The horror of the jughandle
For some strange reason New Jersey thinks that people don’t know how to make left turns. Welcome to the wonderful world of the jughandle.
A jughandle is a side road that allows a driver to make a turn (usually to the left). The problem with the jughandle is that sometimes they are before the intersection, after the intersection, or there aren’t any at all and you can make your standard left turn.
New Jersey is littered with these jughandles.
Just a few weeks ago I was heading to the local grocery store for the first time since I moved here. Unfortunately, for me, I missed the right turn into the parking lot, so I figured I would go up to the next intersection and make a U-turn. So, being the typical non-NJ driver, I got into the left lane and proceeded up to the next intersection. I was greeted there by a no U-turn sign. This forced me to go up to the next intersection, and over to the right lane to hit the jughandle.
Unfortunately, the jughandle forces you to basically do a “P-turn” and face you back at the intersection. After waiting what seemed to be an eternity at the light I was facing the opposite direction of the grocery store. This meant – another jughandle! With another jughandle meant another light.
So, when traveling in New Jersey remember to pay attention where you’re going. Just for missing one turn I lost 15 minutes attempting to ‘turn around’.
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