eptivity

I don’t know if you know this, but England has been around for a while. I’m fairly certain that this is behind the obvious absence of urban planners in the development of their street systems. It is almost impossible for the uninitiated to get to where they want to go without very specific directions, a detailed map (that’s the “A to Zed” guide, not the ”A to Z”), or, ideally, a GPS (”sat-nav”). It may also explain why rumors abound about people who have never left the town they grew up in—like growing up in Beaverton and never venturing into the wild world of Portland.

Along with a mind of her own, our particular sat-nav has a few favorite commands:
“Drive [point-something] miles and then enter roundabout”
“Enter roundabout”
“Enter roundabout and take [some number generally between 'first' and 'sixteenth'] exit”

And with a strange mixture of glee and disappointment in our shortcomings:
“When possible, make a U-turn”

They do love their roundabouts here. We’ve seen exactly one stop sign since arriving, and this one English person we know had to be prompted for the word “intersection” when it came up in conversation.

One of the more infamous is the Magic Roundabout in Swindon. Stephan drove through it last week, and I hear that it is only through the grace of some guy named Russ, who he was following, that he made it through without incident:

The best part is that the mini-roundabouts go clockwise, like normal roundabouts, but the big center roundabout goes counterclockwise (”anti-clockwise”).

Are we surprised that I’m not planning on driving here?