A rant about roadwork lane closures and those who "police" them!

cubegame

So at the moment the A303 near Stonehenge is currently being crippled by delays cause by a land closure on a major roundabout. To facilitate the lane closures one lane of the dual carriageway is closed for about half a mile on each side.

Of course, this should cause done delay but unfortunately the problem is hugely exacerbated by the hoards of petrified drivers whose first instinct at seeing the dreaded lane closed in one mile side is to wrench themselves into the near side lane and form an orderly by slow queue.

Such drivers are obviously completely unable to even comprehend the idea of using two lanes and then merging in turn but worse still are the amateur "police" this situation attracts.

I will certainly not wait in such a pointless queue so when I meet the orderly one mile lane I will do what don't sensible, confident and capable driver would and proceed as long as possible in the unused lane before merging in turn as the highway code suggests.

This approach brings me the ire of absolute idiots who will either do everything possible to prevent the good driver from merging or worse, those who pull out from their orderly queue and then drive along side it to illegally block a lane.

One of the latter example thought this was a good idea this morning as I proceeded past the stationary queue at 45 mph. His details and the video footage are now with the police.

Do we have a queuer on here who can explain their behaviour so I can understand it?

comeandgo

On some of the larger road works up here there are Road signs explaining how things are expected to work, both lanes used then merge at lane closed but I was on one recently and it was lorry drivers who were driving side by side very slowly stopping any vehicles getting past. Crazy.

Manxman_in_exile

Happens near us where two lanes merge into one. Very few drivers use the outside lane up to the merge point, and with most drivers just using the inside lane, traffic backs up and blocks a nearby roundabout.


Fortunately, most drivers here are quite civilised about letting you merge.

bertiewhite

There is a difference between "merging appropriately" and "waiting until the last possible opportunity before pushing in" though.

jimbo6977

On my morning route, I'm thankful for the 99% of people who take to the remaining, left-hand, lane far too early, because I need to turn right just before the merge point and it leaves my way totally clear!!

But seriously, it is poor, poor driving in reality.

Ebe_Scrooge

I almost had a run-in with a lorry driver a couple of weeks back over this. Dual carriageway, roadworks ahead, 1 lane closed in 800 yards. There were signposts every few yards saying "Use both lane when queuing". So I'm in the right hand lane, up ahead a lorry in the left hand lane decides he's God and deliberately moves out to straddle both lanes to stop me passing - right beside another sign that said "Use both lanes when queuing". I don't have a dashcam, but he did have one of those stickers on the back of his wagon saying "How's my driving", so I took great pleasure in calling the number later and suggesting that they educate him on following the signage placed by the Highways Agency. And to think he's a so-called "professional" driver :-(

mchale

cubegame wrote: »

Do we have a queuer on here who can explain their behaviour so I can understand it?

So if the is a long queue in a supermarket/store do you walk to the front of the queue to be served?

Jackmydad

You can be one of those "queuing types" who sits in the inside lane and slowly moves forward, or you can be one of those "confident drivers" who races to the end of the outside lane, and then finds themselves sat in a queue waiting to merge. . .

In a perfect world it'd all work great, but it's not a perfect world.

facade

cubegame wrote: »

Do we have a queuer on here who can explain their behaviour so I can understand it?

There is a pinch point with a single lane.
The amount of traffic that can flow through the pinch point is fixed.
The single lane which is queued solid will exactly fill the single lane after the pinch point if it simply continues forwards.


There is no room for any traffic from another lane to "merge in turn" as this involves the already nose to tail lane stopping for even longer to make enough space to let a car from the second lane in.


So no-one will let them in, because they have been waiting patiently for ages.
So most people will take the lane that continues to avoid having to risk a game of chicken or a road rage incident.


The "use both lanes & merge in turn" idea if carried out properly, simply makes the queue in each lane half as long, but moving forwards half as fast, it doesn't solve the problem of the restriction, and as most people can't drive anyway, it actually slows things down more than just having a single lane would, whilst they dither and create larger gaps than is needed.

spadoosh

mchale wrote: »

So if the is a long queue in a supermarket/store do you walk to the front of the queue to be served?

Bad analogy.

What the OP is describing is more like a load of queues for tills. Everyone joins their individual queues and they then expect to be served in order of the time that they joined any queue as opposed to being served as and when their time in their queue arrives.

Ie wanting to push in front of someone because you picked the slower queue.

I do it mcdonalds a lot. Always pick the wrong lane. I get really angry that i was there first but because i chose the wrong lane the person behind me ends up with their food first. I wouldnt get out of my car and try and make that person give me their spot in the queue which is what im guessing you do?

spadoosh

facade wrote: »

There is a pinch point with a single lane.
The amount of traffic that can flow through the pinch point is fixed.
The single lane which is queued solid will exactly fill the single lane after the pinch point if it simply continues forwards.


There is no room for any traffic from another lane to "merge in turn" as this involves the already nose to tail lane stopping for even longer to make enough space to let a car from the second lane in.


So no-one will let them in, because they have been waiting patiently for ages.
So most people will take the lane that continues to avoid having to risk a game of chicken or a road rage incident.


The "use both lanes & merge in turn" idea if carried out properly, simply makes the queue in each lane half as long, but moving forwards half as fast, it doesn't solve the problem of the restriction, and as most people can't drive anyway, it actually slows things down more than just having a single lane would, whilst they dither and create larger gaps than is needed.

They work on the basis that the flow of each lane will be different as such never plays out as half as fast.

Say lane 1 is moving at 10mph and lane 2 at 20 mph, bear in mind its not conitnuous so (say between 8-12MPH) gaps open up allowing the lane 2 traffic to merge.

This is more or less exactly how it does play out. If youve ever been in lane 1 and a lane 2 car has overtaken you, its extremely rare that they will end up in a situation where they are behind you past the pinch point.