This Will Not Help
Page 21
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WHILST it is possible to be sympathetic towards the Minister of • Transport in his minor dilemma over light signals, either head or tail, and the growing confusion in a few people's minds about their use on the road, it is also necessary to ask whether he and his colleagues really think that " advising " road users not to use such signals will have any practical value. There are more than enough definitive regulations in being, as it is, without asking drivers also to bear in mind legally unenforceable requests of this nature.
It is extremely doubtful whether last week's announcement that Mr. Marples "advises all drivers that the flashing of headlights should be regarded as having only the same meaning as sounding the horn—an indication of the presence of a vehicle on a road," will have any effect on commercial vehicle drivers. After all, it was by them that flashing light signals were devised; it was only subsequent indiscriminate and, on occasions, ill-mannered adoption of these signals by a few private motorists that ever brought the matter to official notice at all.
The Minister does an excellent job as guardian of the safety of road users, and it is to be presumed he acted with the purest' of intentions on those grounds. But it is open to question whether this was not smacking a little of sledgehammers and hazel nuts. It is also open to question whether this latest move will subtract from or add to the existing "confusion," which, in any case, always seems to have been considerably overstated.
Safety Contribution
What Mr. Marples, and those from whom he took his advice, seem to have overlooked is that the whole point of the use by professional heavy-vehicle drivers of such signals is because. they contribute substantially towards road safety. Lorries are the public whipping-boy of the road; they are too big, too slow, too everything in the eye of the general public. Nevertheless, long, loaded lorries do have to overtake each other. A rear-light signal from the vehicle in front is of value because it enables the following vehicle to be ready to start overtaking.
The process of overtaking a 30-ft. vehicle when you, too, are 30-ft. long, probably overloaded, and perhaps underpowered also, is lengthy enough as it is. The flash of a driving light to indicate that your tail is now clear of the vehicle you have overtaken is a positive safety measure because it cuts down the time the fast lane is blocked by the overtaking lorry. This, says last week's Ministry statement, is a light signal; all light signals are dangerous since they are liable to be misunderstood.
Certainly some signals have become confusing, for instance the flash of head or auxiliary light to concede priority to an oncoming vehicle. Many selfish car owners have usurped this to mean "I'm coming through, blow you." The Minister is right to seek means of discouraging that one; but, properly used, this signal is good because it saves a build-up of traffic while both vehicles wait to see what the other is going to do.
There are more than enough official lights and signs to pay attention to on the roads already, so the Minister was right to set his face against inclusion of light signals in the Highway Code. But there seems little logical reason for leaping overboard in the other direction, as he has now done, and seeking to ban them. Still less does there seem to be reason for adding confusion to a basically simple matter. Properly used, by professional drivers, light signals are a sensible contribution to road safety.