I can think of three or four roundabouts on the Leicester ring road that I approach very gingerly and with my heart in my mouth because I can’t see what’s going on around the other side. Why you ask? Well, the council in their wisdom have planted ruddy great treesin the middle of them 
. It looks like a forest and doesn’t do anything for your field of vision when you approach 
. Why I ask you? Anyone know of any more?
Any one they let car drivers on■■?
As both an HGV & a PSV driver be warned those Merc sprinter (30 seater)minibuses have thier wing mirrors positioned in just the right place to totally stop any vision to the right on Roundabouts, without a lot of not only head, but also body movement.
I hate those things, give me a Routemaster any day.
the reason they plant trees on roundabouts is to slow all traffic down on the approach. as you said you slow down so it must work. however this does do nothing for the truckdriver who has to make a guess as to when to pull out as most cars seem to travel at over 30 mph around these small roundabouts giving the waiting truck a hard job not to oull out in front of anyone.
also if you notice that some of the conifers on these leicester roundabouts are fake trees. so much for the enviroment then.
If we done our job as badly as these so called road planners then nothing would be delivered. My ex works in a council with some designers and she said that they work out widths and things and 9 foot is the width of an artic, so I said to this woman (at a party) what about when the trailer cuts the corner and you need to move the unit over to accomodater the trailer AND a car is along side you how does that work. She replied, well it’s not our problem we just design according to the width of a vehicle, I was drunk and said that these people should be tried for attempted manslaughter then if thats their attitude.
M6 J29 turning right onto M65 you come off the motorway and its a 2 lane slip the left hand lane goes straight across and the right hand lane goes straight accross and filters right onto the M65 and i can guarantee you everytime i go round there is an artic in the lefthand lane that cuts accross traffic and onto the 65
M65 J8 turning right onto A56 towards manchester why o why do artics insist on using the lefthand lane for turning right
What i would like to know is when the law changed on lane disipline for artics
Now if you are not one of the above people then my apologies for tarring you with the above but if you are one of the above THEN LEARN TO [ZB] DRIVE BEFORE YOU KILL SOMEONE [ZB]
simon
PS can you tell this really [ZB] me off
I wish people here knew what roundabouts were for but the don’t. The times I have been following a car around one when it has stopped dead because someone is approaching from a side road, I am talking stopping when half way round the thing. 
I particularly like(not) the roundabouts that have signs placed purely to block a truck drivers view, so they have to edge onto the roundabout to see whats coming, amazingly, car drivers, who can accelerate a ■■■■ sight faster, can see under the things.
I would also like to see a cop car sat there taking the numbers of drivers who indicate wrongly, or not even at all.
Don’t get me started on the subject of people not indicating on roundabouts
It seems to be the latest craze here in London. I reckon less than 10 % of drivers use their indicators on roundabouts, drives me nuts. What’s worse though are the ones that indicate too early. You know the ones. They indicate that they are leaving by the road you are waiting to join from, you start to pull away and there they are 6 inches from your front bumper.
I’m not even going to mention lane discipline on roundabouts…it’s bad enough in a 7 1/2, how you guys in the artics cope with these clowns that think the best way across a roundabout is a straight line is beyond me…
Tomcat, it comes with experience how to “deal” with other non-artic vehicles who don’t have a clue about the space we need. Generally speaking if I need to use both lanes on approach to an island/junction then I’ll get across both before another vehicle has chance to get in that space. It usually works. If there’s a queue and you find yourself suddenly needing part of the other lane so that trailer doesn’t go over kerb then I’ll wait for the traffic to start moving and then position the nose of the wagon into the gap between the two vehicles in that lane. Usually, the driver will suss out what I’m doing and simply wait or find out the hard way as I’m bigger than they are 
What does cheese me off are other vehicles that sit alongside when coming to such junctions. I will have already seen from 100yds back that I will need both lanes so I’ll either race to the junction to beat the other vehicle and straddle both lanes or ease off if they’re close already and let them get past first before I take my swing. When they don’t get past or slow down you end up having to slam on before the curve so that they get out of the way and you don’t run the trailer across the kerb.
The other thing is when they can’t keep themselves in their own lane on curved approaches to roundabouts and end up with the nearside wheels in your lane by 1ft, just when you need your own wheels to be up against that lane so that the trailer clears the kerb.
My worst roundabout I have to deal is the one under the M1 at the Dunstable/Luton turn. Coming from Dunstable to turn right onto the M1S at that roundabout is just crazy. Don’t know about 2 lanes required, try 3 ! Cars use the middle lane (2nd straight on lane) like a race-track and it’s a wonder that an artic hasn’t totalled someone there. It’s a death-trap.
I stress on the phrase “other vehicles” because it isn’t just cars and vans that have no road sense, it’s just as much 7.5 tonners and class 2’s as well. Class 2 drivers especially should know better out of the bunch.
Ok, not all class 2/7.5t drivers are wonderful, but we’re not all useless you know…
SOME of us were taught to use sufficient space on roundabouts, and a few of us still remember it and use it!!!
The one that always amazes me is at Dover docks. You arrive off the ferry after driving on the left across Europe and then at the first roundabout driving on the right outside docks the road forces trucks to enter a fast flowing lane on their left or hit the car that was on their right. You really got to vigilant !!!
theres a roundabout between stone and stoke on the a34 with a blooming pub in the middle of it.
i perticually remember this one from whe i passed my test because as you approach it you have to make a decision from about 20 yards if your going to go for it because if you got to the line and stopped you were basically [zb]ed because you coludn’t see around the pub and as soon as you go to pull out cars would be on you like a flash.
jon