For 12 weeks we’ve had to endure delays at this point while temporary traffic lights controlled traffic through a single open lane. When the roadworks disappeared and the lights were switched I breathed a sigh of relief which lasted about 1 day. The problem is reported in the Salisbury Journal. Here’s an extract which explains the problem and why I have to treat the junction as if it were not traffic light controlled. Twice I’ve had traffic thunder across my nose as I pull out on a green light.
“So if you are coming down from Salisbury, just before the junction there is a set of lights which are red, and just beyond there is a second set which are green.” “People are coming hammering down on the Salisbury road and they are not registering there is a set of red traffic lights as all they are seeing are the green ones beyond that.”
Unfortunately, the photographer didn’t take the photo at the right moment to show my problem. I’m coming in from the right of the photo and the lights which are shown green will be red so that I can come out. The lights shown red will be green to let me proceed along the A30. But as it says the traffic approaching the lights seems to focus on the second set of lights which are green rather than the red lights where they should stop!
The lights were operational on Saturday but there has been some ‘adaption’ carried out. The second set of lights in the photo now have angled slats, like a venetian blind, in front of the green lens. From a distance you are unable to see the green lights, but as you get up close your changed angle of view allows you see the green. It would appear to cure the problem described by critics of the lights but may introduce a different problem. It’s been observed in other locations that motorists often slow down as they approach ‘slatted’ lights because with no lights visible they think the lights are out of order until they get right up to them!
Interesting that the lights were all turned off on Saturday. Are they now to be used only at peak times on weekdays?
I always found this one of the easiest junctions to turn right at without traffic lights; the A30 is pretty quiet and you have half a mile of straight road in both directions! What a waste of money the whole thing seems!
I still cannot see what all those lights are supposed to achieve. I presume they have been paid for as part of a planning application to develop the old MoD Porton Down site?