Safe Speed Forums

Helen Blaby, the Radio Five Live traffic reporter, has come up with a seven-point plan to relieve congestion:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/fivelivebrea ... ackli.html

All seems a bit superficial and simplistic to me – perhaps some forum members might like to add their own suggestions

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

Reduce immigration.

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Pecunia Prius Equitas et Salus

Actually I recon the first 4 are pretty close, and the one about shielding accidents too.

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

One school on my way to work tried a walking bus, unfortunately the car park they decided to make the drop off point was just off the roundabout that is the focal point of the congestion on that section of my journey. School runners entering and leaving the car park actually made the situation worse.

[Yes minister mode] In principle I agree with walking buses, however as the traffic for certain schools causes queueing 3 miles or more from the school I find it unlikely that the children will be willing to walk far enough.[/YMM]

Still in the right areas it could work I guess.

Japan has no immigration to speak of, still congested.

Re: working from home - Reduce employer NIC's for employees who work from home. That will soon have the attention of the business community.

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All views expressed are personal.

The best solution would be to prevent local councils from deliberately engineering congestion into their road systems.

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Save a cow - eat a vegetarian

AND give them a tax allowance for the heating and lighting they use while working from home!

I don't understand your point. Reducing immigration would, ipso facto, reduce the increase of congestion (less increase in people = less increase in cars using the roads = not as much congestion). What has Japan got to do with it?

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Save a cow - eat a vegetarian

I thought we were talking about the UK?

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Pecunia Prius Equitas et Salus

She sounds roughly right - the screens idea is a goodun - there are obvious problems with just blanket introducing walking buses as someone else has pointed out.

The "too fast too close" comment annoyed me a bit - driving fast doesnt cause congestion, nor does driving close - unless you combine the two and drive up behind someone too fast, then hit your brakes, only I don't think she meant that.

Finally - "and the 7th (which I didn't get to mention on air) - Improve cycle lanes and other public transport." - made me chuckle because of how impossible simple it looks when put into 7 words.

Simple ideas? Well, yes. But just because an idea is simple or simplisitc, does not mean it will not work.

Diverting some heavy goods from the motorways to other forms of transport (rail, rivers, canals, sea) should be looked at, too.

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www.thatsnews.org.uk / www.thatsnews.blogspot.com / http://thatsmotoring.blogspot.com/

The population density in Japanese cities is insane, even compared to central London. You think those tiny "studio apartments" (ie. overpriced pokey little hovels) you get in London are small? You should see what they put up with in Tokyo.

In fact your comment has actually helped prove BottyBurp's point. The UK is not getting any larger, yet we continue to cram more and more people into a bunch of cities, increasing population density which increases congestion.


Oh, and since we're on the topic. Japan has a number of anti-car measures that make the UK look like a paradise of personal freedom, yet they are still congested. For example they have:

• If you want to own a car other than a kei-car (Kei cars can be no bigger than a Smart, no more than 660cc and 64bhp) you have to provide documentation from your landlord or deeds to the house that you have an off-street parking space for it. It can take several weeks to register a car and you have to re-register it if you move house.
• An MOT&emissions scheme so strict that most cars fail it after 3 years, causing their value to plummet dramatically. It is often more cost effective to buy a brand new car than it is to keep an old one on the road. This is why Japanese imports are so damn cheap
• A national speed limit of 55mph
• All cars fitted with 112mph electronic speed restrictors
• No cars made with power higher than 280bhp (though some manufacturers do play a bit fast and loose with this one)

And despite all this, and the fact that they have a rail network that is famous for it's speed and reliability, as opposed to the UKs one that barely works and is overpriced, they are still congested!

Since most congestion occurs in cities, and HGVs on tthe motorway don't actually cause congestion (more the morons who can't overtake and then return to L1 properly), then that won't make the slightest difference.

Besides that, water transport is too slow for perishables and the rail network is already full of passenger trains.

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

I think that's exactly what she meant. If we could slow down and space out on heavily congested roads our journies to work would be smoother and less stressed. But how can that be achieved? I've only driven on the M42 Active Traffic Management twice when operational. Seemed to work well but that's hardly comprehensive expierence.

I've no issue with the other ideas that were mentioned. All very sensible. I don't think it takes a huge reduction in traffic to free up roads, most run well for the majority of the day, certainly round here.

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In a former life I was Capri2.8

Actually, I think that congestion could be eased without taking ANY traffic off the roads if people learned not to block juntions, roundabouts etc...

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

I think more flexitime is a more workable solution than homeworking. I don't think employers quite trust people enough for homeworking and some workers may object to the increased heating bills, but if you allow flexitime with say, 2 hours either way of standard working hours then the problem will take care of itself as everybody is different and will have different preferences. Some people are "morning people" and like to get up at 6AM. These people will likely end up in work at 7, go home at 3 and get to spend more time with their kids.

My GF has flexitime, and doesn't leave the house until 9:30, arriving in the office for 11 and leaving at 7. She gets to miss all the traffic and get a lie-in every morning, it's wonderful.

Sure it means that businesses can only schedule meetings between 11AM and 3PM but this may well end up being a good thing as it means that employees are guaranteed 4 hours of every day when they can actually get some work done rather than being stuck in sodding meetings.

The problem with that is that it will make the shoulder peaks busier, whilst the main peak is still not free of traffic. So the "rush hour" will stretch to beyond 10am. That means you will have 3 hours of heavy traffic instead of 1 hour of very heavy traffic. If everyone had the same flexitime possibilities as your gf, I'm sure her commute would quickly begin to get longer.

Besides, isn't flexitime well established now in most businesses where it is appropriate?

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In a former life I was Capri2.8

Hello.

Been having a bit of a browse round your forums, and felt inclined to write in defence of weepej, whose rather harmless post seems to have made everyone unaccountably defensive. He (or she) merely offered an example to counteract Bottyburp's baseless assertion that immigration is a cause of congestion. Does Bottyburp have any evidence for this most unlikely conjecture? Casual observation suggests that immigrants are disproportionately high users of public transport. Perhaps the native population is more to blame for over-use of the private car?

Hi Claud and welcome to the forum.

From personal experience, there are a large number of eastern european registered cars around here. No, they don't form a major part of the car population, BUT they do tend to be illegally driven (not UK registered etc). Its a different issue, but itself causes problems.

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.