I don’t want to say this in a roundabout way, but what goes around comes around. That’s precisely what seems to be happening when it comes to the state Department of Transportation’s growing love affair with roundabouts.

Just so there is no misunderstanding: I hate them with a passion. I find them confusing and dangerous. And don’t think I am alone. Most who have encountered them are equally disenchanted with this attempt to smooth out dangerous and heavily traveled intersections.

PennDOT rebuts my notion that these circular monsters are unsafe and claims to have the impressive statistics to prove it.

The state agency has installed 19 roundabouts in 16 locations during the past nearly two decades, and it proudly proclaims that when motorists enter a roundabout they are much safer than when they are at a conventional intersection.

I am old enough to remember the old traffic circles which dotted many New Jersey highways. Motorists despised them, and screamed bloody murder until the state eventually did away with them.

Some are iconic as they circle war monuments in downtown locations of two of our region’s biggest cities — Allentown and Easton.

Roundabout proponents insist that the modern-day roundabout is not your father’s traffic circle. PennDOT officials agree. They point out that the rules of the road have changed when it comes to who has the right of way.

When they were first introduced in 1905 (Columbus Circle in New York City), vehicles entering the traffic circle had the right of way, and motorists already in the circle had to yield. This led to confusion and crashes.

With the new roundabouts, entering vehicles yield the right of way to motorists already within the roundabout. Highway planners also reduced entry speeds. Early on, entering vehicles in traffic circles had a speed limit of 25 mph or higher, while the new roundabouts limit entry speeds to 15 mph.

On top of that, the engineering has changed. Additional safety features have been added, and here is the best part, they say: Continual traffic flow once inside the circle makes for a safer outcome.

Government statistics show that there are about 3,700 roundabouts throughout the United States. In most places when traffic engineers propose building a new one, the public comes out in droves to protest the decision.

Other countries are much more tolerant of these monstrosities. France has more than 32,000; the United Kingdom, nearly 25,000, and Australia, about 11,000.

Roundabouts have been savaged satirically in motion pictures and other media. None was funnier than Chevy Chase’s encounter with one in National Lampoon’s 1985 comedy “European Vacation.”

Unable to get into the proper lane, Chase, with his wife and two children in his rented car on a tour of London, went round and round for hours as Chase called out the same landmarks again and again.

There are a couple of roundabouts in the five-county Times News region — both in Monroe County.

If you were a visitor to the Poconos during the summer, you might have encountered both, which are only about 5 miles apart. One was built eight years ago at the intersection of Route 209 and business Route 209 near Marshalls Creek, while the other was opened to traffic in 2018 just off Interstate 80 near the borough of Delaware Water Gap.

Two more are planned for Brodheadsville in Chestnuthill Township. Both are intended to tackle the tricky intersection at Routes 209 and 115 and the congestion at a nearby road at Pleasant Valley High School.

Before writing this column, I drove through the traffic circle near Marshalls Creek several times, both northbound and southbound. I had driven through this roundabout at least a half-dozen times before my fact-finding mission.

Observing drivers, some of whom seemed completely confused and overwhelmed, most often committed these roundabout sins: failed to yield to traffic already moving within the roundabout, changed lanes abruptly without signaling, and the worst one of all: a New York motorist came to a dead stop inside the roundabout and threw up his hands in frustration. He was nearly rear-ended by the unsuspecting driver behind him. The blare of horns said it all.

Perhaps as drivers get more experience taking on these “engineering marvels,” they will become less skittish.

As for me, unless PennDOT gives me no alternative, I am sticking with four-way intersections.

By Bruce Frassinelli | tneditor@tnonline.com