laned roundabouts - they make me never want to drive anywhere again! Wtf are the rules?

[LiftWantedAroundTheWorld]

I've been driving 4 years and am (I think) a careful and considerate driver.

But laned islands make we want to weep. The ones with road markings and lines and arrows telling you where to go are fine - but the ones where its like a big free for all just terrify and confuse me.

I was taught that on a 2 lane roundabout, in the absence of anything to say otherwise, you stay in the outside lane for left and straight over and go inside lane for anything further than straight over. I am prepared to accept that I might have been taught badly as my instructor was shit, but it seems reasonable and I did do that on my test and passed, so am assuming its correct?

So today. Laned island (dual carriageway and then exits for town and industrial estates) but with no actual lanes marked. Me, wanting to go off at the third of four possible exits. So into the inside lane I go, signalling right, then signal left and move over - and then someone entering from the road before the one I want to take pulls out and almost hits the side of my car. I have to stop on the frigging island, him and his wife gesticulating and waving and shouting as though I am in the wrong? Was I?

I would have liked to have moved over to outside lane sooner tbh but a HGV pulled out and blocked the lane I wanted.

But if you go in outside lane to go right, people pull out on you as they think you are exiting before you really are. And if you go in inside lane they pull out on you because they think you should be in outside lane.

I fucking hate driving

I have a fried who has driven for a few years now, but she meticulously plans all her trips out to avoid big roundabouts She gets her dh to do anything that involves big roundabouts!

He was wrong, you were right. He should have given way to you. He obviously imagined you were going off at exit 4.

The HGV driver was also wrong, as he should have given way to you. BUT HGVs commonly pull out at roundabouts when they don't have enough space so his behaviour, although wrong, was unsurprising.

I live near Aberdeen with some of the worst roundabouts in the UK. To get to work I have to drive through 10 laned roundabouts.

HGV drivers do it all the time in my experience. I always assume they are going to - according to DP they hate having to come to a stop so they just plough on slowly in the knowledge that cars will let them due to their size They certainly are the worst offenders for it where we live, you'll be going round indicating etc and they will just be THERE in the lane you were heading for!

I've had to go round twice on many occasions when I've found the outside lane blocked by some ignoramus driver who wants to turn right.
I've also encountered the idiots approaching from my left who drive straight across the roundabout to go straight on and cut across anyone who is turning right.

Some drivers are just aggressive and inconsiderate.

Just checked the map and there are 12 laned roundabouts, not 10. This is the worst one:

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haudagain_roundabout

But there is also Mounthooly, once the largest roundabout in Europe!

There is a busy one near us which I have to negotiate at least twice a week in rush hour and never seem to get right . 5 exits, 4 of which are main roads and have marked lanes at various stages, controlled by lights. I take 3rd exit which is a B road so no marked lane . Do I
a) keep in outside lane (as marked for 1st and 2nd exit) and get cut up by those wanting to take 2nd exit from inside me
or b) take right hand lane and hope I have time to indicate and space to move across between exit 2 and 3 ?

You were in the right op..... Signalling or not he should not have pulled out into path of an on coming car. maybe he was running late and took a chance then you took the brunt of his frustration.

If my 89 year old nan was in the car with you she would have made round glasses with her fingers and shouted 'Can't you see' at him

Hope you feel better about it soon.

LIZS - god only knows, as whatever you do it will piss someone off and someone will probably cut you up anyway! I think I'd go for b) as I think that's technically correct but its a hairy business!