Opinion: We need Roundabouts

Though roundabouts are common in other parts of the country, they’re still a rare sight in Connecticut, and effectively absent in Norwalk. This may be starting to change though, and that will be good for everyone. 

First of all, let’s define what we’re talking about: the National Association of City Transportation Officials (NACTO) defines a roundabout as “a type of circular intersection; distinguished by a small footprint, yield-controlled entries, and speed control.” In other words, a small looping street where vehicles entering the loop yield to those already in it. Notably, neither Marvin & Gregory nor the roads around the cemetery in East Norwalk are roundabouts, because they have different (frankly, confusing) rules. 

Roundabouts have a huge advantage over traditional stoplight or stop sign intersections: they continue to flow traffic safely at all times. Nearly everyone in Norwalk can remember the feeling of frustration at being stopped at a red light with no cross traffic, when everyone is just waiting for the light to change. Roundabouts eliminate this. As a matter of fact, they mostly eliminate the need to stop at all, as drivers can simply slow down to merge into the roundabout. 

This advantage has far-reaching consequences: it saves everyone gas and reduces idling and pollution by not requiring cars to stop. It improves safety by requiring cars to slow down to enter the intersection (can’t be run at high speed like a red light), but also often increases average travel speeds by eliminating the need to stop, reducing average delays by as much as 89%. Because cars keep moving steadily through the intersection, it also allows more traffic to be carried by fewer lanes, as there doesn’t need to be so much room for cars to wait. Additionally, roundabouts eliminate the need for complex signals that require frequent and expensive maintenance and stop working when the power goes out.

Roundabouts do have some drawbacks, which means they’re not a good fit for every intersection: 

1. They have a limit to how much traffic they can flow (you won’t see them on most interstate highways for a reason). 

2. They require more space than traffic light intersections, which can be a problem if the intersection itself needs to fit in a small footprint. This means they may not be a great fit for space-constrained intersections in the city center. 

Despite these drawbacks, there are many places in Norwalk where converting intersections to roundabouts would be a huge improvement, for example: 

1. West Cedar St and Richards Ave, two suburban roads that both have moderately high traffic. The Department of Transportation, Mobility, and Parking (TMP) has just published a plan to make this Norwalk’s first real roundabout! 

2. Ludlow Park (Gregory, Marvin, Ludlow, and Calf Pasture Beach Rd) could be turned into an elongated “peanut” roundabout to greatly simplify the intersection and help it flow traffic better. 

3. Exit 16 between Route 95 and East Ave is another place where a “peanut” roundabout would be a good choice to improve traffic flow and safety at this increasingly congested interchange. 

4. Many intersections on MLK Jr. Drive, where signal timing is a huge challenge and everyone spends a lot of time waiting at red lights. 

5. Many intersections on Main Ave.

6. Many intersections on Route 1 (CT Ave, Westport Ave) where traffic flow is start-stop and speeding and red-light running are both common safety issues. 

Crucially, roundabouts represent a physical safeguard against many risks on the road, as people cannot run through them at high speeds, and they guide traffic on a convergent path where head-on and t-bone crashes (often the most deadly kind) are effectively impossible. Studies consistently show that converting stop light or stop sign intersections to roundabouts can reduce crashes that result in injury or death by 72-80%. Roundabout conversions represent a proactive improvement to road safety that can be an important element of a safe systems approach, a comprehensive approach to roadway safety that aims to make our streets safe even when people make mistakes or things go wrong. Though they may introduce some short-term discomfort as they’re built and as we learn to navigate them, the safety and traffic benefits are clear, and we should welcome them as an idea whose time has come in Norwalk.