Worst Traffic Jam you have been stuck in?

mum2one

About 8 yrs ago, been down to Exeter for New Yr, there was an accident on m5, what should have been 4 1/2 hr journey - 10 hrs..

At one stage took 2 1/2hrs to drive 1 mile.... then with the diversion - instead of M5 to junction 6 off at Worcester then home... no we had to go over the severn bridge, all throu gloucester...

This was before I had Sat nav, the interior light didnt work... trying to map read in darkness by the light of a mobile phone... (pre-torch on phone, pre i-phone days) xx

Exemplar

December 24 1999. Left Richer Sounds at Hankey Place, London at 14:00, got to Nottingham at 22:00. Smoked 40 Marlboro Red and nearly overheated my 2.0 Alfa Spyder 1999... Nose to tail traffic all the way.

Turn_to_Grey

Queens Silver Jubilee 1977, A30 going to Cornwall, as Her Maj was visiting the area, joined the queue at 11am, got to the campsite 60 miles away at 19:00.

Geodark

Not really a single traffic jam, but Newcastle got hit by a supercell thunderstorm in 2012, and the whole place ended up just about gridlocked - took me near on 7 hours to travel the 7 miles home from work. Never seen anything like it.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/4401740/Supercell-storm-batters-North-East-but-its-all-over-quickly.html

Paully232000

jaydeeuk1 wrote: »

I was on the m6, probably a good 6 or 7 years ago on way to a meeting from Belper to North Cheshire NHS in warrington. I knew there was going to be a storm, didn't know how bad though. Usually a 2 hr drive, remember being a good 20 mile away and at a stand still mid morning, when I got to warrington all routes in where blocked, so turned around and went back on m6 (was at least an hour late for meeting anyway by this point), they diverted all traffic off m6 south on to a single track toll road where you had to pay 10p (I'm trying to find it on google maps) Imagine 10000+ cars queueing to get over a toll booth with a single kiosk..... Think I was in my car for something like 14 hours, had to p*ss in a bottle twice and eat mints to keep me going as I'd not eaten as I just wanted to get the f*ck home.

Worst part is, I was in a hire car stuck on the motorway and at one point a big motorway junction sign blew off from somewhere and smacked in to mine and the car next to me leaving a nice dent on the wing.

I think the one you mean is the Warburton toll bridge.

tim9966

Got stuck for 2-3 hours a few years ago on the A329M near Reading. A horse box had just crashed a few miles ahead and got stuck behind it.

The worse part was if I'd been 5 minutes later the jam would have been back to the M4, so I would have seen it and would have stayed on the M4 until the M25.

In 2007 it took me nearly 13 hours to get home from work. Leaving at 6.30pm on a Friday evening I got home 8 miles away at 7.30am on the Saturday. This was during the floods where every single road was blocked. I also tried walking but had to turn back due to deep water all across the roads, and the fields were all lakes. It wasn't a jam as such as I just had to park up and driving about 40 miles trying to find a clear road.

oldagetraveller

"I think the one you mean is the Warburton toll bridge."
Ah, been over that many, many times. Even on a pushbike when the toll was 1d!
Many people think the toll is for the cantilever bridge over the Ship Canal. It isn't,it's for the little bridge next to the toll booth.
As to getting stuck. The longest, I think back when Princess Diana's remains were being transported up the M1 after her funeral. I was travelling from Dover to Liverpool and was trapped on the slip road from the M25 to the M1 for absolutely hours. Or it seemed like that.