet per side. This gives the bikers the room they need to run with traffic. Car and bike drivers alike have to obey the same rules of the road and Riverside Drive will be a lot safer and a nicer commute for it. As soon as we junk up Riverside Drive with obstacles and all of this visual pollution it won't be so scenic at all. Can somebody stop this dizzy spin?
Excellent! Check this out courtesy of Anonymous:
10 comments:
This is the first I have heard of this - are they trying to implement the type of "turn-arounds" that they have in Europe? Because the turn-arounds they have in Europe are fabulous - they really help to keep traffic flowing...but of course one needs to know how to drive in a turn-around. If they are to be implemented here the public will need to be educated as to how to use them - otherwise there may be accidents.
Hello Anonymous...
The answer to your question is that they think they are building "turn-arounds" like they have in Europe. They have a romantic fantasy taken from a text book or a past vacation and are trying to impliment it here. For all who have visited Europe and who have had experience with round abouts, the first thing that they will tell you is that they are very large; not eight feet in diameter. Can you envision u-turns around an eight foot circle? The only car with a turning radius that tight might be a Smart Car. Here, they are saying that this turnaround is for the purpose of "traffic calming". Let's see, if you are driving down the Drive you now have to be on the watch for a bunch of blind corners with cars backing out of driveways onto the circle. Have you ever seen cars backing into a circle in Europe? Nope. That would be deadly. The real crime here is that Riverside Drive is going to be littered with these things to the point that all of the pleasure is going to be taken out of driving on this scenic route. You will have to be on your guard at all times plus the lines, signs and lights are going to junk it up. It will be a night-mae for residents on the street who simply want to turn left into their driveways. Proper planning would be able to discern what is workable or not with the givens at hand. This, clearly, is the work of a high school project gone bad. We must have better talent than this.
Oh, I see - yes, size certainly does matter in this case! Most of the cars in Europe are very tiny, and yes, the round-abouts are a fair size...
"This is not the proper solution for Riverside Drive. This is not the street for such measures."
This is a true statement on many levels. There is only so much room left to expand on Riverside. Traffic circles are generally used to marshall traffic from high volume roads with a single point of convergence away from the area. This is not the case with Riverside Drive. A simple widening would certainly solve everyones problems and at the same time create efficient traffic flow. To suggest that they are "traffic calming" is rediculous. Maybe someone out there can explain how they calm traffic. I do agree that if all are like the one pictured here safety will become an even bigger issue than it is now.
It's nitpicking, I concede, but this isn't a fair comparison. Essex County built a who-knows-what at Tecumseh and Brighton (a Traffic circle maybe?)
Windsor is planning roundabouts. Not the same thing. The latter has a traffic function besides being an eyesore
"Overall, roundabouts are statistically safer than both traffic circles and traditional intersections,[1] with the exception that cyclists have a significantly increased crash rate at large roundabouts."
I think traffic circles have been placed on Earth by the same aliens that make crop circles.
roundabout claims victims
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFsDjmceuDo
beware!
"This is a strange planning science which needs serious reconsideration.
The safety of this is highly suspect. Riverside Drive is so narrow, these circles have to be tiny as well. Will they slow traffic down? "
People need to calm the heck down and realize the the majority of the rest of the world uses these and the are effective. Everyone here has a fear of anything other than the status quo. I travel to Italy often, and in my area, there are many small turn-arounds. The size of them are based on the vehicle counts for the roads it serves.
People just like to automatically throw every possible excuse or paranoid reasons why anything other than the status quo is acceptable. Next, we someone will post that turn-arounds will cause cancer!
To the last Anonymous:
Like you I have lived in several European cities where traffic circles of all sizes exist. You are right. On a good traffic day these things are quite logical but there are still frequent problems caused by any number of tourists and non locals who just don't understand how to navigate them.
The real point of this post is, however, that there is no need or use for them on Riverside. These things are supposed to maintain continuous traffic flow at major road junctions. Even the ones you speak of in Rome are designed that way. The one in the example above services three driveways and a short dead end street. Why? Whats the purpose? A simple right or left turn is all that was ever needed here. Now you have a smaller than mini circle becoming more of a traffic nuisance than not having one at all. And all of the extra ugly lines on the road and signs. Name one place on Riverside Drive where a traffic circle will be of any value.
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