Comments on: Driver location signs – possibly coming to a motorway near you

By: acer

acer — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 12:47:24 +0000

Road exit numbers on North American major highways are almost universally given in miles (USA) or km (Canada) from the distance reference point (usually the start of the highway – in the case of Highway 401 in Ontario it is in Windsor on the US border, and stretches to the Quebec border, some 800 km (very approximately) away. Thus exit 427 is 427 km from the reference point. This has some useful features, two being that new intermediate junctions can be easily added (as David says), also that it is easy to work out how far you have to go to your chosen exit. Another example of not only other countries doing things better than the UK, but the UK stubbornly refusing to learn from them! Ostriches anyone?

By: John Frewen-Lord

John Frewen-Lord — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 19:24:32 +0000

By: Dave Brown

Dave Brown — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 09:55:36 +0000

I find it odd that the M25 markers have been set at x.3 and x.8 km from the origin. Why on earth didn’t they use x.0 and x.5? However I was pleased to see on the M11 this morning just south of junction 8 (Stansted Airport) they are erecting new distance markers: M11 B 42.5; M11 B 42.0 etc. That makes a lot more sense to me.

By: David

David — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 22:18:11 +0000

I think it would be a great idea to use distance location signs as the basis for junction numbers: it would save a lot of expense (renumbering the existing junctions or having strange junction numbers) and confusion every time a new intermediate junction is built. It would also mean that you could easily work out how far it is to the junction you need to exit at, from your current position: eg, junction 150, 150 km if following the road from the start or 100 km if you join the road at junction 50.

By: Daniel Jackson

Daniel Jackson — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 04:35:40 +0000

I wonder how feasible it would be for distance signs to show metres at exact metre distances but without any unit labels. For example a sign could read: “Curve ahead 200″. The 200 would imply metres, but imperialists could think it is yards.

This way those who try to damage metric signs by changing the units wouldn’t be able to and should the day come when all signs are metricated, then the cost is reduced because nothing will have to be done to these signs.

By: Ezra Steinberg

Ezra Steinberg — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 17:53:29 +0000

Alex makes a shockingly pertinent point. If distances to road work are posted in yards with the expectation that British motorists will understand them safely, then there is no reason not to post them in meters and simply tell the public that for all practical purposes they can be thought of as “yards”!

By: Alex Bailey

Alex Bailey — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 13:52:04 +0000

While the DLS is a great idea, more credit should be given to the “marker posts” that already exist along all of our motorways and are becoming more common on trunk roads. These marker posts show the same distance information in increments of 100 metres and as anybody who has broken down on a motorway will know, also point to the nearest emergency telephone.

These marker posts have been there since the very early days of the motorway and although many have (and still are) sucked in by the myth that these posts are 100 yards apart, this is untrue. The very first marker posts installed were “half a furlong” apart which is 110 yards – perhaps coincidence, perhaps design, but that is 100.58 metres!

As well as the obvious safety function, these marker posts also work well as a tool to judge distance between vehicles at speed and if you know the distance to your destination in km are fantastic for travelling with kids (from simple countdown to your destination for younger kids to maths for the older ones – working out distances or speeds). They would, of course, be an additional aid in route planning if our other signs and road atlases were also metric!

It’s also ironic that, if you see temporary signs on motorways such as “x yards” before roadworks that the signs are generally placed right next to these marker posts meaning yards=metres. Perhaps this is where the myth above comes from… more importantly though it blows out the theory that British drivers wouldn’t be able to cope with metres!