Changing meaning on some roads is a real nightmare. If we go for a National Highway It is relatively simple, but skip a highway exit or in large avenues of some of the larger and more congested cities on the planetit involves going huge to change the meaning of the march. And in a Chinese city they are applying a solution that facilitates the maneuver: the ‘U -urn‘, or “U turning”.
The videos are not very convincing if we talk about security.
U -urn. There are several designs when making changes to meaning. The idea is to make as many maneuvers as possible and that these are safe. Roundabouts are an efficient design for this, but on roads with a large number of lanesThey are little practical. You can always turn in the street and turn the block to rejoin the main road, but it takes longer.
There the U-Turn that has begun to apply in cities such as Jinancapital of Shandong. The concept is simple: a lane stuck to the median that allows not to turn left, but to make an even more closed turn to join the opposite direction of march.
AAAAAHORA. The video that we leave just on these lines is revealing: several cars stop in several numbered squares and wait for their turn to make that change of meaning. A continuous white line makes the difference between that lane and the rest of its march, and a yellow makes medium.
How do you get the impatient drivers wait for your turn? Through a traffic light, which is the one that regulates the maneuver. The coordination between the traffic lights allows to stop the traffic of the lane to which we want to incorporate while opening the traffic light that gives green light to the incorporation maneuver, and discontinuous lines on the ground serve as a guide for drivers.
Jinan’s U-Turn
Risks. Now, although in This video Posted by People’s Daily and In this other Published by MAO NO, spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, the maneuvers seem idyllic, if we look at both videos and in the above we can see two of the problems, and consequent risks, of this maneuver.
On the one hand: the scope that can be produced by the vehicles that already circulated in that direction. There is a traffic light that cuts trafficbut … what happens if they jump it or if they circulated at more speed? The same goes for those who want to incorporate. As the turn is so closed, there may be touches between them. In fact, there are several cars that must lessen or even correct the trajectory so as not to “eat” any of those that are incorporated.
An example in the United States. In Florida, specifically
Nothing exotic. Now, this U turning is not exclusive to China and, although the implementation in Jinan has caught attention, There are other areas in which it is allowed. The United States or Taiwan are two of them, but in the case of the North American country, it depends on the State and the implementation varies from a discontinuous line on the ground, the regulation through a traffic light or more extreme cases such as a road design that, in Spain, seems exotic:
Therefore, although very colorful, that Jinan lane is another implementation of this 180 degree turn to change meaning. In countries outside Europe, where apples are usually smaller and narrower roads, it is normal to see this type of implementations, but in the case of the solution applied in Jinan, the striking is the amount of cars simultaneously that can make the change of meaning.
And the problem is that, although functional because it allows a road with a large number of lanes Several cars can make a 180 degree turn simultaneously, in the published videos you can perfectly see that the possibility of a range is there.
Images | Mrswagger21
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Xataka
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Alejandro Alcolea
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