Are roundabouts different from older traffic circles and rotaries often seen in Europe and the eastern United States?
Modern roundabouts are not the same as traffic circle or rotaries. Modern roundabouts are smaller than older traffic circles and rotaries. Vehicles negotiate a sharper curve when entering modern roundabouts, making travel speeds in roundabouts slower than speeds in traffic circles and rotaries. In some older rotaries and traffic circles, a driver must merge with or weave among high-speed entering or circulating traffic. Modern roundabouts eliminate much of this dangerous weaving found in older traffic circles and rotaries. Additionally, some older traffic circles and rotaries operated according to the traditional “yield-to-the-right” rule, with circulating traffic yielding to entering traffic. In contrast, modern roundabouts require entering vehicles to yield to traffic on the left, as many drivers in this country are accustomed to. Arent roundabouts a new transportation concept? Much of the world has been utilizing modern roundabouts for decades. In the 1960s, Great Britain experiment
