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Traffic Roundabouts - not learning from history

I went to school in Boston back in the 1970's and at that time, traffic roundabouts were a big and upcoming thing. There were roundabouts put in all over. Considering that greater Boston had grown from a collection of villages and connecting horse trails, this was supposed to even out a lot of the chaotic traffic flow and make things safer. I hated these things. Everyone I talked to at the time hated them. They were forced on us by the "city planners" for whom this was a shiny new toy to solve a problem that did not really exist. Two years ago, Jen, my Dad and I went back for a family friend's memorial service and we spent a week going through some of my old stomping grounds. With the exception of the two monster roundabouts at the entrance to Cape Cod (we are talking a mile or two in diameter), every single one of these pestiferous wastes of taxpayer money had been taken out. Every last one of them. Fast-forward to today. The fair city of Bellingham seems to be quite taken with the idea. They installed a two test ones at smaller intersections out of major traffic flow but intersections that still see a lot of traffic (these are feeding the campus of a community college). The planners swore up and down that the roundabouts would reduce accidents. Today, I took a look at our local newspaper (Bellingham Herald) and saw the following front-page headlines:

Kellogg Road-Cordata Parkway roundabout had highest crash rate in city in 2008

Makes me wonder just what kind of scholarship is needed to get a job as a city planner. History is obviously not needed. And, due to the success of these two pilot roundabouts, they are putting a bunch of them on a major artery which connects to Canada. Posted by DaveH at July 26, 2009 7:02 PM | TrackBack