I live in a small midwestern town that has recently taken to the idea of roundabouts. At first, I was extremely pleased (having good experiences with them in Paris/French HW systems) but I quickly became discouraged when I realized that 90% of drivers had no idea what they were doing.

I now avoid certain routes through town because I'm afraid of getting in an accident.

What's so hard to get for those people? Roundabouts seem simple enough to me (though I may be biased, coming from Europe and now living in Britain).

The roundabouts near me seem to be working well...

Stop. Go.

They're so used to driving in straight lines. Their cars are simply not made for corners.

I guess you need to build roundabouts, update the cars so they can corner, and educate the public on how to steer.

Ugh. If there's one thing that the French road system does badly, it's roundabouts.. Firstly, they have the weird idea of having two types - roundabouts that have traffic entering into the roundabout giving way to the traffic already on the roundabout, and then roundabouts where the traffic entering has priority over the traffic already on the roundabout. Some roundabouts of the second type have traffic lights on the roundabout.

And who hasn't seen photos of the traffic on Etoile (the roundabout that goes around the Arc de Triomphe)? Nightmare! All of those stories people tell abot Etoile are true - I sometimes go up there on foot so that guests can see the arc de triomphe up close, and I see an accident about once in every three trips. Insane.

But four-way stops give the Americans so many opportunities to demonstrate their well known diffidence and thinking of other drivers.

s/diffidence/deference