[jarek]

It didn't even occur to me that left and right lanes get confusing. My apologies.

My confusion about the multi-lane roundabout mostly stems from the scenario where two cars, entering from streets 90* in the direction of the flow apart, both want to go straight through. If the one entering 'upstream' takes the inner lane and the one 'downstream' takes the outer lane, it would seem that in some timing conditions you'd get a collision situation when the inner lane car tries to exit but must cross the outer lane to do so. Is this a practical concern? Is there a universal set order of precedence for this case, e.g. inner lane always yields if necessary?

[Nick_C]

You have the additional rule that everything gives way to traffic already on the roundabout, which (in practice) means that particular timing event doesn't occur. The downstream car cannot enter the roundabout until the upstream car has gone past, or it can enter only if the upstream car is too far upstream and is not a threat. In either case, there is no collision.

In places I've driven where there might be confusion, they mark the lanes with arrows to show which ones are exiting and when.

They work pretty seamlessly in my experience. You only have to look one way (upstream), instead of two, to judge whether to enter the intersection, and you don't have the time-waste of traffic lights.