How do you spot retired NASCAR drivers on the road?
They’re the ones stuck in a roundabout for two hours, waiting for someone to wave the checkered flag.
That’s not just a joke. That’s sociology.
In the extraordinary landscape of American traffic misadventures, nothing has thrown our driving confidence into chaos quite like the modern roundabout. These asphalt merry-go-rounds are spreading across towns like dandelions after the first mow, uninvited, unwanted, and totally immune to reason.
City planners say they ease traffic flow.
I say they’re just bureaucratic crop circles designed to test our will to live.
The First Encounter: Confusion at 10 MPH
My first run-in with one of these circular contraptions was in Appleton, Wisc. I approached cautiously as if it were a beehive with a loose lid. The signs pointed everywhere and nowhere. There were arrows painted on the pavement, yielding to other arrows, which were yielding to ghosts, or memories, or something I hadn’t seen yet.
No stop sign.
Just a gentle, smiling “Yield,” which was traffic code for “You’re on your own, pal.”
I crept in.
A Subaru from Minnesota flew past me on the inside.
A Jeep with out-of-state plates joined the fray.
Then, I made the rookie mistake of making eye contact with another driver. We both slammed on the brakes; each convinced the other had the right of way or a weapon.
Eventually, we waved each other on at the same time.
Then we stopped again.
It was like a politeness standoff in a doughnut shop.
And this is what counts as “improved flow.”
The Circle of Strife
Roundabouts, they say, are the European way, just like bidets, lukewarm beer, and declaring soccer to be thrilling.
Yes, it works in France.
They also drive Peugeots the size of microwaves and consider honking to be a conversation.
But here in the Midwest?
We drive trucks that need GPS to make right turns.
Putting a Silverado in a roundabout is like watching a St. Bernard do ballet.
The people designing these things must’ve skipped driver’s ed entirely and gone straight into SimCity.
There’s a town near me that recently built three roundabouts in a row.
Three.
Like a game show from hell.
If you make it through all three without swearing, you get a commemorative cheese curd and your photo on the municipal wall.
When NASCAR Meets Reality
This might be a good time to tell you about John.
Years ago, I worked with an operations manager who moonlighted as a semi-pro race car driver. A level just below NASCAR, but no less serious.
The man could drift a sedan around a parking cone like it was choreographed. Sponsored by Budweiser and the company we both worked for, John was the real deal.
Every summer, we hosted a customer appreciation day in Kaukauna, Wisc., home of the legendary Dick Trickle Pavilion. (And if you can say that out loud without smirking, you’re a stronger person than I.)
One year, as we were setting up folding tables and dragging coolers full of bratwursts across the lawn, I spotted John and struck up a conversation.
“Where’s the finish line, anyway?” I asked, gesturing toward the track.
He pointed.
Calm. Confident.
And without missing a beat, the wiseacre in me quipped: “Oh, so you do know where the finish line is!”
John didn’t laugh, just smirked and walked away.
That’s how professionals handle amateurs.
But that line’s stuck with me. Because let me tell you: no one in a roundabout knows where the finish line is. You just orbit until you recognize a landmark, a street name, or a gas station you trust enough to pull into and cry.
The Rules of the Roundabout (As Imagined by People Who’ve Never Driven)
Rule #1: Yield to the left. Unless you’re in England, then yield to a goat or the Queen or something.
Rule #2: Use your blinker. But only if you enjoy seeing confusion on the faces of others. Blinkers in roundabouts are like interpretive dance, open to wild misinterpretation.
Rule #3: Never make eye contact. This is crucial. Roundabouts are lawless zones where eye contact is a sign of weakness or a duel.
Rule #4: If you miss your exit, keep going. Eventually, you’ll see it again. In 17 seconds. Every. Single. Time.
Roundabouts don’t solve traffic.
They redistribute chaos in a circular format.
Regional Trauma and GPS Betrayals
If you’re from the Midwest, you were raised on four-way stops.
You make pies and lemon bars for funerals.
You wave to strangers.
You yield, yes, but only on the moral high ground.
Then, one day, your city installs a roundabout on Main and Jefferson, and everything goes feral.
The grandma who used to bake you banana bread is now honking like a New York City cabbie.
Your mailman’s been in the inner lane for 12 minutes.
Your cousin took the wrong exit and now lives in Sheboygan.
GPS? It doesn’t help. It’ll say, “Take the third exit.” Which is excellent if you count while panicking. Otherwise, it’s like trying to follow a recipe during a fire drill.
A Word from the Serious Department
Now, I’ll be fair.
Despite looking like a joke from a rejected Mario Kart course, roundabouts do have one thing going for them: safety.
According to the Federal Highway Administration, roundabouts reduce fatal crashes by up to 90%, and injury crashes by about 75% compared to traditional intersections.
That’s because there are fewer conflict points, slower speeds, and less chance for the infamous T-bone crash that ruins both cars and Thanksgivings.
In other words, you may feel like you’re in a perpetual loop of confusion, but statistically speaking, you’re less likely to leave it in a stretcher.
So yes, roundabouts might feel like a medieval psychological test with modern signage, but apparently, they’re safer than the four-way stop where everyone pretends they weren’t waving you on.
We just don’t have to like them.
Tourist Traps and Pavement Purgatory
I once heard of a guy from out of town who got stuck in a roundabout so long he burned through a tank of gas.
His wife packed sandwiches from the glove box.
They named the traffic cones and built a Spotify playlist.
Some say he’s still there, driving.
Listening to Alan Jackson and searching for Exit 4.
Honestly, if purgatory has a form, it’s a roundabout with no signage and no clear destination, just you, a Buick, and the slow unraveling of your faith in infrastructure.
Make Mine Square
I don’t need my roads to be avant-garde.
I don’t want them to resemble a roulette wheel.
Give me stop signs.
Give me red lights and green lights and maybe the occasional yellow to remind me that life is full of caution.
But if I wanted to travel in circles with no idea where I was going, I’d go back to using MapQuest and trauma bonding with my ex-in-laws.
Roundabouts, in theory, are about efficiency.
In practice, they’re a psychological experiment conducted without consent.
And somewhere, a city planner is watching drone footage of all of us trapped like ants in a coffee mug and giggling into his or her soy latte.
With the summer’s vacation season starting in earnest, here’s to the brave souls navigating our nation’s most pointless circles.
May your exits be clear.
May your blinker be interpreted correctly.
And may you never, ever make eye contact.
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