The Most Dangerous Traffic Circle In The World?

"Peddle" cab? Is it selling something?

Over here in Johannesburg, I came across a remarkable intersection where five roads meet. It does not have any high speed traffic but confusing nevertheless. I find it strange how municipal town planners have set up roads in some suburbs. Must have been some bureaucrat, idiot who was put in the council offices by a concerned uncle who use the nepotism rule just to keep him out of mischief.

There is another Road close to my place with some spectacular motor car accidents. I mean real classics. I guesstimated a few years ago that it had more annual road accidents than the whole of New Zealand in the same period. Traffic police have set up hidden cameras for a year or so and this brought down the accident rate. Common accidents include car going (up) into tree in middle, car going fence on left, car going into wall on right. Road goes down steadily and after a dip it comes up again but swings sharply to the left. People speed and underestimate the sharp curve after the dip. Usually spectacular accidents late night on weekends. Will try to search out some pictures of past accidents for you guys. Could actually make a wonderful coffee table book.

Last time I was in New Zealand (which is some odd over 15 years ago) there was a road that was plastered with crosses indicating deadly accidents. It sounds a little bit like your street - but just in New Zealand.

Did you use it to exaggerate your statistic?

IdeaSmith,

Over the past few years, National Road Fatalities in SA averaged somewhere around 20 000 per year out of population of approximately 50 million. Officially, they say this has come down to somewhere around 14 000 per year.

I like to present comparative figures as [Road Accident Fatalities divided by Car Population]. When looked at this way, SA has a figure that is 16 times higher than that of the UK. Strange when you consider that the roads are similar but the weather is awful in UK compared to SA what with their grey, misty, rainy weather patterns compared to SA's abundance of sun. Right now we are in the middle of our winter and Jo'burg has been bright and sunny for the past month as it has summer rainfall. Even then there is sun as the rain is usually concentrated in late afternoon for an hour or so of downpour. Don't get me wrong. I'm happy with our weather. Just wanted to point out that it should be a factor that reduces road accidents.

A few interesting facts: A good portion of road fatalities 50-60% are attributed to pedestrians. In SA, it is clear that the big cities are built entirely for the motor car. The pedestrian takes a back-seat in the area of convenience.

The driving, especially in the hub - the populated Gauteng Province, can be quite aggressive if you will. Quite organized by western standards of facilities. But definitely not polite and courteous as we find by contrast in the chaotic yet polite traffic of the eastern cities. I must say that I would battle to drive or even to exist comfortably as a passenger in those hectic eastern traffic conditions. Looks quite nerve wracking. But I am impressed with the politeness. I think we can learn a great deal from them !

Question is : Would one rather go for cities with low fatality figures or for cities with low nerve-wracking rating in terms of driving?

I think the Australian and New Zealand National Road Fatality figures are quite low. If anyone 'Down-under' has any recent figures for this data please let us know.

Would that be the one in Bad Doberan, where the Mollibahn crosses the main intersection too?

Designate the traffic circle a "Demolition Derby" intersection and sell tickets by the score! Vietnamese love to bet on ANYTHING! LOL

We must also distinguish between hectic, reckless and actual accident rate. Some cities have hectic driving yet have average accident rates. Bangkok, New Delhi, Ho Chi Min City have driving that would send the average westerner into panic attack mode. These could even be termed ordered chaos. But I'm not sure whether this translates into high accident rates. They say Nairobi is also hectic. Other cities have aggressive driving with high accident rates. If anyone can, please do put on some links with spectacular videos on this subject. I can recommend the Website of FunMansions.com

If you are after road accident figures, I would say look at Road Fatalities per year divided by population. If you are interested in the sheer thrill or fear of hectic chaotic driving then the above cities are ones to go for. Other dangers include the chance of being hijacked.

The 5 ways roundabout in Suffolk, near NewMarket seems to have it sorted out (bit slow leaving Mildenhall during peak traffic though...

Drew K

Been there. Still talk about it. One of the nice things about being in the Army was we had a truck bigger than theirs.