City of Salem PLUS

Who had the idea for this rotary? Seriously, it seems that the city planners are deliberately trying to find any ways they can to grind this city to a standstill for traffic! Putting in bike lanes and then putting up signs for bikes to use the full lane. New stop lights that create more backups. Putting in one-ways that block off arteries out of the city. Now a rotary (really a roundabout) in one location that actually flowed (noticed how there are no lights at that intersection?)!

You put in a rotary in the ONE intersection in the whole downtown that actually flowed smoothly! We have been driving in and out of Salem for 22 years and never has that intersection been a problem (October wkds not included, but that is a problem at EVERY intersection downtown).

As someone who has been involved in civil engineering, I can tell you that the only time we ever put in a rotary is to slow things down/stop vehicle/pedestrian accidents. Emphasis on SLOW THINGS DOWN...as in, slow to a crawl. Salem needs to IMPROVE the FLOW of traffic, not create more backups!

The problems downtown are the Essex/Summer intersection and the Washington/Derby/Norman intersections. That second one is mainly just because the city STILL refuses to address the issue of having multiple huge crosswalks across a main artery. Instead, they try to make it look like they are doing something by foolish projects like a rotary in a spot that already works! People just need to drive conscientiously, like making sure to stop so that there is room for turning traffic to make the left turn down Norman while waiting for the traffic backup caused by the Essex St intersection to move. No amount of rotary, planning, etc, can account for people being awful on the roads.

Look at other cities that work well. Set walk signals up at the cross walks that change WITH the signals. So traffic goes at the same time that the pedestrians do in the same directions. Not these huge, 60-second stoppages IN-BETWEEN light cycles! Boston does it. NY does it. Vancouver, BC does it. Houston does it. St. Louis does it...and so on.

For Essex St (at both Summer and Washington) if signals cannot be put in, then consider building maritime-themed and/or witch-themed pedestrian bridges with ramps. They can be made as gorgeous accents to cities if done correctly (emphasis on that part). If nothing is done to get the Essex St intersection moving, the rotary itself is meaningless as you will just have the same problems with cars all backed up waiting for that light.

As for the rotary...please remove it. It was not even instituted properly, with a poor curvature resulting in a hard left turn instead of a smooth transition. Another thing you do not do with rotaries is PUT THEM IN WHERE PEDESTRIANS COMMONLY CROSS! Very, very dangerous.

I have read some people on here say that this is a 'green' solution because cars do not have to stop. Whomever is saying this has no idea what they are talking about and/or have no experience with this. First off, cars today are built with partial-zero and zero emissions. In addition to that, they also normally shut off the engine when having to stop and go in traffic. Ignoring all that (and why would you??), as noted, rotaries SLOW TRAFFIC DOWN, causing more backups. Which means more people just sitting there, idling anyway (if that is your worry).

The downtown traffic needs to be addressed, but in the right spots/way. This location is NOT the problem, but it will become a newly-created one by the city if left here. Take real action at the true problems which I mentioned above.

As one more example, look at the Cape. Millions of dollars were spent to create the 'flyover' to improve traffic flow. What was it? Removing the rotary at the Sagamore Bridge! It has had a huge impact. Population growth and increased tourists/vacationers will offset the gains but the removal of the rotary has greatly decreased the backups, especially compared to what they would be now with the increase in traffic.