Are matrix signs deliberately useless?

[smithyithy]

The general thinking behind that is, I believe, if you're heading southbound and J13 is becoming congested due to a high volume of traffic joining / leaving, then by telling people to slow down to 60 / 50 / 40 a junction or 2 earlier, it reduces the traffic approaching J13.

So instead of staying at 70, then reaching J13 and having to slow down to 30 due to queues, you slow down to 50 a junction or 2 back, and continue at 50 through J15 when traffic has eased.

That's how it should work anyway, the automated signs use loop counters in the road to read traffic flows and speeds and adjust accordingly.

[Fastdruid]

All that jazz said:

saaby93 said:

All that jazz said:

There really is no end to your utter stupidity is there?

Jazzy are you looking in a mirror when saying these things?
All I posted is what I think can happen
What do you think happens?

Umm, the vast majority of people are born with a pair of eyes that enable them to see things, such as fog, for example. The fact you think HA should be responsible for not displaying a warning of "FOG" on the matrix boards when someone has a crash in said fog is about the most retarded thing I've seen written by you yet (and there are plenty of other instances that take some beating).

The trouble is that they are *so* often wrong that people ignore them and then go barrelling into the fog that once in a blue moon really does appear out of nowhere.

Aesop said:

A shepherd-boy, who watched a flock of sheep near a village, brought out the villagers three or four times by crying out, "Wolf! Wolf!" and when his neighbors came to help him, laughed at them for their pains.

The Wolf, however, did truly come at last. The Shepherd-boy, now really alarmed, shouted in an agony of terror: "Pray, do come and help me; the Wolf is killing the sheep"; but no one paid any heed to his cries, nor rendered any assistance. The Wolf, having no cause of fear, at his leisure lacerated or destroyed the whole flock.

There is no believing a liar, even when he speaks the truth.

Some time back there was as nasty crash (IIRC on the M5) in fog and there was some sanctimonious Police officer going on about "Well the fog signs were on so people should have slowed down". Maybe the first 50 times they saw them on the motorway they did but then ignored them as they never saw any fog until that fateful day.

Wrong signs are worse than no signs at all.

[saaby93]

Fastdruid said:

Or rather more likely the survey was carefully selected to produce the results wanted.

eg
On a scale of 1 to 9 please tell us if you agree informational messages about roadworks would be useful.
On a scale of 1 to 9 please tell us if you agree informational messages about road closures would be useful.
On a scale of 1 to 9 please tell us if you agree informational messages about major incidents / road closures on other parts of the network would be useful.

Rather than:
On a scale of 1 to 9 tell us how much you agree with the statement "information on roadworks/closures would be useful if they weren't referring to the location by the name of some obscure junction 200 miles away that you aren't going near and don't know where it is because you haven't memorised every fking road name in the UK"
On a scale of 1 to 9 tell us how much you agree with the statement "I DON'T KNOW EVERY fkING MINOR ROAD JUNCTION IN THE UK! STOP REFERRING TO INCIDENTS BY THEM AND USE SOMETHING MEANINGFUL!"

After a while you realise surveys can tell you more about the people running the survey than the topic being surveyed

[DavidJG]

saaby93 said:

DavidJG said:

I've also driven along the M42 / M40 past loads of matrix signs saying 'Fog slow down' on a completely clear night with no fog present or even forecast. I get that the control centre doesn't always get accurate info, but sometimes the info is just so far wrong it's laughable - or would be if it didn't have such an impact on journey times when linked to mandatory, camera-enforced speed limits.

If someone phones in with there's fog on the road, with no info if they do nothing and there's a pile up who's to blame? If its a hoax is it better to do something? If they get it wrong so many times everyone ignores the fog signs and there's a pile up who's to blame?

I'd hope that the guys controlling the signs actually work with the Met Office, rather than relying on people phoning in. Met Office 12hr & 24hr forecasts are pretty good, and METAR (actual weather) is very, very, accurate.

[Fastdruid]

dcb said:

Centurion07 said:

Seriously, I can't ever remember reading anything on one of those signs and actually being able to make use of it. I would suspect that is the case for quite a large number of motorists.

+1

I also can't remember the last time one of the signs said anything useful.

• <snip>*

Millions of pounds wasted. Really bloody irritated I have to pay for it.

It's the typical short-sighted cost cutting mentality. Plenty of other examples where a contract has been negotiated at a paper reduced cost without any consideration to increased use, changes in circumstances, improvements in technology, company ownership changes etc. Look at the whole Airwave fiasco for example.

Much though it's nice to blame the contractors I don't, the government has negotiated these deals and the end result is almost inevitably a clusterfk.

[Disastrous]

I was thinking how rubbish they were just on Friday night, driving down to Worcester from Glasgow.

"M6 closed between J14-15"

Ok, so if it's closed then a diversion will be in place, right? So what should I do? Are you giving me that info to suggest that I take evasive action sooner than the diversion? If so, will it be quicker than just following the diversion or will I end up having to do one billion miles of country roads to get back on the motorway? No idea so let's stick with the devil we know and follow the diversions.

So whilst I appreciate the effort to inform of closures, there's very little of practical, actionable worth there. I suppose what would help would be some sort of suggestion of alternative routing versus the projected delay time so a valid decision could be made. There just isn't enough info to support any change of plan.

"Driving when tired causes accidents"

This is just daft. I presume this was a bright idea for when the signs are otherwise unused but really, it's so pointless as to be worthless. In all seriousness I'd rather read QI trivia or quiz questions that are answered on the next one along. It would be more likely to keep tired people awake too...