YOU can smell the panic… it’s a white knuckle ride… avoid like the plague… splendid… frightening… the best invention ever… dangerous, scary – but so much fun… strange and challenging… an automotive whirlpool… a car sickness sufferer’s worst nightmare.

I particularly like this one from Richard Jenkins of Dudley in the Midlands: “The worst junction of any description in the UK without a doubt. No-one has a bloody clue what’s going on. The bloke who invented it must have been in a pub on his 18th pint!”

C’mon Richard, stop beating around the bush… do you like it or what? Nothing quite polarises opinion – and it doesn’t matter whether you are from these parts, elsewhere in the UK, or on the other side of the world – like our brilliant, barmy, bold, bamboozling, bodacious Magic Roundabout.

As such it has brought a kind of fame – or infamy, if you like – to our town. Over the decades The Experiment At The County Island Roundabout, as it was originally labelled by the Transport and Road Research Laboratory in 1972, has acquired all manner of accolades and insults.

It once made a list of the world’s Top 12 Roundabouts and then shamed in an insurance firm survey as The UK’s Worst Roundabout.

Rubbished by a UK motoring magazine as One of the World’s Worst Junctions, it was further berated as one of the nation’s Ten Scariest Junctions.

Having graced several glossy calendars – forget Pirelli, take a peek at the curves on this little beaut – it has been hailed “the poster-boy pin-up of roundabout buffs.”

Believe it or not there is a group of anoraks collectively known as the UK Roundabouts Appreciation Society who have organised trips to Swindon to admire our one-way gyratory that is clearly the Real Madrid of Roundabouts.

Memorabilia of “Dante’s Traffic Inferno” – key-rings, t-shirts etc – have been shipped across the world.

Swindon’s singular feat of leftfield engineering has also earned a worthy inclusion on the American website Atlas Obscura, which explores “the world’s wondrous and curious places.” (See Panel.) And what other example of traffic management can you name that has inspired a pop song – XTC’s English Roundabout from the 1982 album English Settlement.

The composer, Colin Moulding, however, was somewhat less than enamoured with the two-way circulation ring junction of his hometown. “Everyone is cursing under their breath, I’m a passenger, I feel close to death.”

The advent of social media has now seen thousands of people across the globe post their views and comments on the Magic Roundabout, which can be found on-line as a Facebook ‘landmark’.

The site, which invites visitors to leave a review and assess the subject in question by means of a one-to-five star rating, has chalked up well over 4,000 visits and acquired 354 “likes”.

On the site, GP Ram Arora, of Wanborough, amusingly described the Magic Roundabout as “this insurmountable human feat of downright stupidity”… before conceding that it was worthy of a maximum five stars (one for each of its five mini-roundabouts, perhaps).

Also lavishing five stars upon our 43 year-old icon was local driver Geraldine Holder who commented: “I actually love the roundabout – it’s so easy to manoeuvre around. Easy, the best invention ever.”

However, Philip Howarth, from The Wirral, offered a measly one-star along with an abrasive “downright dangerous.” One star also from Jan Carrick of Witney who opined: “I hate it!!!!! And avoid it like the plague.”

Five stars, though, from Amy Frances Sellors of Warwickshire who was moved to observe: “Dangerous, scary and completely unnecessary… but so much fun.”

The aforementioned “you can smell the panic” remark is courtesy of Joe Loughrey of Nottingham, who reckoned the structure was also “very funny” before awarding a generous five out of five.

Petrol head Cookie Egidi also threw five stars at the “crazy” road layout while adding that the entire town of Swindon resembled “one giant roundabout.”

Whilst attracting a fair amount of vitriol, the Magic Roundabout – bless it – still managed to notch up a respectable average of 3.7 stars from 111 votes.

And so to handbag designer Kathy Southern of Studio Kat Designs in North Carolina, who came across an internet image of our provocative junction which she promptly posted in her regular electronic newsletter Kat Bytes that is a “fun and interactive mix of articles.”

Kathy wrote: “Saw this picture of what is called the Magic Roundabout in Swindon, England and just HAD to share it. Isn’t it amazing? I’m trying to imagine what would happen if my MOM drove up on this.

“She complains about the three-entry traffic circle near our house. Hee hee. What’s YOUR verdict? Yay or Nay?”

Plenty of both, actually. Kathy’s post has so far attracted well over 4,000 “likes” while more than 2,000 people have shared it on their own Facebook sites, prompting countless other comments – some say magic, some say tragic – from home and abroad.

Among the locals who rallied to its defence were Nichola Law who posted: “Nothing wrong with our Magic Roundabout in Swindon. It does work. Priority from the right. Failing that… put your foot down and just hope you don’t hit anyone else.”

Kimberley Hale: “Treat them (the mini roundabouts) as individual roundabouts… it’s easy for us Swindonians.

Victoria Salvin: “I worked in Swindon for about five years and regularly drove around it. You’ve just got to hold your nerve, keep looking right and take a deep breath.” And Karl Green: “It’s easy enough for anyone with a brain.”

Anna Zvereva, however, reflected: “I’m the idiot who doesn’t know what to do. I seriously don’t understand who goes first, who second. People just randomly driving from everywhere…”

The most intelligent and well-reasoned drop of wisdom probably came from ex-Burford School pupil Hugh Baker who, after much deliberation and forehead furrowed thought, asserted: “Swindon is disgusting. Ha ha.” A privileged education that clearly hasn’t gone to waste.

Last word, though, goes to possibly the old girl’s greatest fan Kevin Beresford of the aforementioned appreciation society, who said: “What’s special about Swindon’s Magic Roundabout is that it’s all on view the moment you enter the system.

“You have that superb mother roundabout at the centre with its five outer orbiting painted mini traffic islands all producing a car choreography that stuns the senses.

“It’s awesome.”

  • THE Magic Roundabout was built in 1972 to solve a mega traffic headache caused by five key roads merging onto one spot next to the County Ground.

    Its unique design of five ‘satellite’ roundabouts circling a central roundabout lent heavily on the pioneering research of British roundabout wizard Frank Blackmore.

    Swindon traffic engineers Ray Harper and Norman Pritchard applied these principles to the former Drove Road junction.

    When it opened in 1972 the Adver branded it “Norman’s Magic Roundabout,” a reference to the popular children’s TV show.

    The council later adopted the Magic Roundabout as the junction’s official moniker.

    Instructions were initially issued to motorists in 1972 on how best to negotiate it such as “be ready to make prompt use of any gap which may occur.”

    Other ‘magic roundabouts’ exist in the UK in Colchester and Hemel Hempstead but these are mere pretenders.

  • FROM churches made of bone and houses built of paper to balancing pagodas… you will find them at the website Atlas Obscura “the definitive guide to the world's wondrous and curious places.”

    Naturally, it features the Magic Roundabout, commenting: “This hilarious English intersection is an automotive whirlpool.”

    Atlas Obscura contributor Kevin Flood writes: “The intersection allows drivers heading in one direction to spin around in a delicate ballet until they are spat back out in any other direction they choose.

    “If navigating the circular roadways wasn’t enough, the smaller, outer circles flow in a standard clockwise pattern while the larger central lane directs cars in a counter-clockwise direction.” Phew!

    “Given the large amount of traffic that spins through the crossroads every day, it is a wonder that there are not more accidents, but there have only been 17 major accidents at the site since it opened in 1972.

    “The lack of crashes within this dizzying roundabout truly is magic.”