Adam,My morning drive is more than an hour earlier than yours, so I do not suffer from any traffic, and am quite happy not to have to wait for the green light which used to be where now is the famous roundabout.As for the afternoon, my experience is that the Worton Road traffic lights are always a nightmare, the queue starting usually somewhere around the Shell petrol station. The issue you have in the northbound direction (by the sounds of it) is not the new roundabout, but the arrangements before it. But to be honest with you, there have not been much changes. This is what actually changed:1. Traffic lights were replaced with a roundabout. With the equal number of lanes roundabout is always faster than traffic lights.2. The number of lanes was reduced from two to one. There is now no dedicated line for turning right. I believe it was the only option, as extra room was given to the cycle lane, and there is simply no space there to accommodate a decent pavement, acceptable cycle lane and two lanes for cars. So this had to happen.As for the fact that there are drivers, who, as you say, “force their way in”:(a) This did not change. Under the previous arrangements, there were drivers who kept in the right lane before Worton Road, and then moved to the left lane before the traffic lights. This was (and is now) completely legal. By the way, under the previous arrangements there was traffic moving from the left lane to the right lane, in order to turn right into A3004. Such intersecting flows of traffic were not very safe and created additional congestion.(b) One may argue that “forcing the way in” is bad manners. I would disagree with this, keeping in mind that it is usually not really “forcing the way”. In fact it is good manners not to delay others, to occupy all available road space, including the right hand lane if you are going straight (yes, this is what driving instructors in fact teach), start moving early, signal well in advance if you intend to turn left, so that drivers behind you can move to the right lane and this way keep the traffic flowing.I personally sometimes end up in the right hand lane, sometimes in the left hand lane. Whenever I am in the left hand lane, I don’t have any problem with cars on the right –cars always make it from 2 lanes into one, one from each lane at a time. And there is really only one lane after Worton Road. If I’m in the right hand lane and there is a car in the lane to the left that left the junction together with me, I would slow down, let this car in, and join the lane behind it (if someone behind this first car believes this is rude, I totally disagree with it. Two lanes joining into one happens all the time, this is the way traffic system is designed, and this is how it has to operate).So generally speaking, my observation is that the arrangements are not perfect, but given the existing flow of traffic and the limited road boundaries, the arrangements are fit for purpose and are better than they used to be.
Alex Shpinkov ● 4249d