Highways agency (big rant)

[Bren]

Just drove 250 miles from Teignmouth in Devon back home to Warrington.

 

Has taken five and a half hours - lots of roadworks on upper M5 with cameras in operation despite nobody actually working on the road as it's Saturday.

 

However, the best bit was on the M6 north of Birmingham - the overhead sign stated "long delays J 13 - J 16".

 

They were'nt kidding - no accidents though, just caused by temporary speed limits that the fucktards at the highways agency saw fit to impose on a busy section of motorway.

 

Stop/start was'nt the word - a few cars ended up on the shoulder, it actually dawned on me that the situation could morph into a serious accident - it only takes one person not concentrating and that's it.

 

I was actually under one sign that changed from queue to "end" - as soon as it changed the traffic started moving.

 

Where do the highways agency get off? The HATO's close the carriageway if as much as an insole is found in the carriageway, the you have some mongoloid in the control room at Robb Lane doing their utmost to cause misery.

 

The piece de' resistance was another overhead sign that stated that drug driving risks lives - not as much as putting pointless temporary speed limits on overhead signs.

 

Oh, and why to do so many HATO's think they are Tom fucking Selleck with their sunglasses? Just keep things moving, for christ's sake.

[Rocket88]

The French have the right idea......after a bad one, hose down the blood, cart off the dead and injured, kick the debris over the hedge, and get on with it.......

[xtriple]

If I'd known you were in Teignmouth I'd have taken you out for a coffee/pint. Only a few miles away in Torquay, and the Teignmouth side.They always used to shut down all the roadworks/speed restrictions for bank holiday to smooth the flow, obviously not this year!

 

On the behalf of Devon, please accept my apologies and a personal undertaking that it will happen again!    

[chaseracer]

I'm certain we have a thread for this sort of thing... 

 

[Bren]

If I'd known you were in Teignmouth I'd have taken you out for a coffee/pint. Only a few miles away in Torquay, and the Teignmouth side.They always used to shut down all the roadworks/speed restrictions for bank holiday to smooth the flow, obviously not this year!

 

On the behalf of Devon, please accept my apologies and a personal undertaking that it will happen again! 

 

Spent a couple of evenings in wetherspoons in Torquay - when I am down there I like drinking the Otter ale - good local stuff.

[Bren]

I'm certain we have a thread for this sort of thing... 

 

Your right - we do. Accept my humblest apologies.

[meshking]

I always thought chase racer was more left.

[Lacquer Peel]

The French have the right idea......after a bad one, hose down the blood, cart off the dead and injured, kick the debris over the hedge, and get on with it.......

I'm sure that's what you'd want if someone close to you were to be seriously injured or killed in a traffic accident.

[Micrashed]

M61/60 round Manc is the same and the M6 round Preston.

 

Utter hopeless fuckwobblers.

[Bobthebeard]

Mustard mitt, often pondered about this myself. Miles and miles of 50/40 speed limits through coned off areas and no one actually doing any 'road works'. Even during the week.

[hennabm]

Best one I saw from the wombles was to block off not just one but the two inner lanes so some truck could have its tyre changed on the hard shoulder. WTF

:? :? :? :?

[sporty-shite]

M61/60 round Manc is the same and the M6 round Preston.

 

Utter hopeless fuckwobblers.

 

They're allegedly doing the managed motorway shit on the M60. More like a conspiracy to cause massive tailbacks and then bleat on about the new guided bus route to Manchester.

[retrogeezer]

yeh, been up and down there a few times recently....always 'queue ahead' sign or '50' then '40' then '60' etc and the only queue is the friggin one thay have caused by putting the sign on and people braking suddenly. posstots the lot of them.

[retrogeezer]

oh, and found out about this waste of £2 million quid today as well:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M4_bus_lane

[New POD]

Given that my current commute to work includes M57, M62, M6, and M1 and is 210 miles each way, I can't agree at all. Motorways are great. If only less people knew this and would stay off them, I'd get there quicker.

[PiperCub]

I understand the theory behind using HATO's and it's a pretty sound one. I get it, but from personal experience and that of friends, sadly most of them seem to be of the type of jobsworth muppet with delusions of adequacy you get working for your local council in some minor capacity. I used to have a neighbour who is a traffic cop and he disliked them almost as much as he hated the special constables saying they were often more trouble than they were worth and often just wound up the public with unecessary lane closures etc. I think half of them (just like the 'Specials') just want to be in a uniform and failed to get into the police, this is their next best option.

[Rocket88]

I'm sure that's what you'd want if someone close to you were to be seriously injured or killed in a traffic accident.

 

If someone was injured/dead, spending 14 hours taking photographs, measurements and statements isn't going to help. All you get is rubber neckers slowing down to have a look, which invariably causes another accident..............

[Largactil]

Just drove from Italy to France this afternoon - some eeejit had an accident / broke down in his wagon in the Mont Blanc tunnel, which meant a 4 hour closure & pandemonium. I liked the French folks style - they set up tables on the hard shoulder & and had a leisurely lunch. The Italians instead gave it mucho horn action, and drove up the verges to gain a spot forward in the queue.

 

Quite different to UK jams...

 

[Guest Lord Sward]

Anyone remotely associated with the Highways Agency should be taken to a British version of Guantanamo Bay, maybe down by the Falklands, as they are clearly enemies of the state.  Utterly useless, fascists who have no idea about traffic flow.  

 

I nearly ran one down once, a mistake I'll not make again.  The fat bint thought her high-viz could stop a TD5 doing 50 and about to enter a right-hand bend motor way slip road and stepped out in front of me to stop me.  Funnily enough, the motorway was clear once I'd joined it.

[sierraman]

I can sympathise after spending what seemed like most of my life on the M5 last week. I'm willing to gamble there's more people on the surface of the moon than working on the M5 on a bank holiday

[Guest Cruyff]

Just drove 250 miles from Teignmouth in Devon back home to Warrington.

Has taken five and a half hours - lots of roadworks on upper M5 with cameras in operation despite nobody actually working on the road as it's Saturday.

However, the best bit was on the M6 north of Birmingham - the overhead sign stated "long delays J 13 - J 16".

They were'nt kidding - no accidents though, just caused by temporary speed limits that the fucktards at the highways agency saw fit to impose on a busy section of motorway.

Stop/start was'nt the word - a few cars ended up on the shoulder, it actually dawned on me that the situation could morph into a serious accident - it only takes one person not concentrating and that's it.

I was actually under one sign that changed from queue to "end" - as soon as it changed the traffic started moving.

Where do the highways agency get off? The HATO's close the carriageway if as much as an insole is found in the carriageway, the you have some mongoloid in the control room at Robb Lane doing their utmost to cause misery.

The piece de' resistance was another overhead sign that stated that drug driving risks lives - not as much as putting pointless temporary speed limits on overhead signs.

Oh, and why to do so many HATO's think they are Tom fucking Selleck with their sunglasses? Just keep things moving, for christ's sake.

We were at Celtic Manor in Cardiff this week and had to get back to Preston on Friday so was faced with the M5 and M6 farce.

 

Ended up leaving the M5 at Jct7 and taking a detour through the likes of Kidderminster, Telford and Market Drayton to get back to the M6 at Jct15. Unfortunately we were still stuck in crawling traffic to Knutsford due to the ridiculous 60/50/40 signs and even saw a 3 car pile up in the third lane that had obviously been caused by the ridiculous stop/start traffic from the signs.

[dollywobbler]

Managed motorways work well in my opinion. I'd rather drive at 40 than be stationary. Problem is, there is still often too much traffic and the system can't cope.

 

Traffic wombles do piss me off, as do overhead signs. Especially the ones warning of congestion that isn't actually there. Had that on the M25 the other day.

[quicksilver]

Had exactly what Dollywobbler describes on the M1 yesterday and I still can't get my head around it. 2:30 on a Sunday afternoon, fine conditions and not much traffic but a spurious 60 limit and overhead signs instructing traffic to use the hard shoulder due to congestion. Everyone just moved one lane to the left so the outside lane was empty and all they achieved was three lanes of slow traffic and nowhere to stop in an emergency. Looking at all the lorries travelling down the hard shoulder at 60 I would have been absolutely shitting myself if I broke down. What total and utter fuckwit came up with the idea of using the hard shoulder as a lane?

[sporty-shite]

Managed motorways work well in my opinion. I'd rather drive at 40 than be stationary. Problem is, there is still often too much traffic and the system can't cope.

 

This is why the M60 project annoys me. They'll cause even more delay for the next God knows how long, and the motorway still won't cope with the volume of traffic simply because it bottlenecks to two lanes at Worsley. To be fair, I'd consider public transport for work, but it simply isn't feasible.

[Alfamale]

The traffic wombles are one of my most hated features of modern motoring. I was on the A1(M) near doncaster a few months ago, as usual traffic was stop start and then just stopped for half an hour. We then crawled at snails pace for the next 5 miles. Was this due to a serious accident? No. Was this due to a defect with the road? No. Was it due to migrating wildebeest? No. One of the two lanes had been closed as a car had a flat tyre on one of the near side tyres and was stopped ON THE FRIGGING HARD SHOULDER! Unbelievable.

[TimothyClaypole]

Most of I see of them is in the Morrisons car park or sitting in the Police viewing area causing everyone driving along at a "making progress" speed to brake suddenly. 

 

Loose horses on the M18 one morning, boxed in by 3 lorry drivers to stop them causing a proper accident, big lump of wood causing everyone to stop drive around it again on the M18, I stopped and dragged that to the side of the road myself... waste of space.

[mercrocker]

Perhaps they should give them real Womble suits to wear instead of fake third world police uniforms and pound shop raybans.   Might weed out the failed dictators.....And unless those signs are going to give proper information SWITCH THE BASTARD OFF.   I don't need to be told to wear a seatbelt or know how many minutes it SHOULD take to get where I am not going anyway.

[jakebullet]

"Check your fuel level" in the 50 roadworks. Why? Not like I can buy any is it?

[Alfamale]

"A628 is closed after A616"

 

Why can't it just say "Woodhead Pass is Shut"

[RoadworkUK]

Here's a thing.

 

Last Thursday we were making our way back from Cornwall via the M25; our progress being badly impeded by the lorry fire between junctions 24 and 26. The fire was on the anti-clockwise side, we were heading t'other way. The outside lane on our side was closed to allow for access to the (Closed) anti-clockwise ring.

 

The following frustrated the crap out of us. At the sight of the first overhead gantry sign saying "I I I X" for outside lane closed, we and many equally diligent drivers pulled in to lane three so the outside lane was clear, because that was what they asked us to do. What happened next was obvious; we sat there either trundling or static. Of course, the outside lane was now freshly clear, so every white van, three-series, slammed VeeDub and Mitsubishi L200 with silly wheels and ANIMAL graffix sped past. Inevitably, when they eventually reached the bit where the lane genuinely is closed, they have to cram themselves in at the top of the queue, holding us up SOME MOAR.

 

SRSly, wouldn't it be better if they just didn't bother telling us about the lane closure until we got there? There was about three miles of advance warning before we reached the actual troublespot; three miles of unnecessary lane closure.

 

Similarly, I vote to get rid of the "...iii...ii...i..." sliproad announcements too, in an effort to combat those twunts who have to leave it to the last minute and then violently swerve across three lanes. You know the sort, usually driving white vans, three-series, slammed VeeDubs or Mitsubishi L200 with silly wheels and ANIMAL graffix....