I think I'm past those days when I might have had a
Falling Down moment.... Maybe I've mellowed in my old age - at least as far as traffic jams are concerned. I'm inclined to just sit it out. It's a great advantage, not often being in a hurry to get anywhere!
Last Friday's journey wasn't one of those
complete-standstill-for-hours-on-end jobs. Rather, it was one of the fits-and-starts type, with many miles done at around 20mph, several brief stops, interlaced with short breaks when one could reach up to 50mph - for half a minute or so....
All this went on for miles and miles, without any let-up. There was no evident cause for this: merely "sheer volume of traffic".
I wonder if the variable speed limits in the 'smart' sections are in fact set
too high? I noticed that they were set at 60mph in the more open sections, and 40mph in the heavily congested sections (where it wasn't possible to go over 30mph anyway!). If a speed limit is set at 60, most motorists will do 70mph, speed cameras notwithstanding, in the belief that they will 'get away with it'.
If the vari-limits were set to, say, 45mph in the more open sections, rather than 60, maybe the pockets of heavy congestion wouldn't build up in the way they did.