YACK on Roundabout.

Here's my column from The Nantucket Independent last week.

My head is spinning. And the reason is simple. It’s that new roundabout that they are building at the intersection of Sparks Avenue and Hooper Farm Road. We’ve been talking about it a great deal on YACKon.com and it seems as though everyone has a strong opinion about it. Some people love it. Some people hate it. And some people were taken completely by surprise by the fact that it’s actually being built. (“When did we approve that?” one YACKer posted a week or so ago.)

I recall about five years back when I was hosting the YACK TV show on TV17, and Edward Sanford, who was then the chair of the Mid-Island Area Plan committee, came on the show to talk about the mid-island plan. At the time, the intersection at Sparks, Hooper Farm and Pleasant street was slated to be a four-way stop. Land was acquired at the corner of Hooper Farm and Sparks from the Sheep to Shore parking lot to bend Hooper Farm to face Pleasant street head on, thus creating a simple T-intersection. Seemed logical at the time.

But somewhere along the way, that simple T-intersection was changed to the roundabout being built this week. I’m not sure why. I guess I should have called up Traffic Planner, Mike Burns and asked him. (He’s a pretty good guy. For an Astros fan.) But life is often busy and harried and who has time to make phone calls about roundabouts and intersections when there are websites to code and ads to write and groceries to shop for and dogs to walk?

So when the vote came up at town meeting, I was somewhat surprised to see the plans for the roundabout for the first time there. It looked, to me, like Stone Henge. And I was surprised that the voters did not listen to Mr. Alan Brown when he spoke so eloquently against the roundabout. I believe the argument went something like this: This is a big project designed to make cars move faster through an intersection where today they move through somewhat slowly. But move, they do. So why do we need to spend millions on a roundabout when all that is really required is patience and perhaps some snappy tunes on the radio? I added that last part. But you get the drift.

It’s a valid argument. But I see this roundabout as serving a purpose that goes beyond mere traffic attenuation. This thing will serve as a sort of gateway to the mid-island. Kind of like the rotary at the bottom of the Bourne Bridge on the cape with the big sign that says, “Welcome to Cape Cod!” It means that people will be coming to the mid island from all over and they’ll see this modern roundabout and the cool granite stone accouterments and the signs with the arrows and they’ll say, “wow,” the mid-island has come a long, long way, man! We don’t have a cool roundabout like this in Shimmo or Dionis!” And then, as a resident of the mid-island districts, I will benefit from rising home values in the area as more and more wealthy summer residents see this roundabout and begin to pine for stylish mid-island living. Before you know it, I’ll be able to cash in on this whole roundabout concept and sell my house for nine or ten times what I paid for it. I can’t wait.

One of the problems with the particular traffic feature is deciding upon what we should all actually call it. We can’t call it “the Rotary” for two reasons. One, It’s technically not a rotary, it’s a roundabout. There are differences between a rotary and a roundabout, but those differences are only known to traffic planning wonks and seasoned municipal engineers. Just take my word for it, they are different. Two, we already have a thing called the Rotary and it’s 23 seconds away from the thing being built now. I can just hear someone giving a tourist on a bike directions.

“Take a right at the rotary and then head up to the other rotary where you’ll want to go around and take a left, which is actually a right because you’ll be headed in the other direction. If you miss your turn Just go around again….”

We may find that some people get caught up in the dueling rotary/roundabout system and run out of gas trying to find their way out of them. Or they may get so dizzy that there will be a preponderance of upside-down SUVs in the mid island due to vertigo-induced traffic accidents. It won’t be pretty.

Which brings me to another problem I have with the new roundabout. We already have one major rotary where visitors and residents alike barely understand the basic rules of engagement. Adding this second circular traffic feature will likely result in twice the number of honked horns, angry shouts and bewildered shrugs from those of us who actually know that the people in the circle have the right of way. Just driving around the new roundabout is a challenge as it is so new and foreign that I have met three separate vehicles head-on as they try to traverse the circle in a clockwise fashion instead of counter clockwise, which is the prescribed driving pattern.

I now carry a can of bright orange spray paint around with me and the next time someone meets me in the roundabout going the other way, I will stop them and paint a giant counter-clockwise arrow on the hood of their car so they can remember which way to go.

Despite my griping and moaning about the new roundabout, I do think it will be a success. I can already see traffic moving smoothly through its dusty pre-pavement layout. Drivers only need to pay attention to who’s in the circle and not who is coming the other way (If I spray paint enough hoods). And access to both Pleasant and Sparks from Hooper Farm will be less of a step-on-the-gas-and-pray proposition.

Furthermore, my wife, Barrie has given the roundabout the big thumbs up. No longer will she need to take a right from Hooper Farm Road and then turn around in the Bank’s parking lot in order to get onto Pleasant street. She’s delighted with this new traffic feature.

And when my wife is happy, I’m happy.

YACK on.

Grant Sanders is the host of YACK, the Nantucket Online Community at yackon.com and he would like to remind visitors and residents that the monument in the middle of upper Main Street is not a rotary or a roundabout. Just get around the thing as best you can without hurting yourselves, please. His views are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of The Nantucket Independent.