I often use this road when travelling to Nottingham from my home in Rhos-on-Sea. It is very easy to belt down these stretches at great speed when you have been stuck behind a load of caravans or lorries for twenty odd miles all the way through Cheshire. Yes, the roundabouts do tend to loom up rather quickly! Last time I went down here, I saw a Nissan Primera stuck up a bank in a hedge.
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let me be the last to let you down....
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Anything that helps you to get out of Crewe quicker is a good thing.
Ben
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Hmm ? I got done for speeding there not long after it opened. I was pretty miffed about it; it?s a brand-new, high standard, well engineered, no pedestrian road that should be quite capable of sustaining higher speeds.
The officer was standing on the last footbridge going towards Nantwich, and I?ve seen them there since on many occasions. The shape of the terrain results in anyone standing on the bridge being pretty well invisible against the western sky, particularly in the evening when I was bowling along at 85MPH. In fact when I was caught, the laser operator was standing to the side of the bridge, with trees behind him and wasn?t wearing a hi-viz jacket. It couldn?t have been better designed set-up for revenue collection.
I did see the MGTF the other day, but that?s the first accident I?ve actually come across there ? it was on the exit from one of the roundabouts. They can be pretty lethal cars in the wet, but it can only have crashed due to planting the accelerator pedal carelessly on the exit, which is just bad driving, not excess speed.
The roundabouts strike me as ridiculous from an environmental point of view ? they really are pretty tight, especially for HGV?s. Plus two of them are positioned immediately either side of fairly steep hill as the road crosses the railway line into Crewe. A tremendous amount of fuel must be wasted, and pollution unnecessarily caused, by vehicles accelerating to regain their previous cruising speeds.
I?m not aware there have been any KSI?s on the road, and it isn?t really helpful in getting out of Crewe ? the Crewe exit road joins the A500 only at the end of the dual carriageway,
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I was bowling along at 85MPH. In factwhen I was caught, the laser operator was standing to the side of the bridge, with trees behind him and wasn?t wearing a hi-viz jacket. It couldn?t have been better designed set-up for revenue collection.
You did help him with his 'revenue collection' just a teensy - weensy bit by driving at 85MPH didn't you?
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You did help him with his 'revenue collection' just a teensy - weensy bit by driving at 85MPH didn't you?
Yes, and of course I don't do it now - I sit there at cruise controlled 70 while everyone flashes past. I wonder if the Bentley's on test from the factory have special dispensation - nothing can keep up with those as the accelerate away from the roundabouts.
The frustrating thing is the me, the car and the road are all perfectly capable of handling 85MPH. All the accidents discussed are at roundabouts where the speed involved was probably 20-30 MPH. It does annoy me that the focus is on the wrong thing.
I notice at the beginning of the road (Nantwich end) they've put a very short stretch of grippy road surface. That's quite common in Cheshire, and I did have a very big 'off' (luckily no damage) a few yrs ago from one of the Northwich (A556) roundabouts, in my RWD Sierra GLS (very cool, in their day, white over black cars) where the grippy stuff that I'd been relying on suddenly finished!
However I now drive a powerful RWD Merc auto and I've never had a problem on the A500 roundabouts, even though I try to work with the other traffic to straight-line them and to carry as much speed through as possible
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>>Yes, the roundabouts do tend to loomup rather quickly! Last time I went down here, I saw a Nissan Primera stuck up a bank in a hedge.
Those roundabouts are terrible, they spoil an otherwise beautiful stretch of road. Having to slow down from 70+ to 20 to negotiate the tighter ones is a pain. If you don't know how sharp the angle between the roundabout and the approach road is, you can very quickly find yourself in trouble as many people have. And of course, that sharp turn is perfectly hidden by the steep embankment - on approach, it's hard to believe there's a roundabout there. It's almost as if they want you to have an accident, the way it's camouflaged.
I'm not sure, but I don't think there are any advisory speed limit signs on approach, other than the so-vague-as-to-be-useless "SLOW - Roundabout". A '30' would give people a better idea what to expect, but even that's pretty optimistic for most vehicles and drivers. You just don't expect to have to slow down that much, one of them is really a 2nd gear job.
In the wet, I've found that you have to leave those roundabouts with a very light right foot - slippery doesn't even begin to describe it... what makes it all the more frustrating is that some of them really aren't necessary. They could just as well be junctions, or even not there at all (what IS that one with no exits for???).
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I'm not sure, but I don't think there are any advisory speed limit signs on approach, other than the so-vague-as-to-be-useless "SLOW - Roundabout". A '30' would give people a better idea what to expect, but even that's pretty optimistic for most vehicles and drivers. You just don't expect to have to slow down that much, one of them is really a 2nd gear job.
If there is a roundabout warning sign then there is a give way sign and you should be able to stop at the line. Especially if the visibility is limited.
Those who are not should not be driving!
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