Rounadbouts entering Dundrum

clipper1981

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On the way into Dundrum there are 3 roundabouts before the shopping centre. Yesterday I was almost involved in an accident as i attempted to go straight on at one of these. According to the rules of the road you should be in the left hand lane if you intend to go staright ahead. Can someone please clarify if this is correct as many drivers approaching these roundabouts are using the right hand lane even though they are going straight ahead.
 
nope, both lanes can go straight ahead. you have to be in left lane if taking 1st or 2nd exit. have to be in right lanes if taking 2nd or 3rd exits
 
the left hand lane is for first and second exits. The right hand lane is for third and subsequent exits. HOWEVER, if you are for example entering a dual carriageway, the right hand lane can be used for the second exit and the left hand lane would feed into the left hand lane of the duel c., the right hand lane would feed into the right hand lane of the duel c.

Some roundabouts have road markings that vary from this. For example in Cork some roundabouts have an arrow to go left ONLY in the left hand lane. I'm not sure if road markings are a law in themselves, that is, if they override the above prescribed behavior.
 
the roundabouts at the dundrum shopping centre enters into dual carriageway but not the previous 3 there are only single lanes of traffic after them.
 
For a country with so many round abouts, we are blissifully ignorant how they should be used. I did my test while living in London, and the use of roundabouts was always a source of friction with my instructor. My particular bug bear is indicating - my instructor reckons you would fail the test for hesitation there if the other driver isn't indicating and you were trying to guess what way he was going (no indiction means going straight through only). I found this funny, cos in Ireland you'd quickly end up in an accident, and sure enough only 12 months after moving back I was T-boned by an idiot in an ESB artic turning left in the right hand lane at the M50 / M1 junction (he was wondering what I was doing there, I thought the fact I was in the left lane and indicating left was pretty obvious) . In the UK, you use them as follows:

left hand land - for straight ahead and left only. Indicting left means going lweft, no indicators means going straight through. On larger roundabouts, tou may have to indicate as you are approaching the exit your going off at.
Right hand lane - right hand turn only. Indicating right.

I would expect the same to apply here, gioven the drive on the same side of the road as us. As far as I know that applies to single & dual lane carraigeways only. I'm not sure of the rules when it comes to road markings when these are marked differently, although where ther are marked people still ignore them and do whatever they like.
I think the government need to run a campaign as to how these should be used, it's chaos out there.
 
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