The magic roundabout
26/01/2006 12:00:00 a.m.
A WELLINGTON City Council experiment with a judder bar-like roundabout in Island Bay has been reversed.
Earlier this year, the council installed a large roundabout with a raised apron at the intersection of Dee Street and The Parade. The apron of the roundabout was so large that cars were often forced to drive over it and the wisdom of this was first questioned in Capital Times in March.
That judder bar roundabout received a mixed response from local residents and the road level has now been raised to make it flush with the apron.
"There were some concerns about the ability of larger vehicles, particularly buses and trucks, to go around the apron," says Stavros Michael, the council’s director of infrastructure.
"The purpose of the apron was to slow down traffic, but if we need to do something to improve it, we will do it," Michael says.
"So we have paved the road to eliminate the gap between the asphalt and apron."
Michael says the roundabout was "a bit pioneering" but is achieving its purpose of slowing down traffic. The negating of the apron at that intersection will not necessarily be repeated at similar roundabouts in the city, he says.
"Every case is an individual case."
