On Tue, 01 Jun 2004 13:27:40 GMT, "mookie89"
wrote:

Interestingly enough, in a fast growing northern suburb of Indianapolis,
traffic circles are becoming quite common in new road construction. Drivers
seem a little tentative, not understanding proper traffic circle protocol,
but hopefully this will ease out and we Americans can take a lesson from our
British ancestors and keep the traffic flowing instead of sitting at a red
light wasting gasoline while absolutely no one is using the cross street.

Do they not use induction loops in the US? Most major traffic-light
intersections in the UK are fitted with these, which mean that if the
direction on green is not being used, the lights can be automatically
changed as a car approaches on the other one, meaning the car will
probably only need to slow down briefly if at all.

Where you have roundabouts with unbalanced flows, it's also common for
traffic lights to be used on the roundabout to regulate traffic flow.
A roundabout only really works if the traffic flow is reasonably
balanced. This is causing problems at certain roundabouts in Milton
Keynes, which are likely to gain traffic lights and/or speed limit
reductions to try to resolve the problem.

Neil

--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK
To e-mail use neil at the above domain