New Lane Layout at Groody Roundabout

Iwannahurl

bazz26 wrote: »

The problem is not motorists stopping as they approach the roundabouts but rather motorists already on the roundabout who are exiting having to brake/stop to allow pedestrians cross. The motorists behind them may not react in time and suddenly you have a knock on effect. The whole idea of a roundabout is to allow traffic on the roundabout to flow off the exits without causing a build up which is defeated and dangerous when you have pedestrian crossings right at the edge of them. The roundabout at the Shannon bridge/Dock Road is the exact same, too busy and dangerous for crossing pedestrians. In an ideal world it should work but this is not an ideal world.

It works fine in other EU cities and towns, so why not here?

Are Irish motorists particularly slow to react?

Popoutman

What is the name and address of the relevant person in the Co. Council that we can direct paper letters to, to voice our concerns about this abysmal construction on the Groody Roundabout?

They got the surface correct on the bike lane - it's now possible to ride a road bike without getting teeth jarred on the bike lanes as they are now smoother than the parallel road surface.

Of the 16 ramp interfaces on 8 ramps, only two of the road-ram interfaces appear to be correct for traffic. Two out of sixteen. Combine that with incorrect lane markings with missing signage for the UL and Groody Link road entrances, it's a nightmare for traffic that is already causing chaos and it will only get worse.

I know of at least one dead engine from a friend's parent knocking the sump plug out, from a normal unmodified passat. I'm aware of a lot of near misses on the roundabout due to people mis-laning.

For the cost, either the contractors made a really bad job of the traffic controls, or the engineers responsible for the contractor's brief need to be fired for incompetence. I don't see how else this was signed off on.

Popoutman

Iwannahurl wrote: »

It works fine in other EU cities and towns, so why not here?

Are Irish motorists particularly slow to react?

Other EU cities and towns do not have steep and abrupt ramps on roundabouts on very high traffic volume access routes to cities. It should work well enough on small roundabouts on single lane accesses and exits, but on a roundabout on a main arterial route with a total of 16 lanes of entrance and exit? It's madness and wouldn't be done on the Continent.

Iwannahurl

Other countries don't have Irish road engineers and "planners" working for them (I hope). My experience in Europe is that large high-speed multi-lane roundabouts are not features of urban and residential areas.

The Groody Roundabout is situated close to residential estates. Why would pedestrians not be expected to cross it?

Perhaps it cannot be rehabilitated, in which case maybe conversion to a signalised junction is the only option. Or perhaps separate infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists.

Of course the typical response of roads authorities in this country is to try to do such things on the cheap, with tick-box tokenism on the walking/cycling aspects.

PS: here's a roundabout in Galway with a total of 14 lanes. It's on an arterial route close to residential estates, schools, a hospital and a university. Old ladies can be seen every day trying to run across. Irish road engineers and "planners" again (the designers, that is, not the old ladies).

Comhrá

Letter sent in to the senior engineer today concerning the ramps. Wonder what sort of response I'll get?

Delphi91

Just wondering - are they speed ramps at all????

If you look at them again, all they are is a layer of tarmac designed to bring the road surface up to the level of the footpath, presumably for cyclists, etc crossing over. Curious why they couldn't have dipped down the footpath to the level of the road instead?

They certainly do have the effect of slowing down traffic, especially on the exit from the roundabout up towards Castletroy (haven't used the other exists yet). It's just a pity that they couldn't have the same incline on the exit as exists on the "ramp" just after Cosgraves Maxol station which is a gradual incline.

Delphi91

Iwannahurl wrote: »

...Perhaps it cannot be rehabilitated, in which case maybe conversion to a signalised junction is the only option...

It was originally a signalised junction back in the late 80's as was the roundabout at the Parkway.

um7y1h83ge06nx

This morning I was traveling towards this roundabout from Ballysimon road.

I think the arrows on the lane were scrubbed off but not sure if there were new arrows elsewhere.

Anyone see this?

Very confusing and dangerous roundabout.

zulutango

Delphi91 wrote: »

It was originally a signalised junction back in the late 80's as was the roundabout at the Parkway.

Both probably still should be. I would imagine that modern, smart traffic light systems can deal with traffic better than these roundabouts can?

Special Circumstances

zulutango wrote: »

Both probably still should be. I would imagine that modern, smart traffic light systems can deal with traffic better than these roundabouts can?

Depends on how smart the people that program them are...
Depends on how smart the people that specify the requirements are...

thesimpsons

Renata Rough Cuff wrote: »

This morning I was traveling towards this roundabout from Ballysimon road.

I think the arrows on the lane were scrubbed off but not sure if there were new arrows elsewhere.

Anyone see this?

Very confusing and dangerous roundabout.

didn't notice any difference there mon/tues this week anyway but there were guys in yellow hiviz vests there yesterday taking photos. the ramps are still as bad as ever, and coming from UL to Groody Road the road arrows still show opposite to what you'd normally expect on a roundabout. visitors only sometimes see this marking when traffic is busy

djsim101

Renata Rough Cuff wrote: »

This morning I was traveling towards this roundabout from Ballysimon road.

I think the arrows on the lane were scrubbed off but not sure if there were new arrows elsewhere.

Anyone see this?

Very confusing and dangerous roundabout.

Yep was there myself only an hour ago, directional arrows were wiped away, I wonder will they be changing it back to the way it was before. Very silly layout 1 out 3 cars were always on the wrong lane....

chicorytip

On the cycle path leading from the Groody roundabout to the University the directional arrows seem to have been reversed,whether by accident or design, indicating users to cycle on the right hand side rather than the left. Why is this?

Popoutman

chicorytip wrote: »

On the cycle path leading from the Groody roundabout to the University the directional arrows seem to have been reversed,whether by accident or design, indicating users to cycle on the right hand side rather than the left. Why is this?

My guess is that it wasn't specified in the contract or design, and that the drawings may have used "standard" engineering clip-art and that would have most likely have been suited to American or European side-of-the-road conventions and not the Irish conventions, and the contractor doesn't have either the imagination or cop-on to do an appropriate painting.

I have to say that the improved transitions on the roundabout between the standard road height and the raised pedestrian/bicycle crossings are a lot less severe than they were previously. There's a much less aggressive ramp and one that can be taken without being as likely to break sumps and suspensions. It's a marked improvement, though not all of the transitions are rectified yet. I wonder though did the contractor have to come back free-of-charge to repair the screwup, or were they paid again to resolve the issue.

As for the lane markings, I would hope that they get painted the intelligent way with the left hand lanes pointing left and straight-on, and the right hand lane pointing right-only.