[Rolebama]

We had another Notification of Road Closure through the letterbox this morning. A local 'main road' is to be closed for another 3 weeks in April. On the face of it, at least they have given notice, but I have lost count of how many 7-day periods they have said the road would be closed, only for the road to remain open for those periods, and then to close the road the following week or even the second week after, which is discovered upon arrival. This has been going on on-and-off since Covid shutdown. Apparently this is to re-lay a culvert. 3 weeks to dig a ditch, chuck in some pipe and refill it. 3 weeks - seriously? When I worked as a plant fitter for a piling company back in the 80s, this sort of thing would be done overnight! (For the purposes of getting soil samples, as we were not allowed to close busy roads in the daytime.)

[olduser]

And all for a High Speed rail link we did not need.
But we had to have one because other countries had one.
If it had been a straight forward rail link well maybe.

[Drivingforfun]

A petty moan maybe but I often find it daft that we have to pay extra fuel duty to follow the diversion when a road is closed

If there was no tax on fuel (or car maintenance which is brought forward due to extra miles, but let’s not get complicated) it’d be fine but seeing as the majority of the fuel price is tax it’s a bit unfair

[Rolebama]

@Drivingforfun I had a job in the late 70s which meant travelling around 10 miles each way through the suburbs. With mini roundabouts and traffic lights causing holdups along the way, it could take me up to an hour. In the winter I had to fiddle with the choke for the first 3 or 4 miles. A change of route going through more rural areas added 4 or 5 miles to my route, but bringing my time down to 35 to 40 mins, and I noticed that because I could cruise, my fuel bill was noticeably less.
It seems to me that most of the congestion is caused by traffic lights, which could most certainly be turned off most of the day.