Tag Archives: traffic-lights

Is Woking joking?

I’ve spent the last few days in Woking, where I used to go to school. 24-hour traffic lights produce congestion at every turn, even on one-way systems where there is no conflict. Are traffic managers, whose armoury of railings and … Continue reading

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Traffic regulation and zealotry

Today’s concluding Point of View by the great Roger Scruton had a bearing on the subject of relationships on the road. Apologies if I oversimplify. He spoke of shared values arising from shared experience, with families and nation states tolerating difference but sinking their differences … Continue reading

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Who are they trying to kid?

The RAC Foundation has discovered that councils are making serious profits from parking enforcement, as if we didn’t already know. Claims that “parking control keeps traffic flowing and pedestrians safe” are specious. Pedestrians will never be safe as long as priority rules. And … Continue reading

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Dead red time and space

Scenes like this are repeated ad infinitum up and down the land.

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“Obnoxious autocrats”

From Alan Rusbridger’s Guardian interview with Google’s Eric Schmidt: He decided against exploiting facial recognition, which he sees as wide open to abuse, and warns of the dangers of combining such technology with London-style traffic cameras. “You could imagine aggressive, obnoxious … Continue reading

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Highway robbery too

Traffic lights in locations such as the one featured here not only make roads dangerous, cause needless delay, maximise fuel use and emissions, they represent highway robbery, public indecency and public disservice. How can anyone countenance such tactics?

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Good money after bad?

Yesterday’s Eve Std article about spending on London’s roads contains this gem: “The number of automated traffic lights will increase by 50% to keep traffic flowing”. That’s funny, when I last looked, traffic lights, automated or not, were keeping traffic jamming … Continue reading

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Extending speed limits

There are plans to reduce speed limits in towns and on rural roads. Like traffic lights, speed limits would be redundant if the rules of the road were based on equality instead of priority, if roads were designed to express a social … Continue reading

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Traffic control causes congestion

Monmouth. A40 southbound approaching the A466 (Wye Valley/Tintern Abbey route). Got caught there in diabolical congestion five years ago. Heading north to Ross-on-Wye last Friday, we saw the same half-mile 3-lane tailback and were reminded of it. Luckily we returned early Sunday … Continue reading

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Brassed off

Today I was timing the traffic lights in Braunton (near Barnstaple) where I still have plans for a lights-off trial, despite a refusal from Devon Highways and apathy from the current Parish Council. The trial is to prove the obvious: … Continue reading

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