Are Roundabouts dangerous?
No… Good roundabout design results in slower traffic speeds. Some potential safety benefits of slower traffic speeds in roundabouts include: • 1. Reduce crash severity for pedestrians and bicyclists, including older pedestrians, children, and impaired persons; • 2. More time for entering drivers to judge, adjust speed for, and enter a gap in circulating traffic; • 3. Allowance for safer merges into circulating traffic; • 4. More time for all users to detect and correct for their mistakes or mistakes of others; • 5. Less frequent and less severe collisions; and • 6. More safety for novice users. Additionally, roundabouts are safe when the power is interrupted. Where traditional intersections can become a safety concern during outages (especially in higher volume intersections), roundabouts need electricity only for nighttime illumination, requiring a slight reduction of driver speed to retain their level of operation.
