A friend's blog reminded me of how frustrated I get with a couple of traffic issues. I hope he isn't upset that I ripped off his topic. First, merging from an ending left lane. Second, the proper way to use roundabouts.
Merging from an ending lane can be really unpleasant. That is mostly because the people in the right lane can get really huffy, as if you are cutting in front of them at the grocery store or something. Some even pull in front of you so you can't get in front of them. The thing that they don't understand is that the wait wouldn't be as long for anyone if they would just move over into the left lane and/or allow everyone to merge like a zipper when they reach the merge zone. This is not just my opinion, but the laws of physics and MNDOT agree. When the right lane is full and the left lane is not, people entering the freeway cannot merge into the right lane easily. This slows the right lane down. If half of the traffic would move into the left lane, traffic would not slow down as much. Then, if at the merge point people took turns politely, there would still be no slowing down.
Roundabouts have been popping up all over the metro area. I have to say that I love them. They save on gas and keep us from having to stop when there is no on coming traffic. We have at least three in my town now, and they have allowed traffic to flow much more smoothly. Unfortunately, they could be even more efficient if everyone knew the law about signaling. When we first got our roundabouts in my town, I read up on them. An article by MNDOT said to signal your turn. I thought that meant to signal as I enter the roundabout whether I am turning right or left. I have frequently been frustrated by my signal turning itself off before I even get into the roundabout due to the way some of ours are laid out. However, now that the law has been officially entered into the books, I have found out that I was mistaken. We are supposed to signal right when we intend to exit the roundabout. If everyone would do this, traffic could flow more freely, as we wouldn't have to assume they are staying in the roundabout any longer than they are.
Let's save even more gas and time by putting into practice these two little changes that can make such a difference!
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