Replacing Intersections With Roundabouts Reduces Accidents Forty Percent

roundabout.jpgFor years, traffic safety experts have been big boosters of the idea of replacing intersections with roundabouts (or as we call them here in Massachusetts “rotaries”). Now, as the BBC reports, the idea is finally catching on in America.
For those of us whose first thought of a roundabout is Chevy Chase exclaiming, “Look kids, Parliament! Big Ben! Look kids, it’s Parliament again! Big Ben!” the idea that a roundabout could be safer than an intersection with traffic signals is a bit counterintuitive. For a lot of American drivers, the roundabout is odd and intimidating; the four-way intersection is familiar and comfortable.
But the statistics don’t lie. According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, if you replace a four-way intersection with a roundabout, you’ll see a forty percent reduction in accidents and a ninety percent reduction in fatal accidents.
That’s why 3,000 intersections have been replaced with roundabouts in the last decade.
I love it when there’s a simple way to save lives.


This blog in maintained by the Boston car accident lawyers at The Law Office of Alan H. Crede, P.C.