By Ron Thaniel
May 30, 2011

The U.S. Conference of Mayors Trustee Carmel (IN) Mayor James Brainard, since he first took office in 1996, has been a strong advocate for roundabouts, citing big savings in cost, gasoline consumption and lives, with enormous reductions in injury-related accidents at intersections formerly managed by traffic signals.

Carmel, an edge city of 80,000 north of Indianapolis, has now transformed 67 of its 100- intersections to roundabouts, with another 20 underway, more than any other city in the United States.

The effort – for which Brainard received the 2008 Conference of Mayors’ Climate Protection Award – is now generating positive national and international media attention, most recently by CNN’s Anderson Cooper in the May 17 edition of his “AC 360” program. The segment can be seen on Youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaICdKez2jg.

In recent months, Carmel’s roundabouts have also been featured in the Financial Times and Newsweek as well as transportation trade media.

In an effort to promote not just roundabouts but economic development for his city, Brainard has conducted interviews with The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, National Public Radio, the BBC and Bloomberg News, among several others. And in May, Carmel played host to the Third International Roundabout Conference, a four-day gathering of some 400 transportation experts from as far away as Japan and New Zealand.

Brainard first caught the roundabout bug while studying in England. When he became mayor years later, he persuaded skeptical transportation officials in his own city to give them a try, starting in a newly developed part of the rapidly growing community. Sixteen years and 67 intersections later, the attractively landscaped roundabouts are so popular “people want to know when their intersection is next,” the mayor says.