Do you think this junction is adequetly signed?

[Somewhatfoolish]

I approached this unfamiliar junction a couple of hours ago in pitch black and fairly heavy rain:

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@54.9666675,-2.03447...

I was turning right and could tell it was a dual carriageway through some combination of experience and logic, but it really wasn't adequetely signed imo and I could imagine someone turning right into incoming traffic. Am I right that there are some signs that would conventionally be there missing here?

The streetview seems pretty representative of the signage that was there, but the conditions were entirely different - obviously it would be close to impossible to screw up in daytime. There was no lighting and it gets properly dark up here.

Edited by Somewhatfoolish on Saturday 4th November 21:30

[Somewhatfoolish]

Cylon2007 said:

Looks fine to me, what other signage would you be expecting?

Some kind of obvious indication you're coming onto a dual carriageway. With the exception of the fairly obscured sign to Hexham, there isn't any signage to that effect, just relatively vague road markings. Again remember this was in pitch darkness with no lighting.

A similar junction in the area has this sign on approach, these signs as you go to turn right, and a marking in the carriageway separator (sorry proper term has escaped me at 1am on a Satuday) as to where/how to turn. That's the norm imo for non grade separated junctions at NSL dual carrigeways.

I was able to figure it out but I was a bit uncertain and that is the first time I've been uncertain at a road junction in many years (in the UK) so it feels worth bringing here for a review. The secondary question of course is to how I could have avoided being confused.

You must imagine it in the dark in fairly bad weather. It's obvious in the daytime of course.

Edited by Somewhatfoolish on Sunday 5th November 01:28

[Somewhatfoolish]

(There is a tertiary question as to why on earth there is a very short dual lane dual carriageway on some random B road there too; my suspicion is that it has to do with this being the course of the A68 roughly 50 years ago).

Edited by Somewhatfoolish on Sunday 5th November 01:40

[Somewhatfoolish]

Super Sonic said:

When you get to the junction you should see the central reservation and the black and white chevrons board.

If I remember correctly, at night (at least in the car I was driving which does have notoriously poor headlights) you see the board and the reservation in the sense of the white lines in the road but not the central reservation proper (i.e. solid stuff) - the lane markings are of course dual carrigeway style rather than single carrigeway so you can see that but my question remains about it being adequetely signed not whether it's impossible to figure out...

[Somewhatfoolish]

Wardy5 said:

So I’m curious as to how you came to be travelling along the A695 to the T-junction, and then needing to turn right? Was that your original plan?

It's not a particularly interesting story, but we'd been to Hexham fireworks and as I often do, not being in a rush I attempted to make a journey back following road signs along back roads I didn't know* and got hopelessly lost - the entire route made zero sense not just that one junction!

Still it being a "pointless" right hand turn makes sense as to how it is in that state.


*The "sensible" route back would have been the A68

[Somewhatfoolish]

NRG1976 said:

I’m not having a dig OP, but you’re asking for signage for something that is quite obvious. I don’t understand why someone turning right wouldn’t understand this big road continues to mean we drive on the left still!

There's "obvious" and then there's "obvious" if you know what I mean? I didn't get the junction wrong and I wouldn't think anything of it if I, for example, encountered it in other countries with poorer signage. But by UK standards it really isn't obvious. I commented to Mrs Foolish at the time that it wasn't satisfactory. At night you cannot see the "big road".

Perhaps I will video it at some point from the car I was driving with the poor headlights to demo what I could see. Not sure when that will be though as that car is RWD and on summer tyres so I certainly won't be doing it in the next couple of days for sure and I don't head up that way too often anyway - main reason I do is that my nearest Waitrose is in Hexham.

Edited by Somewhatfoolish on Sunday 3rd December 20:42