M1

[DJ OD]

Fucking shit puppets. Who the fuck decides that miles and miles of roadworks in one go is a good idea?

Average speed cameras... What a fkin cunts trick. Why not have then the whole 10 mile odd stretch of road "works" while only working on one fkin bit of the road?!

Why do they cone off miles of motorway, and not do it a bit at a time?! Some cash saving reason no doubt, but of course FUCK the people who want to use the motorway.

And WHY have another two junctions of roadworks not 50 miles further on?! Just finish one lot before doing another. Jebus... Anyone actually wanting to use the motorway to actually GET somewhere is roaylly fucked.

Why contraflow the lanes, when nothing is happening on the other side. Aim to finish in 2013?! Fuck me. What a shambles.

2 hours it takes to drive from London to Derby +/- half hour. Fkin double it took me last Saturday. Not helped by every dad and granddad taking their students shite up to university. Every second car was jam packed with bin bags of clothes, boxes of kitchen crap and toilet rolls...

I don't really "get" the concept of traffic, but I know that when there's an accident, the traffic on the other side slows down because people want to "look" at it.

They decide to close two junctions. Close them... yeah great idea. Don't worry about setting up a diversion. Don't worry about TELLING people way in advance... No, wait until I'm heading to the "closed" junction to tell me when I can't do fuck all about it. 45 minutes I sat going no-where while the police picked up the pieces of an accident a good 4 hours ago...

When it got going I was chuffed to bits to get another few junctions on before hitting... congestion...

Caused by people slowing to look at the other side of the road, where another accident had happened.

All that was there, was 8 police cars, a fire engine, and a tow truck trying to pick up a motorbike from the road. All lanes looked closed, one maybe was open. The tailback went on for miles... Poor cunts having to sit in that shit.

I appreciate that accidents happen, bikers do, at times drive like tits and crash. Lorries DO think they own the road and chop in and out, justified by an orange blinking light. Car drivers are also mostly dicks, shouldn't be driving, shouldn't be in that sorry state of a car.. doing 60 in the overtaking lane...

All this is a fact of british motoring life. BUT when it all goes to shit, the police (My bestist buddies) do a shite job or sorting it out. I know exactly how they parade about. Stopping traffic, ushering it to the side, with a smugness and air of importance that makes them so superior to the public. Take your time... cunts.

The whole motorway is CCTV'd up, so why do they not just see whats happened, despatch one of everything and sort the mess out quickly not spend hours marking the road, taking pictures, making tea.

There's just no justification. Another example of broken britain.


DJ OD

[beansontoast]

Good rant. I drove to wembley & back for the Bulgaria game through that average speed camera marathon, fuckers. On the way back I had a bit of a rant myself after trying to do 50mph while knackered at 2 am with 4 sleeping passengers and my eyeballs trying to force my nodding head up off the oh so comfy looking steering wheel. No work going on and it only ended when I joined the M6.

Thank goodness the M6 toll is a straight road, if I'd gone past the belfry I'd have struggled to stay the right side of the hedges.

[TwoPlAnKs]

Move North. No motorways north of Perth.



Still get a fair bit of traffic chaos though:


On a serious note, average speed cameras are an absolute cunt. They work so well at reducing speed though, which makes me think that if anybody was actually interested in reducing speed they would use them everywhere and not just on roadworks.

There was a brilliant set of them near here on the road between Aberdeen and Dundee a few years ago. Half way along the section with average speed cameras there was a lay-by, so people would drive along at considerable speed, stop for lunch, then finish their journey at considerable speed. Cracking way to beat the system.

When the cameras were new they didn't work if you changed lanes half way through either, because your plate would only be picked up by the same camera at the other end. They soon fixed that though, arseholes.

[Owl]

Try using the A1. Used to use it when I worked in Essex. I used to ring the Highways agency up when I was coming home to see if the road was actually open. They'd tell me it was, 'no overnight work planned'

I'd be about an hour from home when, yep, road closed due to roadworks. Used to add approx 45 - 60 mins to my journey

[dpSparhawk]

Don't the average speed cameras monitor you from camera to camera as opposed to from 1st to last camera?

They could still calculate your speed say from camera 3 to camera 4 just the same as from Camera 1 to camera 30...

On a side note, speaking of no motorways above Perth, I'll be heading to Durness on the North coast next April... the Cupra is going to LOVE that!

[ekkl]

Great rant!!

One of the reasons I bought a bike was to shift through traffic jams. Cuts out loads of time considerably.

I don't know why they don't do the roadworks like the railways do, at night.

[TwoPlAnKs]

Don't the average speed cameras monitor you from camera to camera as opposed to from 1st to last camera?

They could still calculate your speed say from camera 3 to camera 4 just the same as from Camera 1 to camera 30...

On a side note, speaking of no motorways above Perth, I'll be heading to Durness on the North coast next April... the Cupra is going to LOVE that!

If that's in reply to me, there were only two cameras (one at start and one at end) so it was OK. That entire road is a stupid speed camera mess though, you could lose your license twice over in the space of about 50 miles. Proper cash-cow stuff as well, like inexplicable drop in speed limit followed by a speed camera behind a bridge at the bottom of a hill. Seems to be permanently in a contraflow for road works too.

Going up to Durness will be ace fun in a cupra, I think you'll have at least 20 miles on single track at the end of it. Just beware the A9 between the central belt and Inverness, I've never been up it myself but it's probably the most complained about road in Scotland - most of it is single carriageway mountain pass type crap when it's a major city link and easily busy enough for a dual carriageway so it's rare to get up it without spending most of the journey stuck behind a slow lorry. Past Inverness you should have some fun though.

If you are really into fun driving, Bealach na Ba is one of the most mental mountain passes in the UK and probably the longest. It doesn't have the pisstaking 35% gradients you see in the hillier parts of England, but it's really long and does something stupid like climbing 2000 feet in 7 miles or something, with alpine style switchbacks and hairpins. It's on the north part of the West coast but could possibly be worked into your journey without a big detour. I'd recommend it for the start of the journey on the way back though because no matter how much you love windy road driving you'll be fucking sick of it after a serious journey in the Highlands.

You know you are onto a winner when a road has these signs at the start:

[dpSparhawk]

If that's in reply to me, there were only two cameras (one at start and one at end) so it was OK. That entire road is a stupid speed camera mess though, you could lose your license twice over in the space of about 50 miles.

Ahh that explains it Yeah I fkin hate cameras of any kind. Especially when there's literally NO reason for them other than being a cash cow. Fkin bullshit.

Going up to Durness will be ace fun in a cupra, I think you'll have at least 20 miles on single track at the end of it. Just beware the A9 between the central belt and Inverness, I've never been up it myself but it's probably the most complained about road in Scotland - most of it is single carriageway mountain pass type crap when it's a major city link and easily busy enough for a dual carriageway so it's rare to get up it without spending most of the journey stuck behind a slow lorry. Past Inverness you should have some fun though.

Cheers for that, I think actually, we'll be heading cross country towards Ullapool on the A835 then up towards Loch Assynt and Loch A Chairn Bhain. Although might still go up past Loch Shin

Oh yes indeed (Click where it says Google Maps for a cleaner view)
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&sour...19.69,,0,14.85

If you are really into fun driving, Bealach na Ba is one of the most mental mountain passes in the UK and probably the longest. It doesn't have the pisstaking 35% gradients you see in the hillier parts of England, but it's really long and does something stupid like climbing 2000 feet in 7 miles or something, with alpine style switchbacks and hairpins. It's on the north part of the West coast but could possibly be worked into your journey without a big detour. I'd recommend it for the start of the journey on the way back though because no matter how much you love windy road driving you'll be fucking sick of it after a serious journey in the Highlands.

Now that looks like MY kind of driving. I'm definitely into fun driving

[Welsh Pete]

The M4 in Wales has been a mare for maybe 3 yrs now. They have been widening the motorway between Newport and Cardiff, and I actually think it has been ongoing for more like 5 yrs!

Contraflows, speedchecks, and now 5 miles of average speed cameras...hopefully it`ll be finished before long though...and then whats next?!?