mtbc: maze D (yellow-black)
Mark T. B. Carroll ([personal profile] mtbc) wrote2016-04-23 07:10 am
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Roundabout terminology

This morning I confused myself over roundabouts (perhaps you know them as traffic circles or rotaries). If I use a small roundabout to make a U-turn then I traversed all four quadrants yet turned through not much more than 180°. Did I drive halfway around the roundabout or all the way around it? I had initially assumed that a quarter of the way around would approximate 90° of turn.

I suppose that the confusion arises from the physical layout: at a smaller roundabout, traversing the first quadrant feels rather like driving further ahead, but at a large one I may be making a considerable turn just to get onto the roundabout and back off it so while I am actually on it I turn through a greater angle.