Sigh. After the A41 fiasco in Chester earlier this year, I had the misfortune of having to drive from Berkshire to Cheshire on Thursday and then back again this morning. Here is the list of roadworks, forgive me if I missed any.
A404 (M) 40mph limit as road is being widened (?)
M40: Those roadworks at the A34 in Oxford are STILL there. What exactly are they doing? Building an underground tunnel to Japan?
J15: Yep, those roadworks still there. "Please drive carefully through roadworks"... cones everywhere, and despite travelling at many different times I have NEVER seen any work being done. Which is probably why it's taken so long...
M42: just the depressing variable limits...
M6: 50 average speed check limit and roadworks up to and past Fort Dunlop in B'ham, then again towards Hilton Park services W'hampton. Then another 50 average near Stafford, "night works in progress". Got bored so came off on A5, thought would cut through A41 Newport... it's shut. For 3 weeks. Completely shut. The diversion is about 25 miles. WHY?
On way back today, M6 J16 to J17 roadworks, 50 limit, and then you're back to where I left the M6 before.
How does anything get done or anyone get anywhere in this country? Does it EVER stop?
How can you plan a journey properly? And don't even talk to me about London, I drove to Euston from Berkshire the other day. Never ever again. And you PAY for the privilege!!!
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Government anti car policy. It could easily be sorted by using contracts with a realistic timescale, overrun penalties, and early completion bonuses. Using adequate resources for the job and 24hr working. Far too easy for civil engineers or planners to work out.
Edited by Old Navy on 23/11/2009 at 14:46
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If the M42 variable limits depress you, ten you're not going to get any happier.
The M6 roadworks are in place so they can install the infrastructure for.....variable speed limits!
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Ha! Yes I know... I do realise that there is evidence that they keep traffic flowing smoothly but like a lot of things, I just irrationally hate them. Driving in the UK has become noticeably more robotised over the past few years. Even my fave stretches of roads and motorways seem to have been "sanitised". If I didn't have to commute 165 miles each Monday and Friday maybe I wouldn't notice it so much... any Cheshire/Manchester based folks with jobs up for grabs? : ) No disrespect to the South, but it's not me!
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It's the others stevied. If they would just stop making all their unnecessary journeys, clogging up our roads and wearing them out....Culling and decimation would seem to be the only short term answer. We just need to agree the criteria.....
;-)
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Yes... the swines. Let's have a middle lane hogger cull. : )
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There were no roadworks on my 45 miles journey on Saturday and my return journey on Sunday.
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: ) From where to where?
It doesn't matter. I was just refuting your statement that there are roadworks EVERYWHERE.
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It's the others stevied. If they would just stop making all their unnecessary journeys
Seriously though, I would love to know where the heck everyone is going. They can't *all* be going to meetings!
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Especially on Saturdays Bill. My retailer friends tell me they aren't going to shops much !
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Its us retired folk out there just to get in your way. :-) EDIT - Shops on a weekend is a no no that's when the workers mob them. :-)
Edited by Old Navy on 23/11/2009 at 15:44
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In a few years time you will be looking back on 2009 with nostalgia as the last time when the government still had sufficient funds to repair roads. :-)
Edited by CGNorwich on 23/11/2009 at 15:44
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J15: Yep those roadworks still there. "Please drive carefully through roadworks"...
I drive past virtually every week day and see lots of stuff going on, indeed they are working nights too I believe, certainly seen them their at 8/9pm and always at 7:45am
This should be over around Christmas but then they start on something else on the junction itself...
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Carl_a, maybe I am just myopic when I drive through there then. I am glad they are actually doing something, I just struggle to work out what it is... and I look forward to their work on the junction, do you think it will take as long as the work on the Oxford junction? I do hope so!
I know that some of you are probably thinking that I don't get that roads have to be repaired and that they wear our etc. etc. I do get it, but if you add to the roadworks the constant threat that if someone even lightly bumps someone these days, they seem to close the road for 11 hours, I just feel frustrated that a seemingly easy journey can take hours. And I will NEVER understand why a road like the A41 needs to be shut for 3 weeks. That is just utter nonsense. Google it, there's been lots of controversy about it.
It just feels like everything is pointlessly difficult these days. Britain is NOT a big country, yes there's a lot of traffic in parts, but if people just THOUGHT about things it could be a whole lot easier.
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The work at Peartree on the A34 at Oxford is to replace the flyover. It is scheduled to take just over two years work in total.The north bound side is finished, just the south bound side to do now.I think it should be finished by Autumn 2010. I moved house three weeks ago. Up till then I used to drive through those roadworks every day. Apart from Friday's they weren't too disruptive.
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For those of you who live in, travel round and through Walton / Weybridge area, this news will make you cringe.
The Seven Hills Road, (B365), will be CLOSED along its entire length for SEVEN months, to replace gas mains.
Those who use this road will realise how much grief and agro this will cause.
Edited by Altea Ego on 24/11/2009 at 10:59
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The Seven Hills Road, (B365), will be CLOSED .... will realise how much grief and agro this will cause. >>
Altea Ego - Thanks for that.
I do not know how I have missed that vital piece of news. Utter madness by the planners.
news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/england/surrey/8363749.stm
I hope to find time to attend the meeting at the Hilton on Friday 27 November to raise my objections.
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Will work on this gas main be co-ordinated with any other work to be done under this stretch of road, and will work be carried out 24/7, if not why not? Penalty clause for late completion? Questions for the meeting?
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Questions for the meeting? >>
I wonder if HJ will turn up at the meeting to raisee his objection if he has any?
b.t.w. If you look at aerial or bird's-eye views of the location, you will see that on either side of the road, ans especially on the are some of the most expensive properties in the country.
www.zoopla.co.uk/home-values/map/walton-on-thames/.../
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On every morning that I have done the journey southbound (I have done it on a Monday, a Tuesday and a Thursday) there is often a tailback to before the previous junction, about two and a half miles I believe. I don't think that it is acceptable to have that level of disruption for two years. It adds half an hour to the journey. If you did that journey every day, that is an extra hour every day for two years. Unacceptable. Maybe, just maybe, I can just about grasp the idea of closing a road for a short timescale in order to get the work done in a reasonable timescale.
I know l'escargot made a point about his 90 mile round trip without roadworks, but I bet if you did over 100 miles in one direction anywhere you would get at least one large roadworks-related disruption.
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Altea Ego's post appeared as I was typing mine! : ) By "the journey" I mean the journey past the Peartree works on the M40.
Re: Altea Ego's post, I rest my case. It does not, and should not, take that long to replace gas mains! Ridiculous. These people need a kick up the posterior.
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Not long ago, I'd swear that the authorities were trying to send Southport floating off into the North Sea. There were that many roadworks around the town that it was as though they were trying to join them all together and cut the town free!
On a national scale though, I suppose that if all the roads were built within a few years of each other then they will need replacing around the same time.
It does make me very angry though (perhaps too angry) when you get roadworks on a major route then roadworks on one of the diversion routes. Do these goons that make decisions such as this not realise how much this costs not just the motorist, but the entire economy?
Gah.
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I seem to remember seeing a documentary about airport runway repairs where the repair team could fix quite large chunks of runway in the time between the last flight at night and the first one in the morning. Willingness and budget factors as ever I suppose.
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Badwolf, I honestly think that the goons as you so rightly call them haven't got the foresight and intelligence to see it, and also see the public as an annoyance who dare to question their divine right to mess around as they see fit with public services. I think it's high time this country woke up and realised we pay for these morons, so we should relentlessly question and interrogate what they do.
Another example of idiocy: when I came off the A41, I drove through Newport (Shropshire!), and thought "aha, I can cut down that lane to get back onto the A41". I drove for 3 miles, and THEN came to a sign that said "no access to A41". Why isn't there a sign at the beginning of the road? Which bright spark couldn't be bothered to put down two signs instead of one?
It does make you wonder whether council employees use the road themselves doesn't it? In London I think that they all cycle to work and think motorists are the spawn of Satan, but out in the rural areas of Shropshire and Cheshire they must surely have some idea of the irritation and general incompetence they inflict on us?
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Does thinking about things include thinking about whether doing a 165 mile commute is in any way sensible?
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Soupytwist, I don't do it every day. I have a house in Cheshire but am working at the moment in Berkshire. I have a room in a house down there, and sometimes I stay down there, sometimes my girlfriend comes down there. Depends on what is going on. I don't want to buy down there as i) it's too expensive and ii) I don't see it as a long-term position.
I thought about it for a long time, trust me.
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