Roundabouts actually consume the same amount of land as an intersection of similar traffic,
They can't be the same size. Where do you get the space for the median in the middle? It has to come from somewhere.
they're also self regulating and dont require power.
I've yet to see a stop sign that needs power, and what is "self regulating"?
They're also more efficient and help the flow of traffic,
That depends on what they are replacing. I'd say that a main route that has to come to a stop because someone on a side street has entered the circular roadway is making things less efficient. Compare all the cars on the main route that don't have to do anything special and the few cars on the side street have to stop and wait for a few seconds, versus every car having to slow down and those on the main road being forced to stop so side street traffic can have immediate access.
But it seems that it requires a higher quality of driver than is typical of your area.
You don't know where my area is, so your insult is particularly stupid.
At a roundabout you look both ways as you would for any intersection,
At a roundabout you need to yield to traffic in the circular roadway. Since that roadway is going ONE DIRECTION, you need only look the direction the traffic is coming from to know if you need to yield or not. Traffic you see looking the other direction is going away from you and you don't need to yield to them.
not just for pedestrians but because people dont follow the rules.
Yes, people can go the wrong way around. It's pretty easy to detect that with a quick glance. If there's nobody in the circle, there's nobody going the wrong way.
Think of it this way, when you're turning right at a T junction, do you only look for traffic approaching from the left?
I don't care what the traffic coming from the right is going to do.