This feels like the exact video that Tom would want to make as an update. Both the video and audio effort is top notch. No wonder the algorithm sent me here. 10/10
I like how the re-design looks like it was done in _Cities Skylines._ Just delete the last chunk of the road, and re-build it, but attaching it further down the road from where you previously connected it.
@@CHMichael As a planner, Cities Skylines would probably not be super useful for this type of job, there is more specialised, sophisticated and accurate software available for that. That said, I belive Cities Skylines has been trialed for public consultation and very early concept testing in the past
Very odd to see my local area like this. I work as a paramedic in the new forest and I lost count on how many accidents we were sent to there. Some of them very nasty. Since the change to the layout, I’m not aware of any there. It’s been a massive success.
I almost want to see how the locals feel about the change.. there's surely some that are cursing that they can't now breeze through it, not understanding they're the very reason it was changed.
I wonder if people are able to continue to question what is going on in their country and its industries. I was given a clear reason to fear by the post WW2 eras negligent psychological pseudoscientist insurance laundering human trafficking mass censorship scheme.
@@pluggedfinn-bj3hn unfortunately i can imagine the people who consistently ignored the stop signs arent that bright, and cared more for their time than others' safety
The most suprising thing is not that it costs £500k to alter a very small strech of road, and replace the sinage, but that they actually had plans in place to change it before Tom Scott brought it up in his video.
Most of that £500k will have been siphoned off in little brown envelopes & off shore transfers to suits that have never picked up a shovel or know the smell of fresh tarmac like the men that actually did the graft! Wonder what they were paid?
@@lpgibbo7463 i mean if you think about either renting/owning the equipment, number of people that need to be paid, administrative costs, design, material cost (asphalt/gravel), ripping up the previous stretch of road, etc im honestly surprised that it wasnt more
@@bigzigtv706 and no one in government or local council (I know some of these people) EVER owns or is associated with any of the companies that supply those eh? From the plant machinery to the agency staff, these people have their grubby little fingers in ALL THE PIES. It's rife & to think otherwise is very naive.
@@lpgibbo7463 While you're right about corruption being rife, it's probable that most of the money went to the job. Laying a road requires digging deep into the ground, to lay the several layers of various materials necessary to ensure the road withstands the pounding of traffic. It's an expensive process, which is why it costing only £1/2 million is a surprise.
@@lpgibbo7463 rubbish. there's very little of that type of corruption in the UK - it's too easy to get caught. Anything going on would be far more subtle and more at the framework contract stage; but still highly unlikely in a case like this. When you think of all the works needed to build a sectiob of road from scratch, I'm surprised it wasn't more tbh.
As an engineer myself, Tom's video may very well have helped push this design change through. Even with the new design approved, clients can drag their heels on implementing the changes to put off the costly redo, particularly in the government sector. A high profile video bringing attention to the problem can be just the kick in the pants they need.
did you pay attention to the video? the plans for altering the intersections were around before tom uploaded it. knowing Tom, he probably figured out they were gonna change it so he made a quick vid about it. Tom's always rifling through public records and blueprints.
@@r3stl3ssyou wanna comment on a person you don't *think* watched all 4 minutes of a video, but you can't be bothered to finish reading the 60 words they clearly wrote out? How embarrassing 😬😂 I know it's been 10 months, but you should still be embarrassed about it
My survival tactic as a bike courier working in the city, mostly during the evening hours, is to assume that I'm invisible, and assume that every driver is an idiot, until proven otherwise.
I used to shake my head at these types of videos with the attitude that everyone should just have your attitude and everything would be fine. After all, *I* operate as if I'm invisible and *I've* never been hit by a car or hit a pedestrian due to my vigilance! Everyone else should just be vigilant like me and that will solve the problem! I think the finer point is that it doesn't have to be that way, and we should strive for an environment that fosters safety in its design, rather than putting all of the onus on the humans using that environment.
@@Matt-sl1wg I'm not saying this is how everyone should have to be on the roads, I'm saying that I have to be like that, because during my job I exist in an environment which is inherently hostile to bikers, and I voluntarily spend more time on the road than a commuter would. Kinda like precautions with radiation. If you are only exposed to a little every once in a while, it isn't much of an issue, but if you are constantly have to be in there to do your job, you ought to do something about it.
@@vale.antoni I get that, your comment was just the first that I could add to because it most closely resembled my own attitude when navigating public roadways. It would be very easy for people to look at your post and carry on while holding on to my old feelings about these things. So thought I'd add to your thoughts with some expansion on why that isn't enough.
@@vale.antoni But you can't ride that way because you will be reacting unnaturally which is very dangerous. It sounds like you're a beginner so please take more time to learn road craft, that is the best way to stay safe.
@@garymitchell5899 Not a beginner at all. In the last 4 years I clocked in over 10 000 km on my bike, half of that was in the city, other half on A-roads. Edit: During which I only suffered 2 accidents that caused notable damage, and just one of those was my mistake (T-boned a car after failing to yield in time, bent my front wheel beyond repair, for about $50). The other was a mechanical fault, and there was no other road user involved (I got a few road rashes)
@@christianbarnay2499 Well of course, there will always be some sub-percent amount of idiots. But overall the situation was clearly improved, so that's all fine.
@@katier9725 Of course it's an improvement. But my point is that we tend to rely too much on technical and design solutions to circumvent idiocy. And we never address the actual problem. So the idiots are still there. And they are reinforced in their bad attitude because we tell them as a society that they don't need to make any effort to improve as we are ready to spend the time and money to come up with solutions. Over the time this is resulting in progressively more people being fed up with always being the ones to make the effort. And ultimately deciding that being the idiot with impunity is the right position. So instead of fighting idiocy we are encouraging it.
@@Adhimaska Well they at least learned of a good design to consider using in the future from this so they don't have as many expensive fixes. But when has beuracracy and the government truly been efficient anywhere.
@@Adhimaska If you go and have a look at Tom Scott's video, he clearly shows the origins of this junction, and has nothing to do with "good design" of the roads.
@@Matt-sl1wg No, really shocking. We, I, expect that drivers don't really stop at stop signs. But usually you brake and look carefully, because a stop sign means more danger of overlooking traffic and collisions. You have to stop legally, but even if you don't stop, make damn sure that there is nothing in the way! Oh and I forgot: Be prepared to stop immediately! That's the reason why at most you roll at low speeds. These drivers just didn't have the speed to step on their brakes. That's what's shocking to me. Not the fact, that they didn't stop, but the fact that they COULDN'T stop, even if there was something there.
@@Matt-sl1wg I live here and did the same as everyone, if it looked clear you dove straight across without stopping. And who wouldn't It is a completely open junction you can see everywhere, (bar where your A post is) and that is where the problem was.
@@anticat900 Lots of people think it's perfectly ok to ignore the rules as long as they don't see anything dangerous. The problem with that kind of self-serving thinking is that plenty of accidents happen because a driver didn't notice something. That might even be the #1 cause of accidents. This is especially true for drivers not noticing pedestrians.
@@DemPilafian Hello i don't believe I'm a fast or bad driver. I just did at this junction what likely 99% of people would do. I was unaware of this junctions unusual characteristics like everyone else and would just see it clear for a mile left and right so why would you stop?
Congratulations from Texas, USA. We have some very poorly constructed intersections that lead to horrible crashes like this intersection. Glad to see the highway department in the U.K. made life saving changes.
Well, this design probably reduces the risk dramatically, as traffic on the minor road actually has to slow down. Which is why, as early as the 1970's, this design has been adopted as the standard intersection design in Denmark. Obviously, not all is rotten in that state...
We still have the issue in t-sections that if a car tries to overtake a lorry, a side road car might not see car and try to cross road in opposite direction of lorry and the see the overtaking car in frontal crash. Don't know how that can be solved without a roundabout or lights. I never overtake lorry's if there is a sideroad access 🤓
The American fear of roundabouts and love for deadly huge cars certainly contribute to the insane pedestrian fatalities in a country so car dependent that basically nobody walks.
It's been nice to know that regardless of ppl like TS bringing it to public knowledge, they were already planning one fixing it. It does make me wonder if it accelerated the process though. We all know that these things can sit and fester for decades if the wrong ppl are left in charge of their care, and just because they have plans to adjust it, doesn't always mean they will be followed through promptly.
Remember: Tom Scott's videos are recorded a few weeks in advance. I wouldn't actually be surprised if they were all "Oh bollocks! Tom Scott's been 'round at the cyclist-killing junction and it's going to go on TH-cam and we'll be a stockinglaugh! Pull out the plans to how to fix it, rush it into planning so it looks like we were already starting work on it before he uploaded the video."
This is an example of how engineering is a solution to road safety. A lot of times, we focus too much on enforcement and a bit on education but engineering of roads is down the list. Sure, it's expensive to commission studies and hire people with degrees to analyse things then actually do the works but it can proven to be worthwhile.
It's so frustrating how many people want to just blame those involved and call it day. The aviation industry learnt this lesson decades ago - pilots are still human, they still make mistakes, they still have off days but aircraft have fewer and fewer crew but the industry is safer than ever, and probably the safest in the world- which is staggering given the potential. How? Systematic changes and wholistic investigations that seek to do more than just hold somebody responsible.
@@regiondeltas we call it human factors. The first step is accepting that everyone has bad days, the second step is designing the environment to mitigate the effects of someone having a bad day. Especially if multiple someones have had a bad day in the same scenario
The fact that people were just blowing through the stop is eye opening to me. Maybe because stop junctions aren't too common here like in the US, but the octagonal STOP sign is kind of hard to miss.
The poor road design was essentially teaching them that there's no need to stop. Visibility is excellent, except the unknown blind spot, and it's a quiet road. On most occasions your way will be clear, so you get used to not having to stop. Humans are crap and will do the wrong thing if at all possible. That's why good road design is important.
@@ColinBroderickMaths Blowing a stop sign in the US can be hundreds in fines and months of license suspension. You'd think it'd be worse in the UK... We still have idiots that blow through stop signs but we have even more idiots that misjudge turns. Intersections like how they changed it are notorious in the US FOR causing accidents.
@@Jmvesey In Spain if you miss an stop it's just about a 100$ fine and 4 points less in your licence. We have up to 15 points. Almost everyone sadly don't make a complete stop
I grew up in a house that was located on a hill with a highway that curved around our property. The county had put up signs a mile in advance in both directions and put up flashing signs 200 feet in front of our driveway. Even with all that it was still like playing Russian Roulette every time we pulled out. I can't count how many close calls we had. It got so dangerous that the county exercised Eminent Domain and rerouted our driveway through county owned property. I remember my father getting his property tax bill the next year and because of the improvements, they reassessed our property value and increased the value, hence more taxes. He was furious. He took it to the County Commissioner and got it lowered somewhat. But the new driveway was an awesome addition because it was flat and downhill the whole way. Sledding down it was faster than we had.
I grew up in a house where the driveway exited to a chicane, built as a traffic calming solution. They could've made it a bend but made it an S curve (or actually Z). Many, many close calls but since cars have to slow down and pay attention to the tricky chicane.. they are going much slower than if it was just a normal bend. To one way there is 2km of straight and then some 700m more to the other way.. It is like someone looked at it on the map and made the obvious discovery: cars would not stick to the speed limit if it was just 2km of straight and easy smooth bend... A lot of cars and mopeds did end up on the opposite neighbors fence.. so many that he didn't even repair it after each collision. It is the 2km straight that caused it, they dropped speed limits there and there has not been a single accident in a decade. On our side there is a bike&pedestrian path, the trees between us and the road did get a few hits but much less than the neighbors nice fence.
Wow, this is the first time I hear that a county voluntarily, without having caused it by a project of theirs, and without a previous fatal accident, spends money on someone's private driveway! Actually, they did a favor to many people, and you, being the most frequently endangered. I really appreciate your county and what it did!
@@skayt35 My father was VERY active in the local politics of the city and the county. He supported the democrats at the city level and the republicans at the county level. Playing both sides of the coin so to speak. I am sure he pulled some strings and called in some markers to make it happen. Not saying it was a shady deal, but it just didn't happen from the "goodness" in their hearts
We just had the road by our house rerouted for safety too! It happened about a month ago and I’ve been here 34 years, but I love the change. It used to be at the top of a hill of a 4 lane, 45mph road and people got hit all the time, including a cyclist who was killed.
I drive past this junction very frequently as I used to live in Hythe - signposted at the junction. I can say that traffic in the area is definitely a lot more aware of the junctions risk now the adaptations have been made and cars take the junctions far slower with enough time to react. So for once, £500,000 well spent 👍
@@zloychechen5150 I just learned about this junction just right now through this video. I bet you 100 quid it will save more than one life, judging from Tom Scott's video cut-in how drivers absolutely ignore the stop signs.
Heh, after Toms video i started using two T junctions instead of X in cities skylines.. It works even there, for different reasons. It separates two right hand turns to their own intersections and makes traffic management SO much easier. Add in slip lanes and you only need to handle two ways, going straight and crossing the road from one side only. Add timed traffic lights and the throughput is quite good, for the amount of space it takes and the cost.
This I will try this evening :D Maybe just w/o the slip lanes because they create yet another point of potential conflict between relatively high speed traffic and pedestrians. Drivers will look for oncoming traffic that they'll have to merge into after the slip lane but usually not for pedestrians and cyclists who might be coming from the opposite direction ;)
If I ever have 4 roads intersecting in anything but low traffic residential zones I introduce a roundabout, when my traffic gets to busy I'll add a slip lane for left turns. But the best way to reduce traffic is a solid underground metro grid
@@julianlaresch6266 And put pedestrian paths EVERYWHERE. Overpasses, underpasses, segregating them so that they are two systems that interact only in residential and commercial neighborhoods.. Paths are super cheap, never gets congested, but does require anarchy, which can break things... And every intersection that can be is a T. Timed traffic lights so that one lane can go thru in each step and right hand turns are green on each step but one. There is also double-T intersection that uses a bridge.. You use the bridge for cars going straight, another road fits under it perpendicular again for those that go straight in that directions and then separate turning lanes split from the main road and curve to the other main road. Takes up only little space, easy to replace a busy X intersection in tightly packed area. It needs the traffic manager to set all the arrows so that they don't act stupid: the fastest way is not the shortest and it will gridlock if not set up just right.
I just started a city with T intersections on every major roads, + intersections are kept at a minimal and on low-usage residential roads only So far with only 10k cims and no public transport it's working well, my traffic flow is above 90% but we should see how it'll perform when it's >50k cims 😇
As a motorcyclist I have a simple rule: everyone is out to kill me so I should ride so. I'll never understand why you'd assume the other road uses know what they are doing
I get you as a fellow rider/cyclist/car user, but a crash can be lethal for a cyclist at 10mph and stopping distance is terrible even that slowly in the wrong conditions. Blaming the victim is a bit of a dick move all things considered.
This is precisely why people like Tom are so important. We need people documenting dangers and becoming activists for a better tomorrow. Thanks for going over this in more detail :)
the danger is stupid people blowing through signs........ not the roads. i know its hard to understand i learned repitition seems to help. Stupid people are the danger.... stupid people. 4 way stops for ALL. hard to get hit in that situation. yet morons ignore signs do what they want and cry when shit happens. survival of the fittest.
This is the first video I've seen from your channel, but I recall very clearly Tom Scott's video from a couple of years ago. It's GREAT to see that this issue was taken seriously even before that video went live, and it's great to see that people listened to the civil engineers who said "road signs alone aren't enough to prevent injury."
I have concluded that if you want people to do the correct thing you have to remove all other options. Expecting drivers to obey the signage and yield or even stop at an intersection is asking for failure. Forcing the driver to make two turns? That forces the correct behavior. Humans are dumb, just talk to one to see what I mean.
@@stevedixon921 I did talk to one once. And I agree with your conclusion. (That I actually passed the interview and got the job is just the conclusive icing on the conclusion cake. 😉)
@@stevedixon921 People stop at junctions all the time, the vast majority safely. Stop being a cheap smart arse on TH-cam and get out into the real world.
This is particularly meaningful to me because in August 2020, I was knocked off my bike at a roundabout where the approaching road was about that angle. I didn't escape without injury; I broke my leg & wrist in the incident. The driver said they didn't see me until they hit me. After seeing Tom's video, it made me realise that I was hidden in their A post blind spot. The re-aligned road should definitely help & the need to turn from the other direction should also improve matters.
If you are riding a bicycle or in my case Motorcycles car drivers suffer from Inattentional Blindness. This a phenomenon where a person looks straight at you but doesn't see you. This is why they pull out in front of you. happens all the time..
@@brianperry Yeah especially if the biker blends into the background because of their slow speed, position in the road (further out from the kerb the side of the biker is visible as well as front so a larger visible surface area) or the relative background.
Yes. Two weeks after passing my police advanced driving course at Hendon with a Class 1 I ran into a cyclist at a roundabout in Peterborough because I hadn’t appreciated this problem. She was only bruised as it was at walking speed only but it scared the bejesus out of me (and her). Now I’m a driving instructor I spend a lot of time on this issue and go to several junctions where the A -pillar obscures the whole road.
@@dickyr3295 It is worrying isn't it? After my accident, when I learned that it was probably a failure to observe the A post blind spot, I realised how easy this is to miss & that I could very easily have made the same mistake when driving.
A most welcome update about a notorious junction - thank you! 🙂 Having investigated many incidents over the decades, one of the most under-recognised causal factors are moving blind-spots.
I myself have investigated a few collisions (as a transport manager). If you do the job properly it can be very enlightening. Unfortunately, most company front line managers do lip service to an investigation & blame one or other driver for ease; ergo other factors are never addressed, ergo collisions of the same nature recur
@@hippophile Theres an original piece that set up the Tom Scott video on a magazine called Single Track. The title is "Ipley Cross | Why This Type Of Road Junction Will Keep Killing Cyclists". HTH
Yes. Two weeks after passing my police advanced driving course at Hendon with a Class 1 I ran into a cyclist at a roundabout in Peterborough because I hadn’t appreciated this problem. She was only bruised as it was at walking speed only but it scared the bejesus out of me (and her). Now I’m a driving instructor I spend a lot of time on this issue and go to several junctions where the A -pillar obscures the whole road.
@@hippophile - I would love to able to discuss many of these. However, sadly bound by confidentiality - even in retirement. Pity as I see lots of learning potential for others including former colleagues who did not always spot moving blind-spots. However, in some cases I was able to get significant changes made to reduce the risk of reoccurrence.
I remember two crossroads in Finland that were fixed by staggering two of the roads like this. One of them had multiple fatalities before the fix because the main road had a high speed limit and was between big cities, while the road crossing it was a small road in a rural area and people would drive into the fast traffic because they didn't bother looking if someone was coming. The fix, like in this crossing, forces people to slow down considerably and that by itself also makes them look around before trying to get onto the bigger road.
Fundamentally, the root cause of the problem is the unnecessary straightness of engineered roads (which are almost always post WW2 and optimized for velocity of cars and trucks and/or sometimes intended to be used as emergency runways for military aircraft). Older roads tend to curve to follow natual topology and "drape" naturally on the land. This causes changes in speed and angle of intersections that avoids the occlusion-by-pillar problem. Separately, modern drivers go significantly faster because of improvements in "comfort" and performance; and simultaneously pay much less attention than drivers used to do when the vehicles were slower and frankly more dangerous. We have traded off hundreds of thousands of fatalities per year at a species level to the drivers and occupants of more dangerous older cars (say pre Volvo and pre Ralph Nader) for a different kind of problem where many drivers simply don't pay attention because they're on the phone or fiddling with a stupid touchscreen on the dashboard.
Also: most people have absolutely no idea neither as to the fact that this blind spot actually exists (in virtually any car) nor as to how massive it actually is.
@@ilyapetoushkoff8362 Isn't that part of any driving course and wouldn't the person in your driving test check that you're checking blindspots by moving your head?
When I cycle I always assume cars do not see me. So if a car approach a crossing like that I would slow down and let them cross before me even if I have the right of way. Even if a car has stopped I would not assume that sees me and would not start driving just when I am crossing. Having the right of way is of little usage in a hospital bed or six feet under. You will not lose a lot of speed or time if you plan ahead because just slowing down a bit will separate you, even if it does better safe than sorry.
They've done this to plenty of rural Australian roads. There were heaps of fatalities at intersections like this. But in the Aussie style, these weren't caused because of blind spots; both motorists would speed up to beat the other through the intersection. The staggered intersections meant that you wouldn't beat anyone through the intersection, you would go straight through into the ditch once it was staggered. This, fatalities dropped like a stone.
Reminds me of road design here in Mexico, we have speed bumps and little nubs to slow down cars everywhere and they force drivers to be at certain speeds (like hell i was even taught at driving school that speed limit signs are a suggestion more than anything, by law cops wont stop you unless you're about 20km/h over them)
Over the past twentyish years, this kind of re-alignment has been done on many country intersections in Australia. I have found it works well and reduces crashes. Good video and I too recommend watching Tom Scott's stuff.
@@eaar I'm not trying to have a go at you specifically but as an Aussie, roundabouts aren't the silver bullet the internet seems to think they are. One of my most common drives involves a 2 lane roundabout which is actually a bit of a local accident hotspot as people struggle to work out how to best use it. If there's any traffic on any branch it's even worse. It'll be replaced by a diverging diamond which I'm not sure will actually make things easier. So many roads here outside of the major cities are 110km/h limited with trucks, cars and bikes having to drive for hours at a time between major towns. Many of the highways could not sustain roundabouts even if they wanted to as the highways run through small towns and often have a mix of local and express traffic. Many of these can be dual carriageway and divided by a median but others twist their way through the environment as undivided two-way roads with one lane each side.
@@martythemartian99 as an actual road safety engineer working in Australasia, roundabouts on 110km/h roads are actually a great idea unless the traffic volumes on the side roads are really, really low
This is the first video I've ever seen that acknowledges car pillar blinding of any kind. It is IMPORTANT to talk about A, B & C pilar blind spots as many people don't seem to understand it. There should be an entire class in driving school that talks about how things that move at just the right speeds can be hidden behind a pilar in your car or that when on the motorway in the middle lane, cars at your 5:30 and 7:30 position often get blocked visually by your C pilar in a car. THIS IS GREAT STUFF!
It's amazing that people can have a driving license and not have the slightest clue about the fact that the huge post that is constantly in they field of view is constantly hiding things from them. Any country that delivers driving licenses without making sure the candidate has acquired that kind of basic obvious understanding is a road safety failure.
I had a One series BMW for a bit but I got rid of it after a couple of months because I couldn't see past the A pillar, no matter how I adjusted I always had a massive blind spot to my right. I came close to having two serious accidents as a direct result. Awful car, uncomfortable too. For context I am experienced with commercial vehicles so know all about blind spots and I never have had this issue driving those, never even come close to a serious accident.
In my experience part of the problem seems to be that cars' A pillars in the US have gotten thicker to accommodate improved rollover survivability and curtain airbags. So those of us who learned to drive on older cars wouldn't have gotten those lessons because it wasn't a problem on the cars I learned to drive.
@@benroberts2222 Absolutely 100% correct, old cars had thin pillars because visibility was the focus. Average cars got faster so more got rolled over so cars were designed to be flipped, thicker pillars, bonded strengthened glass etc. The issue I had with the One series was the seating position, no matter how I adjusted it it gave me a blind spot on the right I couldn't look around (I'm used to adjusting for blind spots, I've driven quite a few miles in small lorries, large vans etc) which is bloody dangerous when you drive on the left, especially when using roundabouts.
I've driven through countless such staggered crossroads in Britain, always wondered why they were laid out like this! Assumed it had something to do with ancient land ownership, as is often the case with weird layouts - turns out it's for safety.
In California, where I live, it is often a relic of old rights-of-way. It can be annoying to negotiate such intersections, but if it is safer the reason doesn't matter.
No it's more likely to be land ownership or topography. When these junctions were originally made nothing travelled beyond a few miles an hour so there was never a safety issue.
In my area there is a road that I always thought was silly it didn't go straight, I always wondered why it would curve round instead and just thought they wanted to keep the small patch of grass (lol) and now I know why too. lol
I remember the Tom Scott video solely because I was stunned to see the number of cars just flying through the stop signs without even slowing down, let alone stopping. Of course people run stop signs in the US, but it's usually accidental. Even people who are from a given area with a deserted rural crossing that has good visibility tend to stop. Of course, there are also relatively few yield signs at crossings here, so maybe it's just a matter of conditioning.
@@0Rookie0 People would take stop signs more seriously if they were used more judiciously. Though they should be eliminated almost entirely in my opinion.
The visibility is extremely good, and nine times out of ten there will be no one else in view, so people naturally get complacent. First they'll roll the stop. Then they'll slow down even less. Eventually they will stop slowing down at all, because they've never needed to before. The road conditions essentially teach drivers to do exactly the wrong thing. This is why proper road design is so important. Humans WILL do the wrong thing if given the chance.
Stop signs are rare in the UK, and are only really put up in places where accidents have happened. Similarly to speed cameras, which you can guarantee only exist where a fatal accident has occurred. Pop one or two down and give people lots of warning that they'll receive a hefty fine for speeding here, and most motorists will make themselves safe because they don't want to receive the fine. We call the idea "policing by consent" because people voluntarily police themselves instead of speeding by the camera and having to be policed by the police.
Good to see logic being used here to keep everyone safe On a side note, anyone else notice the corner cutter at 2:40? Safely knew nobody was there or "I've lost 2 seconds with the new road layout, left me make up
@@Rogue-cg1rm When that junction was designed there were probably less cars around so was suitable at the time. Most likely followed existing horse and cart routes through the New Forest (lovely place by the way, highly recommended to all). I agree that death tolls shouldn't need to rise for improvements to be made and even a near miss should be enough to think "What can we do?". A road near to where I used to live had 5 deaths over a 6 year period which, apparently, didn't meet the local council threshold of more than 1 death per year on average to discuss improvements. A lot of campaigning and lobbying by local groups results in traffic calming being installed
@@smilerbob I think one of the keys here is the signage and lack of adherence to them .. stop and halt , solid white lines are completely ignored by idiots .. I have one such junction close to my workplace that is treated as if invisible because I think it’s in the middle of nowhere .. the A52 meets the A523 at Calton moor , is a regular route I use and if I am going southbound toward it the A52 is to my right and is regularly contravened by cars and trucks .. and as articulated Hgv myself at 44 tonne and legally allowed to travel at 50mph past this junction I have more than a few times had to slap my anchors on and I’m sure you will understand it ain’t easy and a little bit scary at times … good luck .
Probably "safely knew nobody was there". Visibility is pretty good; the previous issues were down to the angles of approach, and the fact that the roads were straight. Looking at the angles, I doubt the driver could have had any approaching traffic in their A-pillar blind spot. Also, no traffic approaches from the minor road after the car passes, thus confirming that there was no traffic for the driver to avoid. Remember that cutting corners doesn't just save you time; it also saves fuel and/or tyre wear, depending on what speed you choose to take the corner. Personally, I don't see an issue with cutting a corner like this if you can be 100% sure that it is safe to do so.
When I was young I was always taught to hold my head up high and look both ways constantly as I cross any road or intersection. As an adult I've learned that I am 100% responsible for my own safety and should never rely on other people or their systems to work for me. As a pedestrian these two simple ideas have kept me alive and uninjured in many situations, and now as I drive more than I ever have before I apply these same rules and it has already saved me from a wreck in 3 instances. PAY ATTENTION and DONT BECOME COMPLACENT!
@gormenfreeman499 In my country the rules say that the driver should have another person help him back out if needed. And backup cameras are a thing these days.
@gormenfreeman499 That's exactly why you should be reversing into a parking space or driveway and driving out, not driving in and reversing out. If you hit somebody doing that then you would be at fault, 100% of the time.
This feels like a great example of making the easiest option also the safest. They can put all the signs in the world leading upto the crossing and just hope that people listen, or they can make it intuitive to be safe!
I think an easier option to fix this would have been to change the visibility temporarily, e.g. with trees along the road, which forces the driver's mind to pay more attention, which usually results in lowered speeds. Another possible way would have been to widen the connection and put a divider between lanes. What they did was pointless expensive in my opinion.
I'm always aware of the moving blind spot in the a pillar. That junctions old layout isn't dissimilar to many if not most roundabout approaches in this respect. Driving involves more head movement than many people realise.
Not just the A-pillar, either. In larger vehicles (I drive a bus), the large mirrors actually pose an additional blind-spot problem - something as big as a car can be right behind your mirror, which is unlikely to be significant in a car.
Hell, remove the car altogether and you still need your head on a swivel. Watch any motorcyclist approaching a junction, I don't think my head ever sits still with a helmet on
@@ukeleleEric scary the number of times a car (or single deck bus at the right angle) would appear from behind the mirror by moving my head, when I was a bus driver
I've been driving for 25 years now, and in that time the A pillars have gotten thicker and thicker. I can understand why, it's safer for the occupants of the car in case of a crash (and they usually stuff air bags into them too). However, it's clearly more dangerous to cyclists and pedestrians. In my Prius, especially the A pillar on the driver's side blocks so much of the view (because it's closest), that I'm weaving my head left and right in every (city) left turn. That's not safe at all, because it only takes one unlucky time to forget it....
@@SolarWebsite Yes, completely agree. The A pillars are so big now and of course, as you say, the close proximity, though there was the idea a while ago of covering them with a display and a camera on the outside to see around it but I haven't heard anything about it since.
I've had an A Pillar incident where I didn't see a cyclist on a roundabout until the last second fortunately I emergency stopped in time, but ever since then I'm continually moving position in my vehicle to look around (Its a Ducato Camper van so the A pillars are quite big) my sister actually asked what I was doing when she was a passenger with me (she's also a driver) and I had to explain! I just wonder how many drivers have had A pillar incidents, I would predict a fair few.
this is absolutely no shade to anyone, we are all human and doing our best! i don’t know what about it stuck in my mind so hard but this is basically the only thing i actually remember from driving school. The idea that I could hurt someone I couldn’t see was terrifying and I just ended up integrating a bit of sway into the movements I make to look around the car. I rarely if ever look with just my head, it‘s a full body motion (albeit somewhat subtle) every time and now I don’t even think about it. It particularly makes the over the shoulder lane change check much easier because you already have so little visibility that any additional visual info is imminently useful.
Modern cars have giant pilars and blind spots. It always used to annoy me on my Berlingo. If I look at the pilars on my 80's citroen Visa or Trabant, they are tiny, and there are almost no blind spots. Then again, should someone crash into me, or should I run into something I'm probably dead.
I actually missed two 15 yo twins bc of my car's huge A pillar. Police didn't believe me, but the lawyer did and thank god I only had to pay the lowest fee. Paranoia never ends with an a pillar of that size. But I hope I will never ever hit a person again and I really hope none of you has to experience that, be it as victim or driver.
they had minor injuries, I later asked them if I could do something for them and if they were okay, but the family told me to leave them alone, so I never heard from them again. Dunno if one of the girls has lasting injury..
Being a cyclist has made me a much better driver. I always lean forward now to check around the pillar; it's not always possible to see everything but it's so much better. It's amazing how poor visibility really is from a car when you're use to cycling everywhere. I'm not surprised that societies with much higher rates of cycling have much lower rates of cycling deaths--not only from better infrastructure and empathy but also just from being reminded that they can only see 80% of reality and they should operate accordingly.
Very interesting. This explains an intersection change near my old place that I never understood. Seen from above, the new layout is identical to the new layout in this video. Makes a lot of sense the way you explained it. Learned something new about traffic patterns today. :-) Thank you!
This is great. Road design is far more effective at alterning the behaviour of road users than signage. If you make it so people can't do it wrong, then you don't have to rely on them doing it right
I wonder if we can get American road authorities to learn such a simple lesson. I think they're starting to catch on, but they have a ways to go before they learn that signs aren't infrastructure
honestly always wondered why people are unable to ignore the curve of the road and the lines etc. i mean, i get that it drives better than cutting through the grass but just simple shapes and lines are enough to corral even the worst driver
Excellent video Ashley. I live 2 miles from this junction and have seen several crashes between cars prior to the changes being made. This road is a short cut to avoid the very busy (and hence slow) A326, so anyone in a hurry would take this route and ignore the 40 mph speed limit. It's also one of only two routes for cyclists to get from the Hythe/ Dibden conurbation into the beautiful New Forest so acts as a focus for them. On summer evenings Ipley crossroads is used as a turn point on the very popular P164 cycling time trial course between Lyndhurst and Beaulieu. As a keen local cyclist I think the money was well spent, it definitely feels safer now.
@@Stompy1984 The cycle path would still need to cross the road somewhere. That's just moving the problem a few steps away. My take is that there is well known impunity for speeding and ignoring the stop sign. A police squad randomly coming to the place and distributing fines and license suspensions for shifts of a couple hours should rapidly reduce the incivility while helping refill the budget and reduce taxes.
This junction is in my daily delivery rounds and it was nice to see the changes. For what is such an open junction with good views left and right, it’s so easy to miss somebody travelling on the main road. Small change makes a big difference!
An identical solution was used over 30 years ago at a junction in Central Scotland to prevent injuries and fatalities.and was successful for a long time. However, some drivers still saw a challenge in crossing the junction before oncoming traffic and accidents continued - albeit at a much reduced rate. Eventually, the solution was a large roundabout which slows everybody down.
@@r3stl3ss It's not natural selection, though. Natural selection means the weaker or less wary are killed, whereas in these accidents, it can be the less wary killing the sensible ones.
I've had this experience once where I couldn't see a cycle till it came very close and I had to slam the brakes. I was not going very fast but I was amazed what a huge blind spot the A pillar is.
It has been road safety policy for decades to identify road accident blackspots and design engineering schemes to reduce the risk and this a fine example of doing just that. As someone else commented, this scheme was on the drawing board and it may well be that Tom Scott's video ensured it was quickly enacted, so well done to Tom , the designers of the scheme and those who made the decision to enact it. Every engineering scheme to make our roads safer has a continuing long term effect in reducing road fatalities.
Another important part of road safety is to enforce rules with fines and license suspensions. So that people keep on respecting the rules. This junction is a blatant demonstration that total impunity results in chaos. Even after the redesign you can still see cars overspeeding on the incoming road, flooring the breaks at the junction and cutting corners to gain just a couple seconds and then flooring the accelerator again to keep on overspeeding. You can create the best design you want. If you never enforce the rules, people will misuse your design and make it look like a complete failure.
A good example on how road design can naturally influence driver behaviour, there were some studies which suggested the wide straight suburban roads in the US are bad design, as even with posted speed limits the wide straight roads influence driver perception and they drive faster than they should and get fixated on the distance, while curvier suburban roads naturally cause drivers to pay more attention to navigate.
I'm sure it's something like for every 6 inches of extra lane width people will drive 10 mile a hr faster. It's also why they're replacing a lot of roads with shared spaces, because it makes the drivers more aware as they don't feel they have a natural right of way.
It indeed affects driver's behaviour. I have been in Germany recently and they have those curved roads a lot. The drivers there usually slow down and pay more attention to the road. They also don't have the time to "look at the mobile phone for few seconds", so it is even safer in that regards
Yes that's a good point. The US system is designed for cars not people ever since the 1920s-30s and some interesting political campaigns by motor companies, and they don't have a real difference between Streets (busy frontages, human activity, low perceived safe soeed) and Roads (inactive frontage, little human activity, high speeds). They get things known as Stroads, which have street frontages of businesses and shops, but road designs type , 4 6 or 8 lane widths, and road behaviour. So being on foot or a cycle is very risky. A solution is to disentangle streets and roads. There are a number of good vids about this on YT. One is "Stroads are Ugly, Expensive, and Dangerous (and they're everywhere)".
It's true of everyone in traffic that design influences behavior, it's just that for pedestrians and cyclists there is basically no risk of a fatal accident, or really any serious accident. In fact with those two groups we usually want to encourage the opposite, Stroads don't just encourage unsafe driving they also make pedestrians and cyclists uncomfortable and therefore people are less likely to use those methods of transport. The large amount of concrete makes Stroads really hot on sunny days which can be outright dangerous if you're not in an air conditioned vehicle, and obviously you can't air condition a bike or walking shoes. It essentially becomes a negative feedback loop where people are pushed into choosing the less safe method of transport overall and that choice leads to infrastructure not being designed to take anyone other than drivers into consideration. Plus they also contribute to the heat island effect which is a serious issue for many cities in the US.
You should visit Germany some time. They have this law about passing distance when overtaking cyclists. They mostly abide by it too! Cycling on 100 km/h roads is legal there and my perception is that it feels a lot safer than the 30 km/h road in the Netherlands... as long as there are no Dutch drivers on that German road.
I live here! It took ages, because they literally moved the top foot of soil from the new position to the old, to protect as much biodiversity as possible (I assume) very cool!
I imagine that was done so that if someone wasn't paying attention and wasn't used to the new layout that they would slow down in a raised dirt section instead of crashing down a foot into the grass. I don't see any biodiversity rationale in a hunk of dirt.
@@schmiddy8433 You'd be pleasantly shocked at the biodiversity in "just" a hunk of dirt! By preserving the mycelium and insects/microbes in that dirt, they keep a much richer soil and will keep that area much healthier than just stripping it away. It's pretty cool
@@itsdrgrandpa I know there's life in the dirt, but 'preserving biodiversity' by placing it in the exact spot the old road was is a rationale I don't believe.
@@schmiddy8433 that's okay, you don't have to believe it. You also don't seem to any relevant expertise (unless you're not mentioning it?) so i think it's worth considering that you're simply missing out on some info. No big deal either way 😊
If I saw the new layout of the junction on some map I'd probably wonder why they built it like that. Goes to show you that sometimes more thought is put into the design of the world around us than people might think, and that the most obvious solution isn't necessarily the best.
This reminds me of a similar intersection near me. I had not used it for a few months, and suddenly it had a “side arm” change like this one. I could not understand why. Now I do, thanks to your video. 😊
as silly as it is, stuff like this makes me feel a lot better about the world. seeing a simple problem with real consequences laid out a couple of years ago and now seeing a followup where those consequences have been addressed gives me a lot of hope about the world :)
@@sirtaugs "Personal responsibility" didn't solve the problem here, did it? You don't solve problems by telling people to be better people, you solve problems by either holding them accountable (stiffer penalties) or, as seen here, making the problematic behavior impossible.
Not designs. Money. Taxpayer money because people won't follow the road signs. If they wanted to save lives and make money off of this, they would have simply parked a cop there and ticketed everybody that broke the law. Eventually people learn.
I used to pass through this junction and imagine the many reasons why it has been redesigned and now I got the actual answers and it makes sense and I'm glad I wasn't too far off
I would love to see a video breaking down the £500,000 pricetag of that change. It feels like a lot for a fairly minor looking change but I'm sure there's more that goes into it.
pretty easy really. asphalt costs about 100quid/tonne. multiply that by the 50,000 tonnes of asphalt needed for the 50 meters of road, i.e. 1000 tonnes per meter, gives you 500K. simples innnit
@@aeropherxd I’m quite certain that 1000 ton of asphalt per meter would be VERY visible lol. It would be a mountain of asphalt. So yeah the bulk of the cost is probably not in the material, but instead bureaucracy
@@simonleeofficial 1000 tonnes per metre of a tiny little road like that? Im pretty sure that would be some diamond density asphalt wouldnt it? Think about the weight of other things and the size of them … no way is a 1metre long*1metre deep*(however wide the road is) slab of asphalt weighing 1000 tonnes, way less than 100 tonnes probably and the depth of the asphalt below the surface of the road is probably a lot less than 1metre tbh
Saw Tom's video 2 years ago. Awesome to stumble on this follow up. Over here to get your attention of a stop sign coming up, we have a series of small speed bumps too small to really bump your car, that get closer together, so if you're still going at speed it starts to vibrate your car, kind of like an airplane's stick shaker stall warning. Grabs your attention if you're not slowing down before the intersection. Would have cost less than half a million quid.
The people blowing the stop signs wouldn't care. As far as they're concerned, the crossing road looks clear and they're in a hurry and they're unlikely to get caught. Yes they're fucking stupid but that's what the redesign addresses.
A lot of junctions in Somerset and Devon are staggered like this. The old Roman roads across open country are often the minor roads, and they used to be dead straight for miles on end. Now many of them have the Roman road do a deviation on one side of the main road to stagger the junction. On family holidays in the 1970s as a child of around 10 I remember working out that this was to increase safety, I was quite proud of my young self!
Hadn't thought of that, but of course the link back to the old viae romanae makes a lot of sense! Impressed by your pre-teen self's risk assessment acuity too! Did you grow up to become a civil engineer or safety inspector by any chance...? 😋
A very quick tip from the world of aviation. If you are moving and you are looking at something and it's not moving relative to your vision. ie. it's on "a constant bearing". You are on a collision course. The trouble in cars is... they typically only have one driver and they have pillars which remain at a fixed bearing to you. The only way to solve that is to move your head. Personally I HATE A pillars. My own isn't too bad, but the rental C3 I have is terrible. The A pillar is about 6 inches wide and in the worst place possible, especially exiting round abouts. It's in such an awkard position even trying to look round it is difficult.
Same principle applies to navigation at sea. Regardless of right of way we all have responsibility for keeping a 'good lookout' and acting accordingly. If that means having to move your head to improve your view, then so be it. Shame it doesn't seem to be taught anymore judging by some of the comments.
on my drive home there's one bend that lines up exactly with my A pillar, I've previously lost something as large as a tractor! in it. Thankfully the road is just about wide enough but it's an O**** moment when it's suddenly in your drivers side window!
But they said bigger A pillars are safer! They'll protect you in the crash that they'll cause! Drivers can hardly be bothered to look for things they CAN see, how can we expect them to look for things they CAN'T see?
Last night when l was driving l noticed the moon was at a constant bearing so l was concerned about collision course. I made a U turn and l went back home for my own safety. Ok l know the exit…
I used to work for the Ministry of Defence, and know more about missiles than is healthy. Aiming to keep a constant bearing to the target is one way of ensuring you hit it.
Great video. I love when slightly smaller but just as important creator can dive deeper and make follow ups that the biggest creators might not have the time or scope to do.
First time I had a near incident from a vehicle hidden behind the pillar it was a light truck... And it was a 90 degree T intersection. Truck speech exactly matched the angle of my vision, and it wasn't until I was just about on the line that it got close enough to be showing past the pillar. I learnt to move my head around approaching intersections after that.
Don't think I've seen a give way sign with a grey rectangular background before, I thought the reason for the inverted triangle was so you could recognise them when covered in snow same as stop signs.
The worst junction I know of is where the B6213 from Tottington crosses the A676 Ramsbottom to Bolton road , there is no way of knowing what is coming from Ramsbottom direction. It’s near me and I simply won’t use it , too dangerous. Please have a look , if only on google maps, I welcome how you would deal with it . Thanks Ashley .
This is fascinating! In my area we have a couple of roads that do the new pattern and I'd always assumed (yes, I know) that it was just poor planning of the layout. There MAY be a real reason to do this! MAYbe not but we'll give them the benefit of the doubt lol.
Great content. I had the exact same thing happen to me many years ago with a motorcycle. The side road was at a bit of an angle and as I approached the motorcycle was hidden behind the mirror of the truck I was driving. I came to a quick complete stop and started to make my left turn when the motorcycle suddenly appeared in front of me. Luckily, the truck was loaded and slow to go and he had plenty of time to clear me and the intersection without evasive action on his part. Scared the stuffing out of me.
It's great to see the junction has now been changed and should, hopefully, improve safety for everyone. I saw Tom's video years ago and thought about what would happen if I was to cycle there? Hopefully it's safer now for everything, like you said Ashley, we're all humans
Stop signs are an extra level of safety, but they're not supposed to be the only thing preventing an accident. They're also rare (I can only recall two others in the UK other than this one after driving for 30 years) and they also sometime get damaged, so can not be relied on alone even if road users adhered to them 100% of the time. That's why this design was notably dangerous and has been fixed. That was literally the entire point of both videos! 🙂
Nice update Ash to a sometimes controversial junction, your are well out of your local patch down here, until last year I crossed this junction every working day for 12 years commuting Lyndhurst to Fawley, now retired and moved back to Helsby. Up until fairly recently there were only give way signs, the stop commands came after numerous vehicle/cyclist collisions and a least 2 I know of were fatal, for a long time there was a white ghost cycle tied to the finger post, I almost got caught out once with 2 cycles side by side my failure totally going from Tesco roundabout towards Lyndhurst, this was the most dangerous approach direction, coming the opposite way was a pretty clear view and, yes early mornings even after the stop signs were added some cars went through at full speed as seen on Toms original video. I fully endorse the recent engineering modifications shown in your video, likelihood is reduction for further serious injuries or even deaths to cyclists, many thanks for posting.
the blindspots on modern cars are fing huge, I've once come at an intersection on the highway where an oncoming car on the other road completely matched up with the blindspot from my roof cornerpillar.. we happened to both be turning into each others road so as we slowed down we stayed in each others blindspots until midway of the turn when suddenly a car literally "came out of nowhere". Luckily since we were both driving so slow while turning that we were able to avoid a collision.
My old Montero had no pillar blind spot because the pillars were narrow enough to effectively see through them or past them but when I purchased a Jeep I nearly had many collisions approaching an intersection because another vehicle was approaching in such a manner as to remain in the blind spot. This was especially the case at night where only the headlights need to be blocked from view.
3:28 Why is the give way sign surrounded in a grey square box? I thought that one of the benefits of the give way sign, being the shape that it is, is that it is recognisable as a give way sign even if covered by snow etc.
As a driving instructor myself all I can say is that every change that'll save lives in traffic is worth it. But DAMN, how can such a 'small' change cost HALF A MILLION?! That's crazy to me.
It really is expensive though. I know they're using asphalt and while I don't know the cost of it I did buy a 100kg bag of cement last week, it was 25 USD! Now consider the length, width, and depth of a road, pay the crew to level the terrain, the surveyors to mark the land, everything else... yeah it does make sense it'd cost that much. This is why governments have to be involved to make paved roads realities, only the wealthiest in the world would even be able to construct roads otherwise. I did find a calculator and did a lot of number fudging, but I'm guessing they used maybe 350 to 400 tons of asphalt to make the new road... according to the internet it might've cost 30k for that much, so yeah maybe 500,000 is a lot lol. Still though, you've got to pay all those people however many weeks, get the machinery out there, dig up the old road. You could do it for less, but would the road be smooth, would it stand the test of time... sometimes doing things right isn't cheap heh
Great video, thank you. In fact, it feels so professional, it is like you are a reporter for a television station. All that's missing is the ticker tape and station logo : )
I know this is about an updated junction but the blue car at 2:41 caught my eye here. Interesting position for taking that turn there. That said I can see how this change would be beneficial for all road users!
Yep. And ironically a cyclist approaching the t-junction to turn right would be in the A-pillar blind spot of that driver. Starting to wonder if driving isn’t for everyone.
Glad to see they've changed it. The stop signs were a flawed solution in a situation like this. I pointed this out at the time; to a certain extent, the average person doesn't follow rules without a reason they deem adequate. In the case of a stop sign; a stop sign on a busy and/or complex junction is likely to be followed. The reason for the sign's presence is clear, as it's a tricky junction and it's wise to stop to make proper and complete observations. This was absolutely not the case for this junction. The junction APPEARED to have absolutely perfect visibility, with a perfectly clear view of traffic approaching from every direction. The only exception to this apparent truth was the perfect blind spot which no-one could reasonably foresee. Of course, the whole point of a stop sign is that it's supposed to be an absolute, but given the perceived visibility, I think we can all understand why someone would see a perfectly clear junction in the middle of rural nowhere and choose to ignore the stop signs, that, to them; seem totally inexplicable. Even road users that tend to follow the rules make exceptions like this where there is no apparent reason for the inconvenience. The solution they've used here is overkill, if anything. I think the problem could've been resolved simply by putting up some hedges to block off the long-range visibility of the junction, forcing drivers approaching the junction to slow down, and either come to a crawl, or stop at the junction to make observations. No-one will fly over a junction blind, but they will fly over a junction with clear visibility.
Watching this, another deadly intersection design comes to mind. Celebration, FL, a town planned and built by the Walt Disney Company in the 1990s, is at the southern end of World Drive (which goes through the whole of Disney World). And it is at this southern end of World Drive at the intersection of it and Celebration Blvd where the bad design is. Just south of it is a lake (nicknamed the Celebration Death Pond), and cars have zoomed so much that they've ended up in that lake because Disney initially didn't put any lights or any indication that there was a lake. Caused so much of a problem that the town built a big wall disguised as a Celebration welcome sign so crashes wouldn't happen. But even with this wall, they still do. Back in October 2021, a 32-year-old's car vaulted over the wall and into the lake, leading to her death.
@@Brave_SJ agreed. The only time I can think of when this is not the case is either ice (but in Florida that's not really a problem) or an oil slick or something similar.
In America I've had the same issue at 4-way intersections, where the right speed and angle leave an A-Pillar blind spot causing me to not see a vehicle coming towards me if I'm set up to turn left into traffic.
Changing road layouts is a great way to reduce accidents. Signs are all well and good but when the road physically restricts drivers that gets results.
I remember Tom's video on this. It seems to me that the reason for the problem at this junction is that drivers think they have perfect visibility and so the stop sign seems to be totally out of place, and thus ignored. Which makes me wonder if a cheaper fix for this junction would have been to make the reason obvious, by making it a totally blind junction by building a big wall!
Just an interesting additional point Tom makes which you don’t specifically state here; as you see in the clip at 2:12 the cyclist wouldn’t see the car approaching the junction as the car is behind the cyclist’s position. So as is often the case in clips you show where failings from two parties lead to incidents, there are two effects (bike hidden from driver behind A-pillar, and car hidden from cyclist due to car approaching from behind) which compound one another and increase the risk.
@@rob-c. 100% agree, it’s not a failing on the part of the cyclist, rather a particular effect that compounds the risk in this case. It’s worth making the point because it shows that the cyclist _cannot_ reasonably take avoiding action here.
I watched Tom's video and when I did it is obvious why so many drivers just went straight over the junction, even with 'Stop' signs up.That old layout was asking to be abused and it was at the expense of cyclists. I would say it's money well spent 👍🏻
the problem is it's a quite road with nothing to obstruct visibility. Normally a good thing, but it makes drivers overconfident that the way is clear, no one would assume it's at all possible for a cyclist to remain in a blind spot for that long.
This is an exellent example of how signs don't define the traffic, road design does. If you build a road that allows comfortable travel at 100km/h, you can put as many 70 signs as you want, most will ignore it.
this junction is near me , been there many times , never had a problem with the old junction as i always stopped , but seen people scream staight through there (including bikes), so it needed to be done .
Great update to the junction but I do find it comical that the give way sign is now square. I thought the whole point of only having one sign as an upside down triangle shape was you could then make it out even when covered with snow - kinda defeats the purpose when you print it on a square signage no?
No doubt the options were considered, It's purpose is to be more noticeable against a dark background, but here I would imagine that there's a greater risk of sun glare as it's so exposed, more so than snow which on this road would render it passable only at slow speeds anyway, if at all. So glad they've finally done it, this was one that got me on to Tom Scott the very day he released it. However, many accidents occur due to the same type of cause, this problem is more likely with larger A pillars but hard to recognize when it happens.
I think it's because it's an advanced give way warning - the one at 2:40 is a GIVE WAY 100yds therefore if covered with snow, you wouldn't think it's a give way at that point. I can't see it in the video, but hopefully the actual give way sign at the junction has the correct silhouette
@@xGeorge1337x The one at the junction is also rectangular. You can see it a number of times in the video, mostly from behind (therefore it's not obvious that it's the GIVE WAY sign, but it's the only sign there, and therefore it must be it), but there's a very clear one at 3:24.
Yes I remember Tom's original video on this as well as a mention in a previous video of Ashley's. Good to see they have addressed this issue but a shame this whole costly redesign had to happen in the first place because drivers totally ignore Stop signs. You could say similar about traffic calming measures such as speed bumps and chicanes. All because some drivers want to drive too fast for the conditions, ultimately inconveniencing everyone by having to have these measures put in place.
Its funny how safety works, the heirarchy for most reliable ways to fix solutions is basically elimination > Engineering/built environment > organization rules > PPE > behavior. And that also usually the same order as decreasing costs so the cheapest solution is "don't fall in that bottomless pit" but the most effective solution is "don't have a bottomless pit in the first place". Basically the most effective solution is to have the roads intersect at a perfect 90° or offest 2 perfect 90° T intersections. (In NY its legally required that all roads intesecting a state highway 90 onto it for this reason) However, the cheapest solution is for drivers to just obey traffic laws and actually stop and the stop sign, but this is also the least effect since humans are inperfect and someone will always ignore the sign. (Especially problematic in the UK where stopsigns are rare and not habitually obeyed)
@@mateuszzimon8216 they wouldn't do that in the USA or UK, I don't know the reason why in USA but in UK we don't have enough traffic officers anymore cos cameras are cheaper......after all, we can't possibly charge more council tax to make the roads safer, that's un-conservative and un- brexshitty.......and we're being "run" (apparently) by brexshitty cuntesrvatives....
@@iandennis7836 Even cheaper than cop, in Poland we have a truck equiped with pole and cameras. I think we used this tactics and week later they have enough money in tickets to get proper remodeling of crossroad.
Can't believe they just ignored the stop signs. Seems like a logical place to put a cop car just off the side of the road. I'm glad they fixed it. It just seems absolutely wild that they don't care at all about stop signs. As someone who lives in the state you always stop. Some state highways that intersect have stop signs on one or both roads and have a warning ahead of the stop sign to let you know you need to slow down. They do a similar thing with street lights as well.
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This feels like the exact video that Tom would want to make as an update. Both the video and audio effort is top notch. No wonder the algorithm sent me here. 10/10
Algorithm did the same for me. I watch Tom video and then the algorithm brought me to this. That is some clever stuff.
Same! 👏
algorithm also brought me here.
Algorithm brought me here too :)
All praise the Algorithm. \[T]/
I like how the re-design looks like it was done in _Cities Skylines._ Just delete the last chunk of the road, and re-build it, but attaching it further down the road from where you previously connected it.
The roads still have to connect to each other so what do you suggest otherwise?
@@garymitchell5899 step off dude they literally said they liked it
Gary Mitchell, two first names for a name.
Worry about that predicament buddy.
Would be great if city's Would actually use it for planing.
@@CHMichael As a planner, Cities Skylines would probably not be super useful for this type of job, there is more specialised, sophisticated and accurate software available for that. That said, I belive Cities Skylines has been trialed for public consultation and very early concept testing in the past
We need an Ashley Neal-Tom Scott crossover video. Let's see how his driving is!
That'd be cool! I'd watch it.
Yes😂
Certainly an idea for the Tom Scott plus channel!
Does that mean Tom Scott assessing Ashley Neal?!😆
Yeah, Tom Scott and Scott the Woz would both be pretty epic ngl
Very odd to see my local area like this. I work as a paramedic in the new forest and I lost count on how many accidents we were sent to there. Some of them very nasty. Since the change to the layout, I’m not aware of any there. It’s been a massive success.
that’s actually really great to hear
I almost want to see how the locals feel about the change.. there's surely some that are cursing that they can't now breeze through it, not understanding they're the very reason it was changed.
I wonder if people are able to continue to question what is going on in their country and its industries. I was given a clear reason to fear by the post WW2 eras negligent psychological pseudoscientist insurance laundering human trafficking mass censorship scheme.
@@pluggedfinn-bj3hn unfortunately i can imagine the people who consistently ignored the stop signs arent that bright, and cared more for their time than others' safety
@@pemo2676 Duh. But now because they only cared about saving that 5 seconds they saved every time, they now have to spend extra 30sec each time.
The most suprising thing is not that it costs £500k to alter a very small strech of road, and replace the sinage, but that they actually had plans in place to change it before Tom Scott brought it up in his video.
Most of that £500k will have been siphoned off in little brown envelopes & off shore transfers to suits that have never picked up a shovel or know the smell of fresh tarmac like the men that actually did the graft! Wonder what they were paid?
@@lpgibbo7463 i mean if you think about either renting/owning the equipment, number of people that need to be paid, administrative costs, design, material cost (asphalt/gravel), ripping up the previous stretch of road, etc im honestly surprised that it wasnt more
@@bigzigtv706 and no one in government or local council (I know some of these people) EVER owns or is associated with any of the companies that supply those eh? From the plant machinery to the agency staff, these people have their grubby little fingers in ALL THE PIES. It's rife & to think otherwise is very naive.
@@lpgibbo7463 While you're right about corruption being rife, it's probable that most of the money went to the job. Laying a road requires digging deep into the ground, to lay the several layers of various materials necessary to ensure the road withstands the pounding of traffic. It's an expensive process, which is why it costing only £1/2 million is a surprise.
@@lpgibbo7463 rubbish. there's very little of that type of corruption in the UK - it's too easy to get caught. Anything going on would be far more subtle and more at the framework contract stage; but still highly unlikely in a case like this. When you think of all the works needed to build a sectiob of road from scratch, I'm surprised it wasn't more tbh.
As an engineer myself, Tom's video may very well have helped push this design change through. Even with the new design approved, clients can drag their heels on implementing the changes to put off the costly redo, particularly in the government sector. A high profile video bringing attention to the problem can be just the kick in the pants they need.
did you pay attention to the video? the plans for altering the intersections were around before tom uploaded it. knowing Tom, he probably figured out they were gonna change it so he made a quick vid about it. Tom's always rifling through public records and blueprints.
@@r3stl3ss did you pay attention to the comment you replied to?
Very cool that rich people can just unilaterally decide to perpetuate social murder if it suits their finances.
@@r3stl3ss Hello! just reminding you, 10 months ago you made this stupid comment
@@r3stl3ssyou wanna comment on a person you don't *think* watched all 4 minutes of a video, but you can't be bothered to finish reading the 60 words they clearly wrote out? How embarrassing 😬😂 I know it's been 10 months, but you should still be embarrassed about it
My survival tactic as a bike courier working in the city, mostly during the evening hours, is to assume that I'm invisible, and assume that every driver is an idiot, until proven otherwise.
I used to shake my head at these types of videos with the attitude that everyone should just have your attitude and everything would be fine. After all, *I* operate as if I'm invisible and *I've* never been hit by a car or hit a pedestrian due to my vigilance! Everyone else should just be vigilant like me and that will solve the problem!
I think the finer point is that it doesn't have to be that way, and we should strive for an environment that fosters safety in its design, rather than putting all of the onus on the humans using that environment.
@@Matt-sl1wg I'm not saying this is how everyone should have to be on the roads, I'm saying that I have to be like that, because during my job I exist in an environment which is inherently hostile to bikers, and I voluntarily spend more time on the road than a commuter would.
Kinda like precautions with radiation. If you are only exposed to a little every once in a while, it isn't much of an issue, but if you are constantly have to be in there to do your job, you ought to do something about it.
@@vale.antoni I get that, your comment was just the first that I could add to because it most closely resembled my own attitude when navigating public roadways. It would be very easy for people to look at your post and carry on while holding on to my old feelings about these things. So thought I'd add to your thoughts with some expansion on why that isn't enough.
@@vale.antoni But you can't ride that way because you will be reacting unnaturally which is very dangerous. It sounds like you're a beginner so please take more time to learn road craft, that is the best way to stay safe.
@@garymitchell5899 Not a beginner at all. In the last 4 years I clocked in over 10 000 km on my bike, half of that was in the city, other half on A-roads.
Edit: During which I only suffered 2 accidents that caused notable damage, and just one of those was my mistake (T-boned a car after failing to yield in time, bent my front wheel beyond repair, for about $50). The other was a mechanical fault, and there was no other road user involved (I got a few road rashes)
As a German, the idea that so many people just ignored the stop signs is insane to me. Good job fixing this up, and at such a low cost at that.
But we can still see in this video some car cutting the corner in the opposite lane. Disrespectful drivers will always find a way to misbehave.
@@christianbarnay2499 Well of course, there will always be some sub-percent amount of idiots. But overall the situation was clearly improved, so that's all fine.
@@katier9725 Of course it's an improvement. But my point is that we tend to rely too much on technical and design solutions to circumvent idiocy. And we never address the actual problem. So the idiots are still there. And they are reinforced in their bad attitude because we tell them as a society that they don't need to make any effort to improve as we are ready to spend the time and money to come up with solutions. Over the time this is resulting in progressively more people being fed up with always being the ones to make the effort. And ultimately deciding that being the idiot with impunity is the right position. So instead of fighting idiocy we are encouraging it.
@@christianbarnay2499 Well what IS the actual problem then?
@@katier9725 Lack of sanctions for people who break the law daily and put lives in danger. Fines, revoked licensed. Just applying the law.
This is a perfect example of how good design is far better than just putting up a sign
yes I would hope spending $500k is better than putting up a sign
To be fair the problem was that people *don't* look at the sign
@@andrewd8026 if they had a good design in the first place, they won't need to spend 500k
@@Adhimaska Well they at least learned of a good design to consider using in the future from this so they don't have as many expensive fixes. But when has beuracracy and the government truly been efficient anywhere.
@@Adhimaska If you go and have a look at Tom Scott's video, he clearly shows the origins of this junction, and has nothing to do with "good design" of the roads.
It was shocking how many people in Tom's video blatantly ran the stop signs.
Was it really "shocking" tho? Or did we all know that's how it is, and were just saddened to see it caught on video so blatantly?
@@Matt-sl1wg No, really shocking. We, I, expect that drivers don't really stop at stop signs. But usually you brake and look carefully, because a stop sign means more danger of overlooking traffic and collisions. You have to stop legally, but even if you don't stop, make damn sure that there is nothing in the way!
Oh and I forgot: Be prepared to stop immediately! That's the reason why at most you roll at low speeds. These drivers just didn't have the speed to step on their brakes. That's what's shocking to me. Not the fact, that they didn't stop, but the fact that they COULDN'T stop, even if there was something there.
@@Matt-sl1wg I live here and did the same as everyone, if it looked clear you dove straight across without stopping. And who wouldn't It is a completely open junction you can see everywhere, (bar where your A post is) and that is where the problem was.
@@anticat900 Lots of people think it's perfectly ok to ignore the rules as long as they don't see anything dangerous. The problem with that kind of self-serving thinking is that plenty of accidents happen because a driver didn't notice something. That might even be the #1 cause of accidents. This is especially true for drivers not noticing pedestrians.
@@DemPilafian Hello i don't believe I'm a fast or bad driver. I just did at this junction what likely 99% of people would do. I was unaware of this junctions unusual characteristics like everyone else and would just see it clear for a mile left and right so why would you stop?
Congratulations from Texas, USA. We have some very poorly constructed intersections that lead to horrible crashes like this intersection. Glad to see the highway department in the U.K. made life saving changes.
Well, this design probably reduces the risk dramatically, as traffic on the minor road actually has to slow down. Which is why, as early as the 1970's, this design has been adopted as the standard intersection design in Denmark. Obviously, not all is rotten in that state...
We still have the issue in t-sections that if a car tries to overtake a lorry, a side road car might not see car and try to cross road in opposite direction of lorry and the see the overtaking car in frontal crash. Don't know how that can be solved without a roundabout or lights. I never overtake lorry's if there is a sideroad access 🤓
The American fear of roundabouts and love for deadly huge cars certainly contribute to the insane pedestrian fatalities in a country so car dependent that basically nobody walks.
Apparently theres still an issue just a couple minutes before this junction
@@MaticTheProto There are roundabouts in the US, but they almost always contain lights and stop signs as well.
It's been nice to know that regardless of ppl like TS bringing it to public knowledge, they were already planning one fixing it. It does make me wonder if it accelerated the process though. We all know that these things can sit and fester for decades if the wrong ppl are left in charge of their care, and just because they have plans to adjust it, doesn't always mean they will be followed through promptly.
They probably had like a doodle of what they might do from 5 years before and counted that lol
Remember: Tom Scott's videos are recorded a few weeks in advance.
I wouldn't actually be surprised if they were all "Oh bollocks! Tom Scott's been 'round at the cyclist-killing junction and it's going to go on TH-cam and we'll be a stockinglaugh! Pull out the plans to how to fix it, rush it into planning so it looks like we were already starting work on it before he uploaded the video."
@@ShadowDragon8685 laughingstock?
This is an example of how engineering is a solution to road safety. A lot of times, we focus too much on enforcement and a bit on education but engineering of roads is down the list. Sure, it's expensive to commission studies and hire people with degrees to analyse things then actually do the works but it can proven to be worthwhile.
Don’t need a degree to work this issue out, just a good understanding of roads and driving habits
Infrastructure changes can go a long way.
It's so frustrating how many people want to just blame those involved and call it day. The aviation industry learnt this lesson decades ago - pilots are still human, they still make mistakes, they still have off days but aircraft have fewer and fewer crew but the industry is safer than ever, and probably the safest in the world- which is staggering given the potential. How? Systematic changes and wholistic investigations that seek to do more than just hold somebody responsible.
@@regiondeltas we call it human factors. The first step is accepting that everyone has bad days, the second step is designing the environment to mitigate the effects of someone having a bad day. Especially if multiple someones have had a bad day in the same scenario
@@miniaturesteamnick We do ;)
The fact that people were just blowing through the stop is eye opening to me. Maybe because stop junctions aren't too common here like in the US, but the octagonal STOP sign is kind of hard to miss.
Yeah blows my mind too! I religiously stop at stop signs
The poor road design was essentially teaching them that there's no need to stop. Visibility is excellent, except the unknown blind spot, and it's a quiet road. On most occasions your way will be clear, so you get used to not having to stop. Humans are crap and will do the wrong thing if at all possible. That's why good road design is important.
@@ColinBroderickMaths Blowing a stop sign in the US can be hundreds in fines and months of license suspension. You'd think it'd be worse in the UK... We still have idiots that blow through stop signs but we have even more idiots that misjudge turns. Intersections like how they changed it are notorious in the US FOR causing accidents.
@@Jmvesey In Spain if you miss an stop it's just about a 100$ fine and 4 points less in your licence. We have up to 15 points. Almost everyone sadly don't make a complete stop
Hard to miss, easy to ginore...
I grew up in a house that was located on a hill with a highway that curved around our property. The county had put up signs a mile in advance in both directions and put up flashing signs 200 feet in front of our driveway. Even with all that it was still like playing Russian Roulette every time we pulled out. I can't count how many close calls we had. It got so dangerous that the county exercised Eminent Domain and rerouted our driveway through county owned property. I remember my father getting his property tax bill the next year and because of the improvements, they reassessed our property value and increased the value, hence more taxes. He was furious. He took it to the County Commissioner and got it lowered somewhat. But the new driveway was an awesome addition because it was flat and downhill the whole way. Sledding down it was faster than we had.
I grew up in a house where the driveway exited to a chicane, built as a traffic calming solution. They could've made it a bend but made it an S curve (or actually Z). Many, many close calls but since cars have to slow down and pay attention to the tricky chicane.. they are going much slower than if it was just a normal bend. To one way there is 2km of straight and then some 700m more to the other way.. It is like someone looked at it on the map and made the obvious discovery: cars would not stick to the speed limit if it was just 2km of straight and easy smooth bend...
A lot of cars and mopeds did end up on the opposite neighbors fence.. so many that he didn't even repair it after each collision. It is the 2km straight that caused it, they dropped speed limits there and there has not been a single accident in a decade. On our side there is a bike&pedestrian path, the trees between us and the road did get a few hits but much less than the neighbors nice fence.
Wow, this is the first time I hear that a county voluntarily, without having caused it by a project of theirs, and without a previous fatal accident, spends money on someone's private driveway! Actually, they did a favor to many people, and you, being the most frequently endangered. I really appreciate your county and what it did!
@@skayt35 My father was VERY active in the local politics of the city and the county. He supported the democrats at the city level and the republicans at the county level. Playing both sides of the coin so to speak. I am sure he pulled some strings and called in some markers to make it happen. Not saying it was a shady deal, but it just didn't happen from the "goodness" in their hearts
@@valuedhumanoid6574 ok NOW I can relate to politics from where I live 😅
We just had the road by our house rerouted for safety too! It happened about a month ago and I’ve been here 34 years, but I love the change. It used to be at the top of a hill of a 4 lane, 45mph road and people got hit all the time, including a cyclist who was killed.
It’s mind blowing how easily we can create unexpected death traps, yet equally amazing how simple the solution can be.
The solution was that drivers should obey the rules of the road. There was no need to waste £500k.
@@nigelarmstrong252its not the cyclists fault though, so we shouldn't make them pay with their lives when we know lifesaving solutions
@@nigelarmstrong252 most intelligent Tory voter
@@rossmacrae749 Explain your remark.
@@nigelarmstrong252Several human lives cost more than that in lost taxes alone, even if you do not care about those lives.
I drive past this junction very frequently as I used to live in Hythe - signposted at the junction. I can say that traffic in the area is definitely a lot more aware of the junctions risk now the adaptations have been made and cars take the junctions far slower with enough time to react. So for once, £500,000 well spent 👍
If it saves one life, it is money well spent.
@@zloychechen5150 I just learned about this junction just right now through this video. I bet you 100 quid it will save more than one life, judging from Tom Scott's video cut-in how drivers absolutely ignore the stop signs.
No it is not money well spent. Typical councils allowing themselves to be fleeced because its not their money.
@@Stringer13ell lmao you're wrong and it's been done. Cope and seethe.
@@Stringer13ell It what way is a council doing it's job not money well spent? This is literally what the money is for.
Heh, after Toms video i started using two T junctions instead of X in cities skylines.. It works even there, for different reasons. It separates two right hand turns to their own intersections and makes traffic management SO much easier. Add in slip lanes and you only need to handle two ways, going straight and crossing the road from one side only. Add timed traffic lights and the throughput is quite good, for the amount of space it takes and the cost.
This I will try this evening :D Maybe just w/o the slip lanes because they create yet another point of potential conflict between relatively high speed traffic and pedestrians. Drivers will look for oncoming traffic that they'll have to merge into after the slip lane but usually not for pedestrians and cyclists who might be coming from the opposite direction ;)
@@friddevonfrankenstein That is what crossing lights are for. The slip lanes can be stopped for pedestrians. Or you can build an over/underpass
If I ever have 4 roads intersecting in anything but low traffic residential zones I introduce a roundabout, when my traffic gets to busy I'll add a slip lane for left turns. But the best way to reduce traffic is a solid underground metro grid
@@julianlaresch6266 And put pedestrian paths EVERYWHERE. Overpasses, underpasses, segregating them so that they are two systems that interact only in residential and commercial neighborhoods.. Paths are super cheap, never gets congested, but does require anarchy, which can break things...
And every intersection that can be is a T. Timed traffic lights so that one lane can go thru in each step and right hand turns are green on each step but one.
There is also double-T intersection that uses a bridge.. You use the bridge for cars going straight, another road fits under it perpendicular again for those that go straight in that directions and then separate turning lanes split from the main road and curve to the other main road. Takes up only little space, easy to replace a busy X intersection in tightly packed area. It needs the traffic manager to set all the arrows so that they don't act stupid: the fastest way is not the shortest and it will gridlock if not set up just right.
I just started a city with T intersections on every major roads, + intersections are kept at a minimal and on low-usage residential roads only
So far with only 10k cims and no public transport it's working well, my traffic flow is above 90% but we should see how it'll perform when it's >50k cims 😇
As a motorcyclist I have a simple rule: everyone is out to kill me so I should ride so. I'll never understand why you'd assume the other road uses know what they are doing
I get you as a fellow rider/cyclist/car user, but a crash can be lethal for a cyclist at 10mph and stopping distance is terrible even that slowly in the wrong conditions. Blaming the victim is a bit of a dick move all things considered.
As a biker both types I hate going out always in the back of my mind that an idiot is near me
@@zbf5h89ftb yeah, I might have been a bit forward with my previous comment to be fair. Thanks for pointing it out.
@@dang2651
You are the type that insists on your rites.
@@Igbon5 And you apparently are the kind who cannot spell "rights"
This is precisely why people like Tom are so important. We need people documenting dangers and becoming activists for a better tomorrow. Thanks for going over this in more detail :)
the danger is stupid people blowing through signs........ not the roads.
i know its hard to understand i learned repitition seems to help. Stupid people are the danger.... stupid people. 4 way stops for ALL. hard to get hit in that situation. yet morons ignore signs do what they want and cry when shit happens. survival of the fittest.
But the ppl who ignored the stop sign are still out there driving around like lunatics.
but I don't like change
@@seeharvesterok?
but the plan was already in place to change the intersection?
This is the first video I've seen from your channel, but I recall very clearly Tom Scott's video from a couple of years ago. It's GREAT to see that this issue was taken seriously even before that video went live, and it's great to see that people listened to the civil engineers who said "road signs alone aren't enough to prevent injury."
If you're relying on civil engineers to give you obvious advice like that there's no hope.
I have concluded that if you want people to do the correct thing you have to remove all other options. Expecting drivers to obey the signage and yield or even stop at an intersection is asking for failure. Forcing the driver to make two turns? That forces the correct behavior. Humans are dumb, just talk to one to see what I mean.
@@stevedixon921 Absolutely. Signs don't force a change in behavior. This does.
@@stevedixon921 I did talk to one once.
And I agree with your conclusion.
(That I actually passed the interview and got the job is just the conclusive icing on the conclusion cake. 😉)
@@stevedixon921 People stop at junctions all the time, the vast majority safely. Stop being a cheap smart arse on TH-cam and get out into the real world.
This is particularly meaningful to me because in August 2020, I was knocked off my bike at a roundabout where the approaching road was about that angle. I didn't escape without injury; I broke my leg & wrist in the incident. The driver said they didn't see me until they hit me. After seeing Tom's video, it made me realise that I was hidden in their A post blind spot.
The re-aligned road should definitely help & the need to turn from the other direction should also improve matters.
Whole cars can be hidden in them, moreso with newer cars as the A-pillar has gotten larger for crash safety.
If you are riding a bicycle or in my case Motorcycles car drivers suffer from Inattentional Blindness. This a phenomenon where a person looks straight at you but doesn't see you. This is why they pull out in front of you. happens all the time..
@@brianperry Yeah especially if the biker blends into the background because of their slow speed, position in the road (further out from the kerb the side of the biker is visible as well as front so a larger visible surface area) or the relative background.
Yes. Two weeks after passing my police advanced driving course at Hendon with a Class 1 I ran into a cyclist at a roundabout in Peterborough because I hadn’t appreciated this problem. She was only bruised as it was at walking speed only but it scared the bejesus out of me (and her). Now I’m a driving instructor I spend a lot of time on this issue and go to several junctions where the A -pillar obscures the whole road.
@@dickyr3295 It is worrying isn't it? After my accident, when I learned that it was probably a failure to observe the A post blind spot, I realised how easy this is to miss & that I could very easily have made the same mistake when driving.
A most welcome update about a notorious junction - thank you! 🙂
Having investigated many incidents over the decades, one of the most under-recognised causal factors are moving blind-spots.
That is very interesting. Do you have a link or some examples?
I myself have investigated a few collisions (as a transport manager). If you do the job properly it can be very enlightening. Unfortunately, most company front line managers do lip service to an investigation & blame one or other driver for ease; ergo other factors are never addressed, ergo collisions of the same nature recur
@@hippophile Theres an original piece that set up the Tom Scott video on a magazine called Single Track.
The title is "Ipley Cross | Why This Type Of Road Junction Will Keep Killing Cyclists".
HTH
Yes. Two weeks after passing my police advanced driving course at Hendon with a Class 1 I ran into a cyclist at a roundabout in Peterborough because I hadn’t appreciated this problem. She was only bruised as it was at walking speed only but it scared the bejesus out of me (and her). Now I’m a driving instructor I spend a lot of time on this issue and go to several junctions where the A -pillar obscures the whole road.
@@hippophile - I would love to able to discuss many of these. However, sadly bound by confidentiality - even in retirement. Pity as I see lots of learning potential for others including former colleagues who did not always spot moving blind-spots.
However, in some cases I was able to get significant changes made to reduce the risk of reoccurrence.
I remember two crossroads in Finland that were fixed by staggering two of the roads like this. One of them had multiple fatalities before the fix because the main road had a high speed limit and was between big cities, while the road crossing it was a small road in a rural area and people would drive into the fast traffic because they didn't bother looking if someone was coming. The fix, like in this crossing, forces people to slow down considerably and that by itself also makes them look around before trying to get onto the bigger road.
Fundamentally, the root cause of the problem is the unnecessary straightness of engineered roads (which are almost always post WW2 and optimized for velocity of cars and trucks and/or sometimes intended to be used as emergency runways for military aircraft).
Older roads tend to curve to follow natual topology and "drape" naturally on the land. This causes changes in speed and angle of intersections that avoids the occlusion-by-pillar problem.
Separately, modern drivers go significantly faster because of improvements in "comfort" and performance; and simultaneously pay much less attention than drivers used to do when the vehicles were slower and frankly more dangerous. We have traded off hundreds of thousands of fatalities per year at a species level to the drivers and occupants of more dangerous older cars (say pre Volvo and pre Ralph Nader) for a different kind of problem where many drivers simply don't pay attention because they're on the phone or fiddling with a stupid touchscreen on the dashboard.
I used to cycle down that exact road, not realising the danger until I saw Tom's video! Glad it's been fixed now.
Also: most people have absolutely no idea neither as to the fact that this blind spot actually exists (in virtually any car) nor as to how massive it actually is.
@@ilyapetoushkoff8362 you'd never realized how big the blind spot is until you've drive a car in 120km/h thru those A shaped 4-road junctions
@@ilyapetoushkoff8362 Isn't that part of any driving course and wouldn't the person in your driving test check that you're checking blindspots by moving your head?
@@mothgru Judging by the amount of bad drivers there are in the UK... obviously not.
(at least not often enough)
When I cycle I always assume cars do not see me. So if a car approach a crossing like that I would slow down and let them cross before me even if I have the right of way. Even if a car has stopped I would not assume that sees me and would not start driving just when I am crossing. Having the right of way is of little usage in a hospital bed or six feet under. You will not lose a lot of speed or time if you plan ahead because just slowing down a bit will separate you, even if it does better safe than sorry.
They've done this to plenty of rural Australian roads. There were heaps of fatalities at intersections like this.
But in the Aussie style, these weren't caused because of blind spots; both motorists would speed up to beat the other through the intersection.
The staggered intersections meant that you wouldn't beat anyone through the intersection, you would go straight through into the ditch once it was staggered. This, fatalities dropped like a stone.
Reminds me of road design here in Mexico, we have speed bumps and little nubs to slow down cars everywhere and they force drivers to be at certain speeds (like hell i was even taught at driving school that speed limit signs are a suggestion more than anything, by law cops wont stop you unless you're about 20km/h over them)
There’s a reason that Mad Max is Australian
Ah yes, the Australian game of chicken. It's how we merge, too.
@@chekoteI saw that documentary, too.
@@worldcomicsreview354What documentary are you guys referring to? I’m interested.
Over the past twentyish years, this kind of re-alignment has been done on many country intersections in Australia. I have found it works well and reduces crashes.
Good video and I too recommend watching Tom Scott's stuff.
Why not just install a roundabout though
@@eaar When one road is a side road, and the other is a main highway with a speed limit of 110 kph, a roundabout is a really bad idea.
@@eaar I'm not trying to have a go at you specifically but as an Aussie, roundabouts aren't the silver bullet the internet seems to think they are.
One of my most common drives involves a 2 lane roundabout which is actually a bit of a local accident hotspot as people struggle to work out how to best use it. If there's any traffic on any branch it's even worse. It'll be replaced by a diverging diamond which I'm not sure will actually make things easier.
So many roads here outside of the major cities are 110km/h limited with trucks, cars and bikes having to drive for hours at a time between major towns. Many of the highways could not sustain roundabouts even if they wanted to as the highways run through small towns and often have a mix of local and express traffic. Many of these can be dual carriageway and divided by a median but others twist their way through the environment as undivided two-way roads with one lane each side.
@@martythemartian99 as an actual road safety engineer working in Australasia, roundabouts on 110km/h roads are actually a great idea unless the traffic volumes on the side roads are really, really low
@@georgelane6350 flying through a roundabout at 110 km/h is a great idea?
This is the first video I've ever seen that acknowledges car pillar blinding of any kind. It is IMPORTANT to talk about A, B & C pilar blind spots as many people don't seem to understand it. There should be an entire class in driving school that talks about how things that move at just the right speeds can be hidden behind a pilar in your car or that when on the motorway in the middle lane, cars at your 5:30 and 7:30 position often get blocked visually by your C pilar in a car. THIS IS GREAT STUFF!
It's amazing that people can have a driving license and not have the slightest clue about the fact that the huge post that is constantly in they field of view is constantly hiding things from them.
Any country that delivers driving licenses without making sure the candidate has acquired that kind of basic obvious understanding is a road safety failure.
I had a One series BMW for a bit but I got rid of it after a couple of months because I couldn't see past the A pillar, no matter how I adjusted I always had a massive blind spot to my right. I came close to having two serious accidents as a direct result. Awful car, uncomfortable too. For context I am experienced with commercial vehicles so know all about blind spots and I never have had this issue driving those, never even come close to a serious accident.
In my experience part of the problem seems to be that cars' A pillars in the US have gotten thicker to accommodate improved rollover survivability and curtain airbags. So those of us who learned to drive on older cars wouldn't have gotten those lessons because it wasn't a problem on the cars I learned to drive.
@@benroberts2222
Absolutely 100% correct, old cars had thin pillars because visibility was the focus. Average cars got faster so more got rolled over so cars were designed to be flipped, thicker pillars, bonded strengthened glass etc. The issue I had with the One series was the seating position, no matter how I adjusted it it gave me a blind spot on the right I couldn't look around (I'm used to adjusting for blind spots, I've driven quite a few miles in small lorries, large vans etc) which is bloody dangerous when you drive on the left, especially when using roundabouts.
I've driven through countless such staggered crossroads in Britain, always wondered why they were laid out like this! Assumed it had something to do with ancient land ownership, as is often the case with weird layouts - turns out it's for safety.
In California, where I live, it is often a relic of old rights-of-way.
It can be annoying to negotiate such intersections, but if it is safer the reason doesn't matter.
No it's more likely to be land ownership or topography. When these junctions were originally made nothing travelled beyond a few miles an hour so there was never a safety issue.
In my area there is a road that I always thought was silly it didn't go straight, I always wondered why it would curve round instead and just thought they wanted to keep the small patch of grass (lol) and now I know why too. lol
I remember the Tom Scott video solely because I was stunned to see the number of cars just flying through the stop signs without even slowing down, let alone stopping. Of course people run stop signs in the US, but it's usually accidental. Even people who are from a given area with a deserted rural crossing that has good visibility tend to stop. Of course, there are also relatively few yield signs at crossings here, so maybe it's just a matter of conditioning.
Out in farm country it's more common. Rolling through is almost mandatory everywhere else it seems though. I wish people took it seriously regardless.
Definitely the conditioning, I think. When I lived in the UK, I only knew of one stop sign and I got around quite a bit.
@@0Rookie0 People would take stop signs more seriously if they were used more judiciously. Though they should be eliminated almost entirely in my opinion.
The visibility is extremely good, and nine times out of ten there will be no one else in view, so people naturally get complacent. First they'll roll the stop. Then they'll slow down even less. Eventually they will stop slowing down at all, because they've never needed to before. The road conditions essentially teach drivers to do exactly the wrong thing. This is why proper road design is so important. Humans WILL do the wrong thing if given the chance.
Stop signs are rare in the UK, and are only really put up in places where accidents have happened. Similarly to speed cameras, which you can guarantee only exist where a fatal accident has occurred. Pop one or two down and give people lots of warning that they'll receive a hefty fine for speeding here, and most motorists will make themselves safe because they don't want to receive the fine. We call the idea "policing by consent" because people voluntarily police themselves instead of speeding by the camera and having to be policed by the police.
Good to see logic being used here to keep everyone safe
On a side note, anyone else notice the corner cutter at 2:40? Safely knew nobody was there or "I've lost 2 seconds with the new road layout, left me make up
It's probably the self-same drivers that used to sail through without stopping.
Yeah I agree but it’s a shame that logic probably took a 100 years and needless death to work out a problem in 5 minutes on the tech board ..
@@Rogue-cg1rm When that junction was designed there were probably less cars around so was suitable at the time. Most likely followed existing horse and cart routes through the New Forest (lovely place by the way, highly recommended to all). I agree that death tolls shouldn't need to rise for improvements to be made and even a near miss should be enough to think "What can we do?". A road near to where I used to live had 5 deaths over a 6 year period which, apparently, didn't meet the local council threshold of more than 1 death per year on average to discuss improvements. A lot of campaigning and lobbying by local groups results in traffic calming being installed
@@smilerbob I think one of the keys here is the signage and lack of adherence to them .. stop and halt , solid white lines are completely ignored by idiots .. I have one such junction close to my workplace that is treated as if invisible because I think it’s in the middle of nowhere .. the A52 meets the A523 at Calton moor , is a regular route I use and if I am going southbound toward it the A52 is to my right and is regularly contravened by cars and trucks .. and as articulated Hgv myself at 44 tonne and legally allowed to travel at 50mph past this junction I have more than a few times had to slap my anchors on and I’m sure you will understand it ain’t easy and a little bit scary at times … good luck .
Probably "safely knew nobody was there". Visibility is pretty good; the previous issues were down to the angles of approach, and the fact that the roads were straight. Looking at the angles, I doubt the driver could have had any approaching traffic in their A-pillar blind spot. Also, no traffic approaches from the minor road after the car passes, thus confirming that there was no traffic for the driver to avoid.
Remember that cutting corners doesn't just save you time; it also saves fuel and/or tyre wear, depending on what speed you choose to take the corner.
Personally, I don't see an issue with cutting a corner like this if you can be 100% sure that it is safe to do so.
When I was young I was always taught to hold my head up high and look both ways constantly as I cross any road or intersection. As an adult I've learned that I am 100% responsible for my own safety and should never rely on other people or their systems to work for me. As a pedestrian these two simple ideas have kept me alive and uninjured in many situations, and now as I drive more than I ever have before I apply these same rules and it has already saved me from a wreck in 3 instances. PAY ATTENTION and DONT BECOME COMPLACENT!
@gormenfreeman499 In my country the rules say that the driver should have another person help him back out if needed. And backup cameras are a thing these days.
@gormenfreeman499 That's exactly why you should be reversing into a parking space or driveway and driving out, not driving in and reversing out. If you hit somebody doing that then you would be at fault, 100% of the time.
This feels like a great example of making the easiest option also the safest. They can put all the signs in the world leading upto the crossing and just hope that people listen, or they can make it intuitive to be safe!
The easiest option was the signs though?
Easiest thing would be people actually stopping at the stop sign. But the Brit’s have never been the smartest people 😂
I think an easier option to fix this would have been to change the visibility temporarily, e.g. with trees along the road, which forces the driver's mind to pay more attention, which usually results in lowered speeds. Another possible way would have been to widen the connection and put a divider between lanes. What they did was pointless expensive in my opinion.
@@defeqel6537 Or just add a speed bump 🤔
@@untheo or that, but that could affect winter maintenance (if that's a problem in the area)
I'm always aware of the moving blind spot in the a pillar. That junctions old layout isn't dissimilar to many if not most roundabout approaches in this respect. Driving involves more head movement than many people realise.
Not just the A-pillar, either. In larger vehicles (I drive a bus), the large mirrors actually pose an additional blind-spot problem - something as big as a car can be right behind your mirror, which is unlikely to be significant in a car.
Hell, remove the car altogether and you still need your head on a swivel. Watch any motorcyclist approaching a junction, I don't think my head ever sits still with a helmet on
@@ukeleleEric scary the number of times a car (or single deck bus at the right angle) would appear from behind the mirror by moving my head, when I was a bus driver
I've been driving for 25 years now, and in that time the A pillars have gotten thicker and thicker. I can understand why, it's safer for the occupants of the car in case of a crash (and they usually stuff air bags into them too). However, it's clearly more dangerous to cyclists and pedestrians. In my Prius, especially the A pillar on the driver's side blocks so much of the view (because it's closest), that I'm weaving my head left and right in every (city) left turn. That's not safe at all, because it only takes one unlucky time to forget it....
@@SolarWebsite Yes, completely agree. The A pillars are so big now and of course, as you say, the close proximity, though there was the idea a while ago of covering them with a display and a camera on the outside to see around it but I haven't heard anything about it since.
I've had an A Pillar incident where I didn't see a cyclist on a roundabout until the last second fortunately I emergency stopped in time, but ever since then I'm continually moving position in my vehicle to look around (Its a Ducato Camper van so the A pillars are quite big) my sister actually asked what I was doing when she was a passenger with me (she's also a driver) and I had to explain!
I just wonder how many drivers have had A pillar incidents, I would predict a fair few.
this is absolutely no shade to anyone, we are all human and doing our best! i don’t know what about it stuck in my mind so hard but this is basically the only thing i actually remember from driving school. The idea that I could hurt someone I couldn’t see was terrifying and I just ended up integrating a bit of sway into the movements I make to look around the car. I rarely if ever look with just my head, it‘s a full body motion (albeit somewhat subtle) every time and now I don’t even think about it. It particularly makes the over the shoulder lane change check much easier because you already have so little visibility that any additional visual info is imminently useful.
Modern cars have giant pilars and blind spots. It always used to annoy me on my Berlingo. If I look at the pilars on my 80's citroen Visa or Trabant, they are tiny, and there are almost no blind spots. Then again, should someone crash into me, or should I run into something I'm probably dead.
I actually missed two 15 yo twins bc of my car's huge A pillar. Police didn't believe me, but the lawyer did and thank god I only had to pay the lowest fee.
Paranoia never ends with an a pillar of that size. But I hope I will never ever hit a person again and I really hope none of you has to experience that, be it as victim or driver.
they had minor injuries, I later asked them if I could do something for them and if they were okay, but the family told me to leave them alone, so I never heard from them again. Dunno if one of the girls has lasting injury..
Being a cyclist has made me a much better driver. I always lean forward now to check around the pillar; it's not always possible to see everything but it's so much better. It's amazing how poor visibility really is from a car when you're use to cycling everywhere. I'm not surprised that societies with much higher rates of cycling have much lower rates of cycling deaths--not only from better infrastructure and empathy but also just from being reminded that they can only see 80% of reality and they should operate accordingly.
Very interesting. This explains an intersection change near my old place that I never understood. Seen from above, the new layout is identical to the new layout in this video. Makes a lot of sense the way you explained it. Learned something new about traffic patterns today. :-) Thank you!
This is great. Road design is far more effective at alterning the behaviour of road users than signage. If you make it so people can't do it wrong, then you don't have to rely on them doing it right
I wonder if we can get American road authorities to learn such a simple lesson. I think they're starting to catch on, but they have a ways to go before they learn that signs aren't infrastructure
honestly always wondered why people are unable to ignore the curve of the road and the lines etc. i mean, i get that it drives better than cutting through the grass but just simple shapes and lines are enough to corral even the worst driver
Excellent video Ashley. I live 2 miles from this junction and have seen several crashes between cars prior to the changes being made. This road is a short cut to avoid the very busy (and hence slow) A326, so anyone in a hurry would take this route and ignore the 40 mph speed limit. It's also one of only two routes for cyclists to get from the Hythe/ Dibden conurbation into the beautiful New Forest so acts as a focus for them. On summer evenings Ipley crossroads is used as a turn point on the very popular P164 cycling time trial course between Lyndhurst and Beaulieu. As a keen local cyclist I think the money was well spent, it definitely feels safer now.
From what you are saying, there should actually be a seperate cyclepath.
Improves safety even more
@@Stompy1984 The cycle path would still need to cross the road somewhere. That's just moving the problem a few steps away.
My take is that there is well known impunity for speeding and ignoring the stop sign. A police squad randomly coming to the place and distributing fines and license suspensions for shifts of a couple hours should rapidly reduce the incivility while helping refill the budget and reduce taxes.
Do we know if Tom is aware of this update? I bet he'd love to spotlight if he could! Great job on this video!
Tom is aware. Have a look at the description of his video. Link is in my description 👍
Thank you for creating a great update video on the road. It's good to see something was actually done to fix a problem.
This junction is in my daily delivery rounds and it was nice to see the changes. For what is such an open junction with good views left and right, it’s so easy to miss somebody travelling on the main road. Small change makes a big difference!
An identical solution was used over 30 years ago at a junction in Central Scotland to prevent injuries and fatalities.and was successful for a long time. However, some drivers still saw a challenge in crossing the junction before oncoming traffic and accidents continued - albeit at a much reduced rate. Eventually, the solution was a large roundabout which slows everybody down.
you can't pave your way around natural selection, im afraid
@@r3stl3ss It's not natural selection, though. Natural selection means the weaker or less wary are killed, whereas in these accidents, it can be the less wary killing the sensible ones.
I've had this experience once where I couldn't see a cycle till it came very close and I had to slam the brakes. I was not going very fast but I was amazed what a huge blind spot the A pillar is.
It has been road safety policy for decades to identify road accident blackspots and design engineering schemes to reduce the risk and this a fine example of doing just that. As someone else commented, this scheme was on the drawing board and it may well be that Tom Scott's video ensured it was quickly enacted, so well done to Tom , the designers of the scheme and those who made the decision to enact it. Every engineering scheme to make our roads safer has a continuing long term effect in reducing road fatalities.
Another important part of road safety is to enforce rules with fines and license suspensions. So that people keep on respecting the rules. This junction is a blatant demonstration that total impunity results in chaos. Even after the redesign you can still see cars overspeeding on the incoming road, flooring the breaks at the junction and cutting corners to gain just a couple seconds and then flooring the accelerator again to keep on overspeeding.
You can create the best design you want. If you never enforce the rules, people will misuse your design and make it look like a complete failure.
A good example on how road design can naturally influence driver behaviour, there were some studies which suggested the wide straight suburban roads in the US are bad design, as even with posted speed limits the wide straight roads influence driver perception and they drive faster than they should and get fixated on the distance, while curvier suburban roads naturally cause drivers to pay more attention to navigate.
I'm sure it's something like for every 6 inches of extra lane width people will drive 10 mile a hr faster.
It's also why they're replacing a lot of roads with shared spaces, because it makes the drivers more aware as they don't feel they have a natural right of way.
It indeed affects driver's behaviour. I have been in Germany recently and they have those curved roads a lot. The drivers there usually slow down and pay more attention to the road. They also don't have the time to "look at the mobile phone for few seconds", so it is even safer in that regards
Yes that's a good point. The US system is designed for cars not people ever since the 1920s-30s and some interesting political campaigns by motor companies, and they don't have a real difference between Streets (busy frontages, human activity, low perceived safe soeed) and Roads (inactive frontage, little human activity, high speeds).
They get things known as Stroads, which have street frontages of businesses and shops, but road designs type , 4 6 or 8 lane widths, and road behaviour. So being on foot or a cycle is very risky. A solution is to disentangle streets and roads.
There are a number of good vids about this on YT. One is "Stroads are Ugly, Expensive, and Dangerous (and they're everywhere)".
It's true of everyone in traffic that design influences behavior, it's just that for pedestrians and cyclists there is basically no risk of a fatal accident, or really any serious accident. In fact with those two groups we usually want to encourage the opposite, Stroads don't just encourage unsafe driving they also make pedestrians and cyclists uncomfortable and therefore people are less likely to use those methods of transport. The large amount of concrete makes Stroads really hot on sunny days which can be outright dangerous if you're not in an air conditioned vehicle, and obviously you can't air condition a bike or walking shoes. It essentially becomes a negative feedback loop where people are pushed into choosing the less safe method of transport overall and that choice leads to infrastructure not being designed to take anyone other than drivers into consideration.
Plus they also contribute to the heat island effect which is a serious issue for many cities in the US.
You should visit Germany some time. They have this law about passing distance when overtaking cyclists. They mostly abide by it too! Cycling on 100 km/h roads is legal there and my perception is that it feels a lot safer than the 30 km/h road in the Netherlands... as long as there are no Dutch drivers on that German road.
I live here! It took ages, because they literally moved the top foot of soil from the new position to the old, to protect as much biodiversity as possible (I assume) very cool!
The shit environmentalists come up with. What a joke.
I imagine that was done so that if someone wasn't paying attention and wasn't used to the new layout that they would slow down in a raised dirt section instead of crashing down a foot into the grass. I don't see any biodiversity rationale in a hunk of dirt.
@@schmiddy8433 You'd be pleasantly shocked at the biodiversity in "just" a hunk of dirt! By preserving the mycelium and insects/microbes in that dirt, they keep a much richer soil and will keep that area much healthier than just stripping it away. It's pretty cool
@@itsdrgrandpa I know there's life in the dirt, but 'preserving biodiversity' by placing it in the exact spot the old road was is a rationale I don't believe.
@@schmiddy8433 that's okay, you don't have to believe it. You also don't seem to any relevant expertise (unless you're not mentioning it?) so i think it's worth considering that you're simply missing out on some info. No big deal either way 😊
If I saw the new layout of the junction on some map I'd probably wonder why they built it like that. Goes to show you that sometimes more thought is put into the design of the world around us than people might think, and that the most obvious solution isn't necessarily the best.
This reminds me of a similar intersection near me. I had not used it for a few months, and suddenly it had a “side arm” change like this one. I could not understand why. Now I do, thanks to your video. 😊
as silly as it is, stuff like this makes me feel a lot better about the world. seeing a simple problem with real consequences laid out a couple of years ago and now seeing a followup where those consequences have been addressed gives me a lot of hope about the world :)
The funny thing is that this sort of stuff happens a lot. It just doesn't get enough publicity.
People just need to be more responsible. None of this would be a problem if people obeyed street signs.
@@sirtaugs "Personal responsibility" didn't solve the problem here, did it? You don't solve problems by telling people to be better people, you solve problems by either holding them accountable (stiffer penalties) or, as seen here, making the problematic behavior impossible.
Thanks to Tom I spent a significant chunk of my morning learning about a small rural intersection on the other side of the world.
I like when problems like that are solved by designs and not merely by signs and warnings.
Not designs. Money. Taxpayer money because people won't follow the road signs. If they wanted to save lives and make money off of this, they would have simply parked a cop there and ticketed everybody that broke the law. Eventually people learn.
I used to pass through this junction and imagine the many reasons why it has been redesigned and now I got the actual answers and it makes sense and I'm glad I wasn't too far off
I thought about this junction a lot since Tom's video about it came out. This one literally brought me peace of mind. Thank you a lot!
I would love to see a video breaking down the £500,000 pricetag of that change. It feels like a lot for a fairly minor looking change but I'm sure there's more that goes into it.
pretty easy really. asphalt costs about 100quid/tonne. multiply that by the 50,000 tonnes of asphalt needed for the 50 meters of road, i.e. 1000 tonnes per meter, gives you 500K. simples innnit
@@simonleeofficial 90% of it will go into the mate of the locals councillor who approved it’s offshore bank account
@@simonleeofficial Nice, that's a lot of asphalt lol. It's nice to know that the bulk of the cost is it's down the cost of materials.
@@aeropherxd I’m quite certain that 1000 ton of asphalt per meter would be VERY visible lol. It would be a mountain of asphalt. So yeah the bulk of the cost is probably not in the material, but instead bureaucracy
@@simonleeofficial 1000 tonnes per metre of a tiny little road like that? Im pretty sure that would be some diamond density asphalt wouldnt it? Think about the weight of other things and the size of them … no way is a 1metre long*1metre deep*(however wide the road is) slab of asphalt weighing 1000 tonnes, way less than 100 tonnes probably and the depth of the asphalt below the surface of the road is probably a lot less than 1metre tbh
Thank you, I often miss videos (regardless of whether it's TV or TH-cam) that explain “how it went on!”
Great update. Thanks Ashley. This is a prime example of how infrastructure choices can improve safety.
Thanks for the explanation. Sometimes I see roads like this and scratch my head wondering WTF for. But you and Tom make some valid points.
Saw Tom's video 2 years ago.
Awesome to stumble on this follow up.
Over here to get your attention of a stop sign coming up, we have a series of small speed bumps too small to really bump your car, that get closer together, so if you're still going at speed it starts to vibrate your car, kind of like an airplane's stick shaker stall warning. Grabs your attention if you're not slowing down before the intersection.
Would have cost less than half a million quid.
The people blowing the stop signs wouldn't care. As far as they're concerned, the crossing road looks clear and they're in a hurry and they're unlikely to get caught. Yes they're fucking stupid but that's what the redesign addresses.
i like the part where you call algorithm-based recommendations "stumbling upon"
A lot of junctions in Somerset and Devon are staggered like this. The old Roman roads across open country are often the minor roads, and they used to be dead straight for miles on end. Now many of them have the Roman road do a deviation on one side of the main road to stagger the junction. On family holidays in the 1970s as a child of around 10 I remember working out that this was to increase safety, I was quite proud of my young self!
Hadn't thought of that, but of course the link back to the old viae romanae makes a lot of sense!
Impressed by your pre-teen self's risk assessment acuity too! Did you grow up to become a civil engineer or safety inspector by any chance...? 😋
@@anna_in_aotearoa3166 I grew up to be a computer programmer. I'm very physics and mathematically minded.
I saw Tom's video years ago, I just got this recommended by the algorithm.. thank you for making this video.
A very quick tip from the world of aviation. If you are moving and you are looking at something and it's not moving relative to your vision. ie. it's on "a constant bearing". You are on a collision course. The trouble in cars is... they typically only have one driver and they have pillars which remain at a fixed bearing to you. The only way to solve that is to move your head.
Personally I HATE A pillars. My own isn't too bad, but the rental C3 I have is terrible. The A pillar is about 6 inches wide and in the worst place possible, especially exiting round abouts. It's in such an awkard position even trying to look round it is difficult.
Same principle applies to navigation at sea. Regardless of right of way we all have responsibility for keeping a 'good lookout' and acting accordingly. If that means having to move your head to improve your view, then so be it. Shame it doesn't seem to be taught anymore judging by some of the comments.
on my drive home there's one bend that lines up exactly with my A pillar, I've previously lost something as large as a tractor! in it.
Thankfully the road is just about wide enough but it's an O**** moment when it's suddenly in your drivers side window!
But they said bigger A pillars are safer! They'll protect you in the crash that they'll cause! Drivers can hardly be bothered to look for things they CAN see, how can we expect them to look for things they CAN'T see?
Last night when l was driving l noticed the moon was at a constant bearing so l was concerned about collision course.
I made a U turn and l went back home for my own safety.
Ok l know the exit…
I used to work for the Ministry of Defence, and know more about missiles than is healthy. Aiming to keep a constant bearing to the target is one way of ensuring you hit it.
Great video. I love when slightly smaller but just as important creator can dive deeper and make follow ups that the biggest creators might not have the time or scope to do.
It's my job at 1:45 to produce drawings like that! Funny seeing another engineers approach of illustrating information
Do an analysis video 😉
I would have expected a roundabout for that amount of money. But it's great that someone made a change to reduce the likelyhood of future accidents.
First time I had a near incident from a vehicle hidden behind the pillar it was a light truck... And it was a 90 degree T intersection. Truck speech exactly matched the angle of my vision, and it wasn't until I was just about on the line that it got close enough to be showing past the pillar.
I learnt to move my head around approaching intersections after that.
looking left and right while crossing the road is something they teach you in kindergarten. im assuming it applies to driving a car as well.
Don't think I've seen a give way sign with a grey rectangular background before, I thought the reason for the inverted triangle was so you could recognise them when covered in snow same as stop signs.
I noticed this too! Should have checked the comments before making my own
The worst junction I know of is where the B6213 from Tottington crosses the A676 Ramsbottom to Bolton road , there is no way of knowing what is coming from Ramsbottom direction. It’s near me and I simply won’t use it , too dangerous. Please have a look , if only on google maps, I welcome how you would deal with it . Thanks Ashley .
Nice to know that that junction is now so much safer. Thanks for bringing the improvements to our attention.
This is fascinating! In my area we have a couple of roads that do the new pattern and I'd always assumed (yes, I know) that it was just poor planning of the layout. There MAY be a real reason to do this! MAYbe not but we'll give them the benefit of the doubt lol.
Great content. I had the exact same thing happen to me many years ago with a motorcycle. The side road was at a bit of an angle and as I approached the motorcycle was hidden behind the mirror of the truck I was driving. I came to a quick complete stop and started to make my left turn when the motorcycle suddenly appeared in front of me. Luckily, the truck was loaded and slow to go and he had plenty of time to clear me and the intersection without evasive action on his part. Scared the stuffing out of me.
It's great to see the junction has now been changed and should, hopefully, improve safety for everyone. I saw Tom's video years ago and thought about what would happen if I was to cycle there? Hopefully it's safer now for everything, like you said Ashley, we're all humans
Speak for yourself earthling.
I like the simple redesign. The psychology of a straight road versus a very visual t shape probably plays a large part in why this is so effective.
Now that's sensible road planning in action. Shame it took so long for it to happen.
Shame they had to change it in the first place since people would not stop at a stop sign.
Stop signs are an extra level of safety, but they're not supposed to be the only thing preventing an accident. They're also rare (I can only recall two others in the UK other than this one after driving for 30 years) and they also sometime get damaged, so can not be relied on alone even if road users adhered to them 100% of the time. That's why this design was notably dangerous and has been fixed. That was literally the entire point of both videos! 🙂
yep, to accommodate those non-sensible motorists that didn't stop..
@@metromadness2016 To be fair large percentage of motored and cyclist zipped through the Stop sign - anyway a good improvement to this junction.
Nice update Ash to a sometimes controversial junction, your are well out of your local patch down here, until last year I crossed this junction every working day for 12 years commuting Lyndhurst to Fawley, now retired and moved back to Helsby.
Up until fairly recently there were only give way signs, the stop commands came after numerous vehicle/cyclist collisions and a least 2 I know of were fatal, for a long time there was a white ghost cycle tied to the finger post, I almost got caught out once with 2 cycles side by side my failure totally going from Tesco roundabout towards Lyndhurst, this was the most dangerous approach direction, coming the opposite way was a pretty clear view and, yes early mornings even after the stop signs were added some cars went through at full speed as seen on Toms original video.
I fully endorse the recent engineering modifications shown in your video, likelihood is reduction for further serious injuries or even deaths to cyclists, many thanks for posting.
Ashley, Neal, Tom and Scott, 4 of my favorite people on TH-cam.
I cycle in downtown Toronto almost daily. Our difficulties are much different but yet I feel your pain. Nice to see a change for the better.
the blindspots on modern cars are fing huge, I've once come at an intersection on the highway where an oncoming car on the other road completely matched up with the blindspot from my roof cornerpillar.. we happened to both be turning into each others road so as we slowed down we stayed in each others blindspots until midway of the turn when suddenly a car literally "came out of nowhere". Luckily since we were both driving so slow while turning that we were able to avoid a collision.
My old Montero had no pillar blind spot because the pillars were narrow enough to effectively see through them or past them but when I purchased a Jeep I nearly had many collisions approaching an intersection because another vehicle was approaching in such a manner as to remain in the blind spot. This was especially the case at night where only the headlights need to be blocked from view.
This is a surprisingly simple solution, which is bound to help out a lot. You can't just ignore the stop sign when you're required to turn
It's so cool of you to make a video showcasing this update, and even cooler that government actually did something about it. ❤
3:28 Why is the give way sign surrounded in a grey square box? I thought that one of the benefits of the give way sign, being the shape that it is, is that it is recognisable as a give way sign even if covered by snow etc.
It might be because of the signs on the other side of it, so their shape doesn't detract. Not sure though.
As a driving instructor myself all I can say is that every change that'll save lives in traffic is worth it. But DAMN, how can such a 'small' change cost HALF A MILLION?! That's crazy to me.
Every change that'll save lives, sooo... banning cars it is? ;-)
@@PetervdVeeken *Millions die as a result of our economy collapsing* "Haha oops :)"
Money Laundering
Probably a ridiculous amount of red tape to get through.
It really is expensive though. I know they're using asphalt and while I don't know the cost of it I did buy a 100kg bag of cement last week, it was 25 USD! Now consider the length, width, and depth of a road, pay the crew to level the terrain, the surveyors to mark the land, everything else... yeah it does make sense it'd cost that much. This is why governments have to be involved to make paved roads realities, only the wealthiest in the world would even be able to construct roads otherwise.
I did find a calculator and did a lot of number fudging, but I'm guessing they used maybe 350 to 400 tons of asphalt to make the new road... according to the internet it might've cost 30k for that much, so yeah maybe 500,000 is a lot lol. Still though, you've got to pay all those people however many weeks, get the machinery out there, dig up the old road. You could do it for less, but would the road be smooth, would it stand the test of time... sometimes doing things right isn't cheap heh
2:40 In tribute to the Original Tom Scott video, the blue car decides to do its own illegal maneuver on video
and the white car at 3:01
Great video, thank you. In fact, it feels so professional, it is like you are a reporter for a television station. All that's missing is the ticker tape and station logo : )
I know this is about an updated junction but the blue car at 2:41 caught my eye here. Interesting position for taking that turn there.
That said I can see how this change would be beneficial for all road users!
Yep. And ironically a cyclist approaching the t-junction to turn right would be in the A-pillar blind spot of that driver. Starting to wonder if driving isn’t for everyone.
Glad to see they've changed it. The stop signs were a flawed solution in a situation like this. I pointed this out at the time; to a certain extent, the average person doesn't follow rules without a reason they deem adequate.
In the case of a stop sign; a stop sign on a busy and/or complex junction is likely to be followed. The reason for the sign's presence is clear, as it's a tricky junction and it's wise to stop to make proper and complete observations.
This was absolutely not the case for this junction. The junction APPEARED to have absolutely perfect visibility, with a perfectly clear view of traffic approaching from every direction. The only exception to this apparent truth was the perfect blind spot which no-one could reasonably foresee. Of course, the whole point of a stop sign is that it's supposed to be an absolute, but given the perceived visibility, I think we can all understand why someone would see a perfectly clear junction in the middle of rural nowhere and choose to ignore the stop signs, that, to them; seem totally inexplicable.
Even road users that tend to follow the rules make exceptions like this where there is no apparent reason for the inconvenience. The solution they've used here is overkill, if anything. I think the problem could've been resolved simply by putting up some hedges to block off the long-range visibility of the junction, forcing drivers approaching the junction to slow down, and either come to a crawl, or stop at the junction to make observations. No-one will fly over a junction blind, but they will fly over a junction with clear visibility.
You don’t plant hedges in a nature reserve.
Sweet MR2
Watching this, another deadly intersection design comes to mind. Celebration, FL, a town planned and built by the Walt Disney Company in the 1990s, is at the southern end of World Drive (which goes through the whole of Disney World). And it is at this southern end of World Drive at the intersection of it and Celebration Blvd where the bad design is. Just south of it is a lake (nicknamed the Celebration Death Pond), and cars have zoomed so much that they've ended up in that lake because Disney initially didn't put any lights or any indication that there was a lake. Caused so much of a problem that the town built a big wall disguised as a Celebration welcome sign so crashes wouldn't happen. But even with this wall, they still do. Back in October 2021, a 32-year-old's car vaulted over the wall and into the lake, leading to her death.
Is there not a guardrail stopping cars from going into the lake if they aren't paying attention or am I picturing the layout incorrectly?
@@atomknight8361 Nope, just a white fence, the welcome sign, and that's it
Is the Road ends in 600ft sign and 35 mph speed limit sign new?
I feel like driving through a sign and into a lake is a skill issue on the driver's part.
@@Brave_SJ agreed. The only time I can think of when this is not the case is either ice (but in Florida that's not really a problem) or an oil slick or something similar.
In America I've had the same issue at 4-way intersections, where the right speed and angle leave an A-Pillar blind spot causing me to not see a vehicle coming towards me if I'm set up to turn left into traffic.
Changing road layouts is a great way to reduce accidents. Signs are all well and good but when the road physically restricts drivers that gets results.
I remember Tom's video on this.
It seems to me that the reason for the problem at this junction is that drivers think they have perfect visibility and so the stop sign seems to be totally out of place, and thus ignored.
Which makes me wonder if a cheaper fix for this junction would have been to make the reason obvious, by making it a totally blind junction by building a big wall!
that's a neat idea! i can't imagine anyone going through with that but you have to wonder if they at least thought about it
Ah, Ash and Tom Scott- two TH-camrs who managed to resist the lure of Established Titles ad money. Respect!
Especially as it seems to be a scam
Well done tom and everyone who was involved in this major change to actually saves lives.
I can't believe people were just running the stop sign though, that's completely alien to me!
Just an interesting additional point Tom makes which you don’t specifically state here; as you see in the clip at 2:12 the cyclist wouldn’t see the car approaching the junction as the car is behind the cyclist’s position. So as is often the case in clips you show where failings from two parties lead to incidents, there are two effects (bike hidden from driver behind A-pillar, and car hidden from cyclist due to car approaching from behind) which compound one another and increase the risk.
A car approaching from behind a cyclist and blowing through a stop sign, is not a failure on the part of the cyclist.
@@rob-c. Especially when the car has a stop sign.
@@rob-c. 100% agree, it’s not a failing on the part of the cyclist, rather a particular effect that compounds the risk in this case. It’s worth making the point because it shows that the cyclist _cannot_ reasonably take avoiding action here.
I watched Tom's video and when I did it is obvious why so many drivers just went straight over the junction, even with 'Stop' signs up.That old layout was asking to be abused and it was at the expense of cyclists. I would say it's money well spent 👍🏻
the problem is it's a quite road with nothing to obstruct visibility. Normally a good thing, but it makes drivers overconfident that the way is clear, no one would assume it's at all possible for a cyclist to remain in a blind spot for that long.
This is an exellent example of how signs don't define the traffic, road design does. If you build a road that allows comfortable travel at 100km/h, you can put as many 70 signs as you want, most will ignore it.
this junction is near me , been there many times , never had a problem with the old junction as i always stopped , but seen people scream staight through there (including bikes), so it needed to be done .
Great update to the junction but I do find it comical that the give way sign is now square. I thought the whole point of only having one sign as an upside down triangle shape was you could then make it out even when covered with snow - kinda defeats the purpose when you print it on a square signage no?
No doubt the options were considered, It's purpose is to be more noticeable against a dark background, but here I would imagine that there's a greater risk of sun glare as it's so exposed, more so than snow which on this road would render it passable only at slow speeds anyway, if at all.
So glad they've finally done it, this was one that got me on to Tom Scott the very day he released it.
However, many accidents occur due to the same type of cause, this problem is more likely with larger A pillars but hard to recognize when it happens.
I think it's because it's an advanced give way warning - the one at 2:40 is a GIVE WAY 100yds therefore if covered with snow, you wouldn't think it's a give way at that point.
I can't see it in the video, but hopefully the actual give way sign at the junction has the correct silhouette
@@xGeorge1337x The one at the junction is also rectangular. You can see it a number of times in the video, mostly from behind (therefore it's not obvious that it's the GIVE WAY sign, but it's the only sign there, and therefore it must be it), but there's a very clear one at 3:24.
@@misterflibble9799 Huh, thank you for correcting me. It really is just dumb then.
Since they made it rectangular, they should have added the yellow backing to the sign as it was an accident blackspot.
Yes I remember Tom's original video on this as well as a mention in a previous video of Ashley's. Good to see they have addressed this issue but a shame this whole costly redesign had to happen in the first place because drivers totally ignore Stop signs. You could say similar about traffic calming measures such as speed bumps and chicanes. All because some drivers want to drive too fast for the conditions, ultimately inconveniencing everyone by having to have these measures put in place.
Its funny how safety works, the heirarchy for most reliable ways to fix solutions is basically elimination > Engineering/built environment > organization rules > PPE > behavior. And that also usually the same order as decreasing costs so the cheapest solution is "don't fall in that bottomless pit" but the most effective solution is "don't have a bottomless pit in the first place".
Basically the most effective solution is to have the roads intersect at a perfect 90° or offest 2 perfect 90° T intersections. (In NY its legally required that all roads intesecting a state highway 90 onto it for this reason) However, the cheapest solution is for drivers to just obey traffic laws and actually stop and the stop sign, but this is also the least effect since humans are inperfect and someone will always ignore the sign. (Especially problematic in the UK where stopsigns are rare and not habitually obeyed)
In my country this become fixed by cops standing everyday for month and reduce cost of improvement to zero by ticketing Evey driver who ran stop sign.
@@mateuszzimon8216 they wouldn't do that in the USA or UK, I don't know the reason why in USA but in UK we don't have enough traffic officers anymore cos cameras are cheaper......after all, we can't possibly charge more council tax to make the roads safer, that's un-conservative and un- brexshitty.......and we're being "run" (apparently) by brexshitty cuntesrvatives....
@@iandennis7836 Even cheaper than cop, in Poland we have a truck equiped with pole and cameras. I think we used this tactics and week later they have enough money in tickets to get proper remodeling of crossroad.
Can't believe they just ignored the stop signs. Seems like a logical place to put a cop car just off the side of the road. I'm glad they fixed it. It just seems absolutely wild that they don't care at all about stop signs. As someone who lives in the state you always stop. Some state highways that intersect have stop signs on one or both roads and have a warning ahead of the stop sign to let you know you need to slow down. They do a similar thing with street lights as well.