STANDARDIZING TRAFFIC SIGNALS.
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'By "The Inspector."
EVERAL weeks ago, after I had experienced a most exciting time at the hands of various policemen on duty during the course of a short trive somewhere in the provinces, I came straight pack and dictated a shoat meraora,ndum of a suggesion that efforts should be made to ensure that police /affic signalsshould be the same throughout the wintry. Since that short note appeased in the olemns of The Commercial Motor, there has been ante a crop of communications in the motor Press, nd noticeably in that portion of it devoted to the nterests of the private-car owner, all dealing with he same subject: I do not know whether the activiies of the provincial police have become more larked in this direction during the past few months, r whether I can lay -claim to have aroused some reasure of interest in road -users so far as the paricular form of irritation is concerned. It is suffilent, however, that increased notiae is now being aken of what is, undoubtedly, an unsatisfactory tate, of affairs.
Traffic on the highways is increasing at such a apid rate, and it is, of course, at the same time, so screasing in average speed, that most of us are erfectly well aware of the supreme necessity for takag all and every precaution that makes an appeal eommon sense as a means of obviating the possiility of collision and accident-. Moreover, I am perectly sure that, unless some steps are taken at an any date to ensure national standardization of the elicentan's signals, there will be some very nasty ccidents due to misinterpretation of the pantomimic istructions of the local representative of the law sr the time being on point duty.
Some little while ago there appeared in the olumns of the daily Press one or -two letters which 'ere highly critical of the methods of traffic control aat have he-en developed, admittedly with no small maeure of success, by the Metropolitan and the City 'ohm, of Greater London and the City of London espectively. UP to that time I had always had npressed upon me that the most remarkable traffic sntrol in the world was that to be found in the letropolis, but I must admit that, reading these go or three letters sowed some seeds of distrust
my mind. But after a little further observation, came to the conclusion that the London policeman, ithout any question, carries out his traffic duties ith the minimum of gymnastics and of flurry and orry.
The broad principles in which he is instructedfor re control of congested traffic and -of lousy crossver points are sound so far as London is concerned. hey very largely consist, as most of the readers of he Commercial Motor will know, of stopping and artiag the traffic at shortintervals in cross-over ireetions. There is an entire absence, so far as the ondon policeman is concerned, of wild svavinge of te arm.; beekonings in this-, that, and the other aections of extended, uplifted, white-gloved palms, hich, in certain parts of the country, are expected , command instant stoprpage, whilst in other parts ley mean, something entirely different. In the etropolis it is all done so very calmly and very ficiently. There is no comparable ease, even in the isiest cities of the provinee, to what happens at it bottom of Ludgate Hill, at Holborn Town Hall,
Blackfriars (one or the worst of London's mossTers because of the traffic tangle), at London Bridge rproach, at the bottom of Shaftesbury Avenue, and ; a hundred-and-one other places. While paying my meed of praise to the London constable for the results he undoubtedly achieves in circumstances that are unknown elsewhere, I hold that much'-of the credit of traffic control in Lqndon is due to the driver. He has"-been'wellatrained, and he has proved to be an efficient learner. He is quick-thinking, and quick to act as a rule.
A great deal of attention:has been given throughout the provinces lately VS:improving traffic': control in the big cities—aye, and in a great many of the small ones in the North and Midlands. Claims have been advanced on behalf of Manchester and Birmingham and other cities that their methods of controlling local traffic are a great deal more effective' than those employed in the South ; but, to ascertain whether these claims:can be supported', it would be necessary to institute a very strict comparison between traffic conditions, and, in the writer's opinion, . they are not comparable. The result of-this-renewed acEivity in the provinces is that all. sorts of schemes of signs and semaphores have been suggested, and adopted in many cases, with the result that the driver of a motor vehicle proceeding from north to eolith through the Midlands is often bewildered by the diversity of physical exercises he is forced to witness whilst being " controlled " by the police. It is high time the Home Office insisted that the police throughout the country shall observe acodified and standardized set of signs for control.
There is no doubt that there is a lot of confusion' up and down the country now that the police in the provinces are really taking an interest in this matter of traffic control, and there is, else,. no doubt that one result of this increased interest is in most cases that the police are attempting over-control. The object-lesson Valise leasnecrfrorn London is that traffic controls itself hest if wisely directed, just as a crowd does. A crowd gets unhandy and troublesome directly it is dragooned and over-directed, but, if it does not know that it is being directed, it is quite easy, as a rule, to control. The trouble with the provincial policeman is that he attempts to control every vehicle, whether there is the slightest ne-ed far it or not. It pleases his sense of officiousness, and he mistakes the whole idea which should govern traffic control. Nine times out of ten the practised road-user is adequately controlled, if he is given a sign that the road is clear, or, if he is stopped, if it is not. There is no need for complicated startinge and etoppings such as one can frequently watch nowadays when a bicycle is perhaps, half a mile away down the road and the butcher's boy is presuming to approach the crossing. All this sort of thing can look after itself quite well.
It-is not only the policeman who wants standardizing in these matters, but there is a big call for standardization of local regulations of all kinds to do with tiaffic. The tendency, nowadays, is for every little twopenny-ha'penny local authority to get out its own rules and regulations -as to what may or may not be done with regard to motor vehicle traffic. No opportunity appears to be lost for bringing in local regulations embodying the personal and, very often, very local views Of certain members of the council as to what is safe and good for the public and what „ is not. All these things must be settled on a national basis. Motor vehicle traffic is national, and must increasingly be treated' from that standpoint. We must get rid of the parishasump outlook, particularly now that we are entering the era of vastly increased long-distance road transport.