The thing about Mount Vernon is that while people tell you they love living there and what not, they really don't. They wish they were in Europe or some major city. And that's how you get them thinking they need a roundabout. Makes it feel "more European." South Carolina has had major growth and the DOT put a ton of effort into getting roundabouts in Charleston and they've spread throughout the state after success down there. We've got a lot of roundabouts near me, but the key is they are all very tight and in spots where they can get everyone slowed down to 10 mph or so for the roundabout so they actually operate more as rolling stop signs with zippers rather than the "let's slow everyone down to 40 and have the cars off Highway 1 play a game of chicken" like they have done in Mt. Vernon.
I have no problem driving in dense traffic and I did it in Chicago all the time. But the thing about Chicago is the highways have fairly little speed variance. I absolutely hate driving in Atlanta because the interstates are all super wide and have a 30 MPH speed variance from the right to left lane. That variance makes for insanely dangerous driving and it appeared to me be exactly what they have created at that intersection. I absolutely hate it because I've seen what it does. It creates swerve situations, hard brake situations that take the steering away and quarterpanel hits that cause rollovers. To me, no driving situation is more stressful than that variance because I've seen too many horrific car accidents to ignore the risk, but 70% of the morons on the road are either ignorant or from the "it won't happen to me" school.
