Ffs - our motorway network is ****

2 years back I was detoured over 40 miles. I was playing a party at Scotch Corner & had to go north & then over to Middlesbrough. It's not that funny when you've already been working 10 hours & instead of getting to bed at 2:30, you get in at 4am... Was DJing in Oxford 2 months back & a similar story, with M69 closed.

 

It were immigrants that built the roads

 

The signs that get me are "A356 closed after A213" or "M62 closed J12-14" without any information about where those closures actually are. Fair enough, if you know the road in question you might know where it is and how to avoid it, but the information given is nowhere near enough for those unfamiliar with the affected road..

 

Couple of "favourites" spring to mind for me

1. On the M62, late at night, driving home, I need to come off on the A1 southbound. Just after passing the Pontefract junction, the matrix sign told me that there was no entry onto A1 southbound. So I had to go head North on the A1 and come back via a convoluted detour. Thanks for that - had you told me further back on the M62 I could have come off at Pontefract and headed home that way.

2. Driving to a hotel late at night for a customer visit the following day I was on the M42 and in a good few miles of road works slowing me down, so decided I was ready for a break and a coffee and came up the slip road at Tamworth for the services. At the top of the slip road there was a manual sign stuck next to the roundabout saying "no re-access to M42 Southbound". ******* great - thanks for not telling me that before I chose to come off the bloody motorway. After getting my coffee I had to head back out on the northbound carriageway for about 15 miles before I could turn round and come back through the bloody road works a second time. 30 miles added to my journey for the sake of a bit of consideration for the motorist.

 

An awful journey back last night. The diversion near Daventry took forever, single file traffic trundling through various villages before another 'A' road came into view. Then a good 5 miles running parallel to the M1 before finally rejoining. The second diversion took us through Derby and onto Long Eaton, another 12 miles roughly, much quicker mind you than the previous diversion. There were various diversions all signalled by different symbols which added to the fun. By the time we pulled into Woodall services it was gone 2am and there were two buses, one ours and one Hudersfield Town, all occupants looking very tired! We got home for 3am, which was actually earlier than we anticipated it being back near Daventry.

The A1 was also shut at some point last night, so us, Bolton and Huddersfield all had interesting return journeys.

 

We came off the M1 the junction before the Daventry detour and went through the middle of Northampton, and onto the A34 picking up the M1 where the M6 joins. That was quick so we made it home by 1.30.
The journey to the game down the M1 was something else! 5 hours 15mins with no stops and a massive hold up of two hours round Towcester. I would have happily risked a trip down the M1 past the suspect package rather than endure that.

 

And to cap it all I had a drive back to Lincoln from Oakwell.
Fkin marvellous that was !

 

Yes the road closures are always down to immigrants aren't they????? Ffs...

 

Take my hat off to all of you who travelled . I'm in the transport business and every day is a nightmare and ultimately the reason I don't travel to long away matches. Friggin rubbish roads ...smart motorways my arse .

 

personally if i was in a car with a good sat nav i would set it to find me a route avoiding motorways or is that me being naive?

 

Doesn't really take a genius to work out it'll be closed at junction 12 and the diversion will probably bring you back on at junction 14.

 

If you've got a hundred miles to drive at night, you would want to be on a motorway normally... although I did drive down the A65 instead from the Lakes the weekend before last, after a gig, as I knew there were closures on the M60, north of Manchester. Lots of these closures are not picked up on Google maps & sat navs,

 

But if you are driving down the A1 and see M62 closed at J12, is that east or west? If it is in the direction you are going, is it before or after you get off. If you don't know that particular piece of road it really does not help.

 

Wouldn't you ascertain that by the direction you are traveling in. Why diaplay.the.message about the oncoming carriageway

 

I do that all the time, both here and in France. Mind you I save a fortune in toll fees in France.

 

The m62 starts in liverpool and ends in hull. Its fairly obvious which end j12 is at.


The m25 it s bit tricker as its orbital but the low numbers are at the bottom and the m1 is 23 I think so its not difficult to work out that its probably round about the south western area of the m25

 

Surely it starts in Hull and ends in Liverpool