Laybys

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Sat 12 Apr 2008 19:21
Laybys - Manatee
Coming back from Suffolk after Easter we were on the look out for a convenient place to stop for 10 minutes. The only signed "services" we came across consisted of a filling station with no parking, ajoining a closed down Little Chef or somesuch, the car park of which was blocked off. Never mind, a layby will do, stretch our legs and have a coffee from the Thermos.

Despite much of this road being of recent construction, almost all of the laybys are right next to the carriageway. The A14 is a racetrack and I wasn't prepared to park with traffic whizzing by at 80mph and more in the adjacent lane.

Given that we are advised, if not required, to get out of our cars if we break down on the hard shoulder of a motorway I found this approach to the provision of stopping places surprising. How do 'they' justify this? It might not be a motorway, but the A14 is a major arterial route - all I wanted was 10 minutes break to avoid tiredness and stay alert, which is as far as I know in line with official advice. There seemed to be plenty of landscaping at the side of the road that could have accommodated something a little safer.

Anybody else had the same thought, or is it just me?
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Sat 12 Apr 2008 19:26
Laybys - Alby Back
Absolutely agree Manatee. Best example of getting rest areas right in my view is France. Ok there is often a price to pay in the form of tolls but this is mainly offset by lower fuel costs. Can't help feeling that they wouldn't feel as "safe" in this country though.
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Sun 13 Apr 2008 13:27
Laybys - b308
Best example of getting rest areas right in my view is France.


Germans have to put "rest" areas overy so often on their Autbahns - they tend to be quite large, few facilities but great for a quick break, or a 2 hour snooze at 6-ish in the morning after an overnight drive from the tunnel....
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Sat 12 Apr 2008 19:36
Laybys - Screwloose

Lay-bys or all sizes have been disappearing for years thanks to abuse from "non-members of the Caravan Club."
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Sat 12 Apr 2008 23:26
Laybys - Harleyman

Lay-bys or all sizes have been disappearing for years thanks to abuse from "non-members of
the Caravan Club."


By NON-members, do you mean the ones who DON'T park right in the middle so that no-one else can get in? ;-)
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Sat 12 Apr 2008 23:39
Laybys - Screwloose

No; the ones with '07-plated Transits and Irish accents.
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Sat 12 Apr 2008 23:39
Laybys - Manatee
I think Screwloose means the ones who usually tow with a Transit that's not registered to them, tend to stay for several weeks and then leave all their troubles behind.

As a member of the Caravan Club (I couldn't get into the Athenaeum) I would not wilfully obstruct a layby, and I doubt I have ever held you up either ;-)
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Sun 13 Apr 2008 00:06
Laybys - Harleyman
Only teasing, Manatee, and as a truck driver who is occasionally forced to spend a whole night in one of those lay-bys (lends a whole new meaning to being "rocked to sleep") I fully sympathise with you.

The A14 is an absolute disgrace when it comes to facilities. Those few which are available are poorly sited and virtually unsigned.

BTW I have no problem with bona fide CC members; they tend to be the sensible and responsible caravanners in my experience.

As for the "tinkers", this lot had the right idea;

www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,4786624-103690,00.html

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Sun 13 Apr 2008 00:30
Laybys - Manatee
No offence taken - your ;-) was noted.

You have my sympathy if you have to overnight on the A14. The draught from passing traffic was bad enough in the layby we eventually used, set back about a lane's width from the carriageway.
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Sun 13 Apr 2008 13:37
Laybys - Optimist
Now when I was a student, many years ago, one of the group had a Hillman Imp which I think was a rear-engined, funny looking car. A rival to the Mini, I suppose.

On the way back into London on a Saturday night, with all four in the car fuelled up on several pints of Old Gruntfuttocks Sheepbotherer, he'd drive off the road, through the long lay-bys you found in those days, and back onto the road again without losing any of the highish speed we were doing. It seemed fun at the time, though now of course I see that it was highly dangerous.
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