Jimmy Hoffa and the "Michigan Turn"

We found Jimmy Hoffa!

OK, we lied. But we did stay in the town where he once lived, Lake Orion, which is now a northern bedroom community of Detroit. It is near Auburn Hills, where The Palace sports arena, home of the Detroit Pistons, is located. We passed The Palace on the way to our hotel.

Lake Orion is also where we first experienced the Michigan U-turn, which is this bizarre way of crossing major multi-lane boulevards. Instead of having four-way intersections with left-turn lanes and appropriate traffic lights, oh no, you have to proceed through the light for a short distance and then do a U-turn to return to the intersection where you can turn right onto the street you passed just seconds earlier. And some of these U-turns have traffic lights. So tell me how this is a smarter or more efficient way to handle traffic????? It's so weird that it warrants its own Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_left