Route to London - The Experience

[TheScullster]

Hi all

After considering the various opinions last Friday (see Totally OT - Route to London last Friday) I took M1 route in both directions. Journey time was 4 hours near enough both ways (excluding stops), although daughter's rental flat was close to the London end of M1 so not too much city driving thankfully. As noted by others, the semi-contra-flow section close to London was a bit of a pain - as much from the reduced width lanes (as far more concentration needed) as the 50mph restriction.

Things that were different in the big smoke:

The lane widths seem significantly narrower than Hull. Watching a Porsche slightly ahead on the A406 showed only about a foot clearance to each lane marker (OK so this car is a little wider than your standard saloon).

One thing very noticable was the lack of alignment of lane markings either side of a junction. So you drive through traffic lights taking the intuitive line to find you're rubbing door handles with the car in the outer lane! The lane markings seemed to be misaligned by upto 2 feet across some junctions.

Luckily the parking outside daughter's flat was uncontrolled Sat and Sun. It was interesting (and a little concerning at times) to see the size of the cars that managed to get successfully parked in the slots either side of ours. Distance between parked cars appeared to reduce as the day wore on.

On the return journey "up north" there were numerous signs indicating delays between junctions 16 and 18 on the M1. These were also reported northbound on a highways agency display at junction 15a services at around 5pm. As it turned out, all the trouble was on the south bound carriageway, which was at a complete standstill. Occupants had left cars and were sat on the central reservation chatting!

So all-in-all the journey could have been far worse. The new (second hand) Ford Focus 1.8 diesel returned about 52mpg cruising between 70 & 80 where possible (probably 20mpg better than the Mazda it replaced).

Just thought I'd share

Phil

[ARWadsworth]

Did your daughter offer a brew when you arrived?

[TheScullster]

We took her down with us for the start of term. Don't worry though we made sure we/she had a kettle with us!

Were a bit caught out when we offered her friend's parents a cup though - they asked for milk which we don't use!

Phil

[Steve Walker]

You're lucky! I live not far from the Trafford Centre (J10 of the M60). The road from Urmston onto the roundabout used to have two lanes, but they decided that they needed to add a left-turn only lane for getting onto the motorway. Now I would have done it by using part of the grass verge that lies between the left lane and Pizza Hut's car park, but no, they made the existing left lane, left turn only and added a third lane by narrowing the approach road's central refuge. The end result is that when going straight on or right, your lane is perfectly aligned with the wrong lane of the roundabout! At least a fifth of drivers seem not to recognise that they need to jink left one lane on entering the roundabout. Even worse, many drivers in the left turn lane, don't realise that they should not be going straight on and are heading straight into the traffic that is jinking left!

There is another junction for the Trafford Centre (J9). Now if you are going right onto the motorway there, you have to be in the right-hand lane and then if you get stopped at the lights part-way round the roundabout, when the lights change and everyone moves off you have to move over two lanes to the left before stopping at the next set of lights less than twenty-five yards on - a very interesting manouevre!

The local schools round here have that effect - I've even had a resident come out and offer to move their car up to give me room to get out, but by the time they'd opened their car door, I was gone (lot's of practice!)

SteveW