Common "incorrect" one-way roads

Communities Canada
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There are many instances of little circular cul-de-sacs in Calgary labelled one-way, but no actual signage exists, and people drive both ways.

Here are some examples:

Imagery clearly shows cars parked on both sides, and people drive both ways. If you lived in a house on the “left”, you’d drive straight to it.

Should these one-way tags be removed?

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I would argue yes, you ought to remove them; I’m pretty sure I’ve removed a few myself. Where there is no one-way or do-no-enter signage it’s certainly not incorrect to delete the one-way tags. If I was to presume the thought process of the mappers who added the one-way tagging, I would guess they genuinely believed based on the geometry of the roads and the aerial imagery that the one-ways were implicit, regardless of an absence of signage saying so.

However, I would caution that the smaller these ‘loops’ are, the more an ‘implicit’ one-way becomes practice. Take for instance 200 Douglas Glen Point SE‬ (‪180438624‬) | OpenStreetMap, nearby a couple of your examples. From Bing aerial imagery the traffic/parked cars are following that one-way counter-clockwise around the island, and cross-checking with Bing Streetside imagery there’s a yield sign for the traffic leaving the ‘loop’ on the west side, but no such corresponding sign on the ‘east’ side of the loop for clockwise traffic… :man_shrugging:

Technically the Calgary Parking Bylaw does not allow parallel, street-side parking to “face the wrong way” as well, so if they’re truly two-way streets then anybody who parks their car on the left side of the road could be ticketed. But as you can see on the aerial imagery, people park in whichever direction they find most convenient. :upside_down_face: People also commonly park their cars nose-in in culs-de-sac, perpendicular to the curb, but that’s also illegal. [1], [2]

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Thanks for your reply. I had not considered the yield signs (hadn’t noticed them at al) but agree that each should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. You’re right some are probably more 1-lane than 2-lane. Much appreciated, I’ll keep a more careful eye out when I run into one next.