Deepest circle of hell located, in Aberdeen

A NOTORIOUS traffic bottleneck has emerged as Scotland's sole nomination for the title of worst roundabout in Britain.

The infamous Haudagain roundabout in Aberdeen, where traffic on the main A96 road to Inverness meets cars, buses and lorries on the A90 Aberdeen to Peterhead trunk road, has been a major pinch point in Europe's oil capital for decades.

Only last year, the Institute of Directors warned congestion at the roundabout in the north-west of the Granite City was costing the local economy up to 30 million a year as a result of severe traffic delays at peak periods. And yesterday, its notoriety was confirmed when it was revealed the Haudagain was the only gridlocked roundabout in Scotland to have been shortlisted for the dubious honour of being dubbed the worst in Britain, in a "Roundabout Idol 2011" competition launched last month by online car leasing service CentralContracts.com.

Exasperated motorists flooded it with nominations for the Haudagain. One said: "It's undoubtedly the worst in the UK. Aberdeen's thriving economy is stifled by this awful bottleneck."

Another dubbed the Haudagain a "commuter hell with a poor layout and continual jams".

Other roundabouts that drive disgruntled motorists round the bend include traffic islands in London, Manchester, Nottingham, Cardiff and Bradford. But Nottingham's "BBC roundabout" was the only one singled out for praise as one of the UK's best by multiple motorists.

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Neil Greig, the Scottish-based policy and research director of the Institute of Advanced Motorists, said it was no surprise the Haudagain had secured the sole Scottish nomination. But he stressed that some of the roundabouts on the Kingsway in Dundee and the Sheriffhall roundabout, a vital point in the network linking the A7, A68 and A720 Edinburgh city bypass, were also causing problems for Scottish motorists.

He said: "With various improvements to other notorious roundabouts, the Haudagain is probably one of the last remaining really, really bad ones in Scotland.

For predictable mayhem, the Haudagain is certainly up there near the top in Scotland.

"It's an urban roundabout where you have got two major trunk roads joining together on a major route round Aberdeen - with local and long-distance traffic all mixed together at the same spot - and there is very little you can do with it."Mr Greig added: "The long-term solution to the Haudagain is the Aberdeen bypass, getting long-distance traffic out of the way."

A spokesman for CentralContracts.com said: "We asked motorists from up and down the land to tell us what roundabout makes their head spin, their stomach churn and their tempers rise.

"We're really pleased that the public have got so involved."

Last August, former transport minister Stewart Stevenson announced he had approved proposals for a 14.5m bypass at the Haudagain roundabout, backed by Aberdeen City Council and transport partnership Nestrans, to improve traffic flow at the notorious bottleneck.

But he warned construction work on the roundabout project could not begin until the completion of the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route, a major project in the region which has been further delayed because of a legal challenge by pressure group Roadsense.

Under the plans, more than 300 homes in the Middlefield area of the city will be demolished to make way for a dual- carriageway connecting North Anderson Drive with the western arm of Auchmill Road on the A96 road to Inverness.