Margaret Hanson, Wollongbar
I’d like to start off on a positive to say a big thank you to all who contributed to the repair and part resurfacing of McGettigans Lane, Ewingsdale. It’s a treat to travel along it. Thank you.
But next, a negative. It’s to do with the changes made last evening to the mini roundabout at the hospital. Who in their right mind would make a roundabout into a halfabout?
Occasionally (twice a week) I get to the end of McGettigans Lane and need to travel into Byron. Up until this morning I had two choices. To sit at the end of McGettigans and wait; take my life in my hands and turn right across busy oncoming traffic.
Sit in a box of death with traffic zooming by me on my left, turn my head the 180 degrees that really only an owl should be able to do, look for a break in the oncoming traffic from the rear and venture out; holding my breath that all would be well.
OR, my first choice was that I could sit at the end of McGettigans, turn left heading towards the mini roundabout by the hospital and go all the way around it (what roundabouts are actually for). But no longer!
Someone has decided that the roundabout isn’t one. Traffic coming from the hospital public car park cannot go around it to turn right towards Byron and neither can I. It’s now a no right turn zone! From now on we all have to head for the big roundabout at The Farm, go all the way around that one, in order to turn back towards Byron.
Question – when did a roundabout become a halfabout and why for goodness sake?
The two options I mention above both had their risks, but a far, far better option would have been to put up one of your matrix boards on the verge next to the sign ‘join like a zip’ and say ‘Give way at the mini roundabout to oncoming traffic from the right’.
I know there has been a tendency for drivers to miss this point, but for heavens sake, let’s keep a roundabout a roundabout.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
