Bike Lanes and Roundabouts: A Comparative Case Study Analysis 89 views

Over the last decade, American roads have become increasingly unsafe for pedestrians and cyclists, with fatal and injury crashes dramatically increasing. Over the same period, roundabouts have been promoted as safer alternative to traffic signals, but their safety benefits for bikers and pedestrians are not as significant as they are for vehicles. There is a large body of research about roundabout designs that prioritize cyclist and pedestrian safety, and using a comparative case study approach, this research was compared to four case studies of roundabouts in the USA. Two case studies highly conformed to the best practices found in research, one moderately conformed, and one did not conform at all. Each roundabout design revealed which modes of travel were prioritized when the roundabouts were constructed, and in all but one case study, the vehicle was the primary mode of travel that the roundabout was designed for, even if infrastructure was added for cyclists and pedestrians. This reveals that it takes significant political pressure for a roundabout to prioritize any mode of travel besides the vehicle, and most projects that transportation agencies hail as a model of multimodal safety still prioritize vehicles equally, if not higher, than cyclists and pedestrians. To achieve meaningful progress in reducing injuries and deaths for cyclists and pedestrians, further priority for these groups is needed when designing roundabouts.

BUEP (Bachelor of Urban and Environmental Planning)

transportation; traffic safety; bike lanes; roundabouts; multimodal

English

All rights reserved by the author (no additional license for public reuse)

2026-05-16