reducing roadside shrines

Without rules, people tend to do what they want, regardless of the consequences for others. The realisation of this has led to the Ten Commandments, the Magna Carta and Sadie McGlumphur's Tartan Emporium's Code of Conduct for Kilties.

And the Highway Code.

The Highway Code isn't actually part of British Law, but while you'll never be arrested for observing it, you might well be for breaking it. If, that is, you're observed to be not observing it.

This is where the problem arises in Cantabrigia and its environs, not least the draughty old fen.

We have long had "rat-run" problems, whereby motorists try to evade snarl-ups on busier roads by using the roads running through the d.o.f. which they perceive to be less busy, only to be caught up in other snarl-ups which are largely of their own creation.

Leaving the draughty old fen, some motorists tend to accelerate before the national speed limit is applicable. The main reason for this has been cited as the lack of signage on some roads reminding drivers that the speed limit is still 30mph.

So the solution appears simple: put more signs up so that drivers know the speed-limit.

But, thinking about the matter, do we need to put up other signs, for example "when you're shooting rabbits don't shoot at people"? Or, "if you're cutting down a tree, don't aim your axe at any non-sylvian being"?

Cambridgeshire County Council is dealing with the problem of fatalities in the region's roads, and it has to be admitted we do not have a situation, we have a problem. It's rationale: to prioritise "accident cluster sites where people had been killed or seriously injured".

So far, so fair. But its method is to remove roadside shrines, on the basis that they distract drivers and cause accidents. Personally, if I saw a cluster of roadside shrines, it would occur to me that since a few people had died in that location, I should reduce my speed. Taking the shrines away, to my mind, is removing intelligence that drivers should be extra careful on a certain section or a certain bend.

New Labour's boast once was that it was going to be tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime. It turned out to be neither. I would, however, ask one thing of them: if they are going to allow county councils to be tough on roadside shrines, then please, please, force them to be tough on the cause of roadside shrines.