tonybooth

Yet again the media are having a frenzy about so called 'Rat Runs'. The worst one in the country is a residential road in Scarborough of all places

The question is this: -

What do you think about the whole 'Rat Run' thing?

Personally, I think it is a load of government spun cr@p and just another way of seemingly having a pop at law abiding motorists. At the end of the day my car is taxed, insured and paid for, so as far as I am concerned I will drive it where the **** I want, so there If local councils wish to install so many traffic lights and mini-roundabouts on main roads that are far too congested any way, then thats not my problem. I will always take the quickest route. This is not to say that I drive through housing estates at 50mph, but I have just as much right under the Road Traffic Act to drive on a 'Rat Run' as I do on any other road in this so called country.

Over to you........

TONY

Adrian F

You have made the point that the main roads have been altered by local authorities to reduce traffic flow thus forcing people into the back roads to make any progress in their journey's and this is the key point until the main roads are altered back so that trafic flows people will use alternaive routes.


This is cetainly the case in London since Ken took over and appointed the management and policies that TFL now operate under.

I suggest that if local authorites were required by law to re-design roads to maximise traffic flow the use of "rat runs" would be significantly reduced as people would return to the main roads.

Trafic is like water it will use the route of least resistance as you Dam more Rat Runs the trafic jams on the remaining routes will increase what we need is a road building policy to reduce congestion and attract people back on to the trunk roads. And before we get all the build a road it attracts trafic stories look at the highlands miles of Tarmac all empty no congestion! the roads are there to serve a need and at the moment we need more roads! Also if we opened more of the closed Rat Runs in london and removed the Trafic calming introduced by TFL we would save 500 lives a year according to London Ambulance Service (A independant authority i would say) and reduce congestion, journey times and save money wasted on fuel and actually improve air quality!

Jen

I get annoyed with the attitude of some people - "all these people driving down my road" ...er, it's the highway, if they're taxed and insured they can drive where they like! Same with parking

tbh, if you don't want to live on a busy main road then you'll find a cul-de-sac...if it really is a prority. Roads are for cars

Johnny50

Seen this on the news this morning too.

Cant see the problem, as said above, if you dont want to live near traffic, dont buy a house near a busy road.

Granted, that at some point the said road must've been quiet, and other closures/traffic calming measures have caused the build up in recent years..but hey...it's a bl00dy road..get used to it !!

BOB.T

It's typical of the authorities / government, they can't see past the end of their noses and just spin the cheapest thing into the new best thing ie build humps instead of new roads

We need restrictions taken out of our daily drives then we wouldn't need rat runs cos it's be quicker on the main roads! It's like exhausts, you want to make you're car go faster you put a big **** of zorst on, simple as! You want to download a mahoosive file, you bin your crappy dial up and get Broadband. You want to get to New York really quickly, you bin your Cesna and get on Concorde....The way everthing else is getting faster, I really don't see why there is a need to slow cars down with speedhumps et al, we need to speed the slow ******* who are running the country up[img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img]

As for the parents who say "it's not safe for our kids to play in the street" oh no sh*t Sherlock...you wouldn't send them out to play on a mine field would you so don't send them out onto the street....unless you're gonna staple a tax disc to them

And breath