All about them Roundabouts December 6 2025

The average American wastes about one week a year sitting in traffic, so says the Commercial Carrier Journal. They put a dollar figure on it of about $771.00 annually but since its a week sitting in the car going nowhere, I guess it depends on how much you make a week doesn’t it.

All I know if I spend a 40-hour week sitting in unnecessary traffic jams, I would probably eat close to that in gas, let alone the lost productivity.  

I don’t think about this particular economic cost to mankind very often as we all just kind of accept traffic with a grrr, but it came to mind again when I made my usual drive down to Auburn on highway 49 and hit an atypical traffic jam about halfway down a few months past. After 10 minutes of creeping along, I came upon the reason for the jam up and it was a new roundabout.

It had a weird jig and a jag into this odd circle of lines and the other cars maneuvered as tenderly as I did trying to avoid hitting someone else during the exercise. No doubt all of us were trying to comprehend how this thing was laid out, seeing it for the first time and all.

No sooner then we popped out of the thing, a little further down the road another new roundabout appeared and caused about the same confusion as the first one.

I use the word roundabout loosely here. It was more of a what’s-this thing- about. 

Actually both of them were odd. I didn’t recall any big intersecting side roads that would necessitate either of the new roundabouts. Maybe I don’t know the area well enough, but I do drive the route on occasion and don’t recall any big clusters happening anywhere near these areas in previous trips down 49 that would require traffic mediation when it comes to needing a roundabout.

I am sure some of you know whence of where I speak when it comes to these two roundabouts and it got me thinking of how these things are engineered the way they are.

Speaking with other drivers who have gone through these two clusters brought them to the same conclusion I did.

Who the heck engineered this thing and if it was a school project he or she probably would have received an F if the grade was arrived at by popular demand.

Frankly roundabouts are supposed to make things smoother and only be installed where they are needed.  When it came to these two labyrinths I saw nothing of the sort. What once was a smooth sailing trip is now a traffic headache that eventually, and to this day, makes me take highway 80 from my house. This new route turned out to save me about 20 minutes from what it took me now that the new roundabouts were installed.

It reminded me of the roundabout that was installed in Grass Valley where Ridge Road, Zion Street and Nevada City Highway come together. Although not nearly the mazes that the two highway 49 roundabouts are, it’s still a jumbled mess. One has to wonder if these two designers went to the same school or sit back imbibing the same elixirs when coming up with these things.

Ah, but all is not lost when remembering the frustrations of the time spent and accidents had on bad highway designs like these roundabouts. Take the roundabout at East Main and Idaho-Maryland which also has a third leg handling a Highway 20/49 off ramp.

The designer of that ought to be given an award as that is a breeze to navigate and a well-designed and simple roundabout that works like it should.

Sometimes simplicity beats out complexity when it comes to handling people and their cars.

In conclusion, while we all breeze through the Idaho-Maryland/ East Main roundabout, pity those drivers stuck in the new highway 49 concrete whirlpools or new to the Zion Street roundabout trying to figure out which arm goes where to remain accident free.

Considering the enhanced risk, lost time and wasted gas that goes into these badly designed Frankenbouts, and how long these concrete monstrosities will be used by motorists, it might be better just to bite the bullet, tear them down and redo them.

And when you redo them, hunt down the guy or gal that did the East Main beauty, and give a broom to the other two guys.