Going round in circles works better!

  You see, traffic lights can be hopelessly inefficient and cause traffic build up that simply compounds jams.
My local neighbourhood is inundated with traffic lights that drive me to distraction not just because they are red far more often than they are green, but because they are not set to prioritise the flow of traffic on the most densely populated road and nor are they synchronised to encourage flow.  As soon as you set off (eventually) from one green light, the next one a couple of hundred metres away goes red as you approach it. To prove that my irritation is founded on fact, I’ve made a point while sitting twiddling my thumbs, to count the vehicles prevented from moving by red lights.   The worst example I can come up with is that around 42 vehicles were kept waiting on either side of one set of lights while the princely number of three were released on what I will call the “other” side.  All 42 vehicles remained stationary for around a minute while the “other” side shone green for absolutely no purpose.  The longer a stationary queue gets, the longer it takes to move because of the lag factor.   This means that a good proportion of the aforementioned 42 vehicles simply won’t get through the intersection on the next green sequence and so it goes on, or rather, doesn’t go on.   The  42 builds up and the problem is further aggravated.
The solution as I’ve said so many times before, lies in using well-designed roundabouts or traffic circles. Why a roundabout hasn’t been installed on the Borrowdale Road adjacent to the primary school of the same name is beyond any sane person’s comprehension.  Not only are the roads in a complete shambles at this busy intersection, it is so badly designed that to get through the maze, it is often necessary to clear two sets of lights, assuming they’re working in the first place.
It’s no accident that countries with the densest vehicle populations employ the most roundabouts.  They abound on A roads throughout Britain and even in the heart of rural France, you’ll find them controlling traffic flow an awful lot more efficiently than traffic lights would.
Given this situation, I thought I would do a little scientific research on the subject as city councillors in Southern Africa appear to be mostly blind to the benefits bestowed by roundabouts.  In precis form, this is what I found, courtesy in the main of the American Institute for Highway Safety.
Surprisingly, roundabouts are relatively new on the American scene by which I mean they’ve been adopted only in the last 20 years.   Properly constituted studies have proved considerable improvements in traffic flow.  In New York, New Hampshire and Washington, where roundabouts replaced traffic lights or stop signs, there was an average reduction of no less than 89 percent in traffic delays and a 56 percent reduction in stops.  A study of 11 intersections in Kansas gave corresponding figures of 65 percent and 52 percent respectively.
Safety improvements are simply massive.  For starters, a roundabout slows traffic automatically whereas a green light generally encourages haste and blind entry into an intersection.  A roundabout also separates oncoming traffic flows and reduces rear end shunts by a considerable margin because traffic is not halted so often.
Statistically, in the US at least, a 2001 study of 23 intersections that were either traffic light or stop controlled but had converted to the roundabout system, showed crashes reduced by 40 percent and injuries from such crashes were down by 80 percent. Perhaps a little more relevant are figures gleaned from Europe and Australia  where the introduction of roundabouts reduced injury-inducing crashes by between 41 and 61 percent while serious injury crashes declined by between 45 and 75 percent.
Back in America,  studies have also been conducted on issues such as emissions and fuel consumption.  On average, carbon monoxide emissions were down by 32 percent and nitrous oxide emissions declined by 34 percent.  This translates into significant reductions in fuel consumption and again, the Americans had this aspect covered. 
Their research showed an average 30 percent  reduction in fuel usage at roundabout-controlled intersections  which, at 10 intersections studied in Virginia,  translated into a saving of more than 200 000 gallons a year. Unfortunately, it wasn’t possible to establish the reduced wear and tear inflicted on cars but you can be sure that brake pads/linings would last considerably longer as would clutch facings and auto transmissions.
Finally, and in the interests of not boring you with a bucketful of statistics, it’s worth pointing out that while only 36 percent of drivers surveyed in six communities were in favour of the introduction of roundabouts in their vicinity, the approval rating  jumped to 74 percent just one year after the roundabouts had been installed.      
Given these facts, just why is it that those responsible for road construction are so enamoured with wretched traffic lights?
Just maybe the fact that in many cases, they are the self-same people who are besotted with speed trapping, will provide the answer you’re looking for.  Should you have had access to Carte Blanche on the DStv bouquet last weekend, you will have observed the farcical situation in South Africa  (and virtually every other country for that matter) where trapping is as good as universally conducted to raise revenue and for no other reason.  The presenters rightly pointed out that your legal right to be regarded as innocent until proved guilty has no place in the shady, often sinister world of speed trapping.  The system puts the onus on the motorist to disprove guilt and every obstacle imaginable is put in place to make that denial as difficult as possible.  The fact that every day, virtually every motorist exceeds the set limits tells you that the limits are more often than not, simply absurd.
No one, including yours truly, objects to reducing speed provided there’s good reason to do so and provided that the suggested speed is sensible in the circumstances.   As I’ve stated until I’m blue in the face, I’ve never seen a speed trap on the Arcturus Road, which is narrow and exceedingly bumpy and is accessed by driveways every few metres, yet there are  (or rather were) traps mounted incessantly on double carriageways with virtually no access roads.  The outskirts of Karoi constitute another favourite speeding extortion zone for the simple reason that no sane motorist can believe the utter stupidity of being restrained to 80 km/h when the only signs of life for miles outside the dilapidated town are threadbare msasa trees and clumps of grass reaching for the other side of the moon.  The Plods are there for the easy pickings and for no other reason, full stop.  Having said that, South Africa is no better.  For all the marvellous roads, it’s quite common for an utterly ridiculous limit of 60 km/h to be set even on dual carriageways bordered by substantial shoulders.  And you can be 100 percent certain that the more ridiculous the imposed limit, the more likely you are to encounter someone in a blue uniform wielding a pinging device.
Jenson buttons up GP
As I predicted, the status quo in F1 racing was blasted apart in Melbourne last Sunday.  The achievement of Brawn GP, even if there was a little good fortune thrown in late in the race when Vettel and Kubica saw each other off, was simply magnificent.  Button never put a foot wrong and the praise he received from the new commentary team on BBC was fully deserved and a lot less parochial than the gushing, overly-partisan stuff dished out by the now-departed James Allen.
With all the euphoria surrounding the extraordinary outcome, it was perhaps a little unfortunate that Mercedes-Benz didn’t get their fair share of the kudos.  After all, their V8 engines only got attached to the Brawn cars a little more than a month ago yet they ran like clockwork and helped produce the first 1-2 debut victory since Juan Fangio and Karl Kling did the same for Mercedes-Benz in their all new W196 Streamliners at the French GP in 1954.
With the ban on testing in F1, it’s hard to see how the opposition will go about closing the gap other than by trial and error on race weekends.  
All that glitters
There’s no doubt in my mind that the majority of UK-based car mags, no matter how hard they try to promote their impartiality, have a natural tendency to punt home product, sometimes to the extent that a blind eye is turned when it comes to exposing potential problems.   For example, when the much-lauded Jaguar XF was launched at the Frankfurt Motor Show in September 2007, I was alarmed to observe some really poor finishing detail evident on the metallic blue example on display.  I actually photographed some of the badly aligned panels on this car as proof and also noted that not one mention was made in any Brit magazine about these unwanted defects.
Now I’ve come across some info sourced from the US which I believe more accurately reflects the likely truth about the otherwise dynamically excellent Jaguar XF.  Automobile Magazine’s long term XF has been (and I quote from a source) “affected by a littany of issues ranging from faulty window regulators and bad rear axles to a failed power steering system”.  Further, a US research company called True Delta which updates its findings every three months, has reported that the XF spends far more time than the industry average visiting dealers for repairs.  On an annualised basis, this translates into 139 dealer visits per 100 cars and this is for vehicles with an average mileage of just 6000.
 
By contrast, the 2008 BMW 5 Series with an average mileage of 11 300 is down to 33 visits per 100 cars and the 2006 Merc C Class, not the best example of the breed, sits at 58 visits but with a much higher average mileage of 29 100. I leave you to draw your own conclusions.