ADUK Archive

Ramp Metering could be coming to a motorway near you. In a bid to keep traffic flowing at peak times the latest idea is slip road traffic lights. Personally I have never had any experience of these but I think that is about to change as one of the junctions I use regularly (M1, junc.28 ) is about to have them installed.

More info here http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/derbyshire/7198904.stm


Mike

MikeG wrote:Ramp Metering could be coming to a motorway near you.

Never mind could!

Junction 18 M6 northbound
Junction 2 M56 eastbound
Junction 2 M60 anticlockwise.....

crr003 wrote:

MikeG wrote:Ramp Metering could be coming to a motorway near you.

Never mind could!

Junction 18 M6 northbound
Junction 2 M56 eastbound
Junction 2 M60 anticlockwise.....

Well, I must live a sheltered life, not come across any . . . .yet


Mike

MikeG wrote:Well, I must live a sheltered life, not come across any . . . .yet

I think it only started last year in the north west. There used to be a junction on the M6 in Birmingham that had it years ago.

About a year ago I saw some traffic lights on entry slip roads to the M1 somewhere on the Leeds to Sheffield section, or maybe a bit further south.

It looked like they were just being installed, but so far I have not seen them in use.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

Is this the same as they have in the US?
They have a system that lets one car at a time onto the Freeway, which seemed to work quite well.
It's essentally a traffic light that changes red/green every few seconds giving each car a 50-100 yard gap when joining.

TripleS wrote:It looked like they were just being installed, but so far I have not seen them in use.

They only come on during busy traffic periods.

http://www.highways.gov.uk/knowledge/17308.aspx

They've been running on the M27 for a few years now and do seem to work reaasonably well (assuming that people can get up to the speed of traffic on the carriageway before joining). I'm not sure if they are clever enough to decide when there are gaps or whether they're just on a timer but they only operate during peak times. I guess if other parts of the country are now adopting them they have been deemed a success!

Chris

crr003 wrote:

TripleS wrote:It looked like they were just being installed, but so far I have not seen them in use.

They only come on during busy traffic periods.

http://www.highways.gov.uk/knowledge/17308.aspx

Thank you for that. I see the Wakefield area was mentioned so that's probably where I've seen them installed, M1 J40/41 etc. or thereabouts.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

Junction 22 M6 and Junction 10 M62 have them and what a pain in the arse they are,in my opinion from what I have seen they seem to cause more collisions (minor)than time saved.

They change to red you stop,they go back to green and by the time you get a gear there back at red again,they cause so much confusion and hessitation amongst drivers,that i would save my money and just let the traffic run as it is.

The other thing is that they encourage red light jumping due to how theyre set up,or perhaps thats the whole idea behind it,next thing will be a static camera and flash flash,your licence has got points on it thanks to a government road safety experiment.

Just my opinion but then i am always a bit suspicious of these schemes that are put in place to allegedly help the motorist, they probably will be policed by the wait for it HATO's. as I think it is about time now that they became self sufficient.
Stephen

Stephen wrote:They change to red you stop,they go back to green and by the time you get a gear there back at red again,..

Maybe hold in first gear? They do seem to cycle through the sequence pretty quickly at times!