I couldn’t quickly find a post about this (so, sorry if this has been posted before).
On some maps, like Innsbruck and Scotland, roundabouts don’t always allow you to return in the direction you came from, and instead force riders onto a specific direction or climb. It would be great if roundabouts in general allowed a full 180-degree option as part of route routing.
I know that when free riding you can always do a U-turn yourself, but for official routes and events this isn’t possible. Allowing proper 180-degree routing at roundabouts could open up interesting new route options in the future.
For example, in Innsbruck this could make routes possible where you ride Innsbruckring in both directions in one route, without forcing riders up the Lutscher KOM each time. Scotland has similar situations where extra routing freedom at roundabouts would make course design more flexible.
Watopia already does this well in several places, where roundabouts allow riders to loop back naturally, and it really adds flexibility to route design.
No new roads would be needed, just more routing options at existing roundabouts, but it could really increase variety for routes in some worlds.
You’re right; U‑turns work fine when free‑riding, but things get a bit more limited once you’re on official routes or events. That’s why roundabouts or finish arches don’t always give you the option to swing back the way you came.
I really like the way you framed this idea. More flexibility at roundabouts could definitely open up some creative route options, and Watopia is a good example of how that can add variety. I’ve shared your feedback.
Thanks for sparking the conversation. It’s always cool to see riders thinking about how the world could evolve. Let’s see what other Zwifters think about it.
Clearly a sensible idea…however what we really need in order to make that practically useful is for Zwift to fiiiiinally add in the functionality for approved event organisers to add their own routes based on the existing roads. No more manual turning or “Rebel Routes” etc, just freedom to actually add a route via the existing roads which doesn’t already exist…but we all know Zwift developers haven’t and seemingly won’t do this…so there’s not really any point in adding an ‘official’ 180 on roundabouts when no-one can add any official routes.
Zwift COULD have a lot more routes than it does, some weird, some wonderful, etc, but this has been known about for years and we still dance around doing Rebel Routes and crossing fingers that Zwift might make it official at some future point in time instead of simply giving approved event creators a simple tool to create a useable official route on 100% pre-existing roads
