Kappara Junction - a tale of two circles

No two roads or road junctions are exactly the same, as no two situations are exactly the same. It may not be perfectly correct to compare two road junctions. Yet it may be useful to compare different road junctions to try and explain or understand what results might be obtained.

There are a number of configurations for roundabouts, but for our purposes we may restrict this discussion to basically three types. In the United States, roundabouts are called circles.

The roundabout at Kappara is the type that normally creates the biggest gridlock, particularly during rush hours. There are a number of these in Washington, DC, and when a driver gets caught in one of these there is very little one can do except to pray to keep one's cool.

It so happens that just before and just after the roundabout at Kappara there are two other different junctions along Regional Road. At the Tal-Qroqq junction the main road passes underneath a roundabout. This type of solution could be considered for Kappara, but it would still be very expensive.

Between the Kappara roundabout and the Regional Road tunnels there is another junction of which few of us take notice. The reason is that in this case what could have served as a roundabout is split, so traffic drives right through it. In this particular case, traffic cannot cross from one side to the other, so the situation is totally different.

These two junctions remind me of two circles in North West Washington, DC. At Dupont Circle, Connecticut Avenue passes underneath the roundabout above that directs traffic going along Massachusetts Avenue. This is very similar in nature to the set-up at Tal-Qroqq, although the volume of traffic is evidently different.

At Tenley Circle, traffic along Wisconsin Avenue goes through a split roundabout with the two semi-circles on the side of the road directing traffic going along Nebraska Avenue and Yuma Street. At this circle traffic is controlled by traffic lights.

In the past we used to say that roundabouts and traffic lights do not mix. Experience has shown that when necessary the two may co-exist with proper traffic management systems.

The flyover proposed for Kappara might be the right solution, but it is not known if the authorities concerned had conducted proper exercises in cost-benefit analysis of different types of junctions.

It may well be that an arrangement similar to the one at Tenley Circle could solve the problem at Kappara at a much lower expenditure and in a shorter time frame, and without the need of demolishing nearby buildings. The main carriageway needs to pass through the Kappara roundabout, moving the semi-circles to the side to direct the flow of traffic of Sliema Road, the secondary road, or the traffic that wants to make a turn from the main carriageway.

Traffic moving along the central lanes of the main carriageway need to keep going straight, and may not make any turns. Those cars that want to make a turn need to stay in the left lane and go round the semi-circles if they wish to make a right turn, waiting for the appropriate light signals.

The flow of traffic is controlled by traffic lights from all directions, including the secondary road and the ones going round the semi-circles. A proper study of such a possible solution might show that the limited resources allocated for road building could be spared from this junction and allocated for another location.

EU funds are not endless or infinite, so it might make sense to find the best possible use of them following the appropriate benefit-cost analysis of each and every project.