A Normal Drive to Work?
Over the last three years I had travelled sixteen miles to and from work. On a good day this takes 35 minutes, the worst 3 1/2 hours, on average about one hour.
As an advanced Driving Instructor this has proven to be a useful training aid.
The first four miles takes about fifteen minutes, Scrummy’s = School Run Mummy’s in their Surrey Tractors, 4×4’s everywhere, plus normal traffic, “could walk it quicker”.
I join the A3 for London just before junction 10, M25, this is always slow as it is usually queuing or stationary for M25 over motorway bridge, then the junction for Painshill on A3, slow down almost stopping, creeping along, then, as if by magic, the road clears, three lanes of tarmac, it’s now a race to see who can get to the next traffic jam first.
Lane Discipline
I usually go to the left lane and drive at about 65mph, as usual its empty; maybe a couple of Lorries, lane 2 has a few cars and vans, all speeding. Lane 3, Packed nose to tail trying to push the car in front to go faster, as they disappear into the distance we are making good progress, as we approach Hook the A3 goes from 3 lanes to 2, loads of signs, “Beware Queuing Traffic, Speed Camera, and 5, yes 5, 50 mph speed signs, 2 sign boards highlighted in yellow, as well as being painted in the road with a red back ground”.
Does anyone slow down, of course not! Then the whole horizon goes RED! Speed camera, (this is the camera that had earned the most from fines issued in 2006), NO-ONE KNEW IT WAS THERE! As everyone queues in lane 2 & 3 the left lane is still moving, I keep going with caution in lane 1 passing the cars that went flying passed me earlier over the last 10 miles, we then creep and crawl all the way to Tolworth exit, some cars have re-passed me, I then meet them again queuing at the roundabout, exit roundabout into car park, calm and relaxed.
Some days I have been overtaken 4-5 times by the same vehicle and you get to recognise them, do they see me, I wonder if anyone actually knows what they are doing, seeing and achieving, it looks like ‘follow the leader’, as they all seem to do what the car in front does, with no regard for themselves or anyone else.
The moral of the story is the faster you go, the longer the queue, and the longer you have taken to get there. They’ve used more fuel, and got themselves more stressed in the process. They put themselves and others at great risk. The worrying part of this is that they seem to be oblivious to their actions, due to the fact they are not thinking about what they are doing.
I have been made redundant, so now working from home, what a relief!!
Martin Maguire ADI
