h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

You always seem to get stuck behind a refuse truck, school bus, or old man wearing a hat when you are late for work and trying to make up time on the drive in to the office.

that's the time when your car doesn't even start up, or when it does, it starts to snow or you run into a road block...

Don't forget that the length of the delay, from whatever cause (slow driver, bad weather, traffic jam) is directly proportional to how late you are already. That is, the later you are to start off with, the longer the delay.

In addition, the road itself alters according to your personal condition. The potholes become wider and deeper in direct proportion to the amount of urine in your bladder

i'm certain also that some roads are tidal. that is, they are longer or shorter depending on the time/date. in particular i'm thinking of the M5 in somerset england, which i drive up and down frequently.

i originally thought it was longer sw than ne. but the tide theory seems stronger...

Any alternate route chosen to avoid said delay will create a longer trip than just putting up with the delay.

Also, the "Other Lane" only remains faster untill you finally merge into it.

There will also only be oncoming traffic preventing overtaking when the road is straight. On the bendy bits, there will be no traffic coming the other way at all.

Also, there are 'No Overtaking' signs or road markings when the road is clear

>i'm certain also that some roads are tidal

I don't know about tidal, but I seem to recall that somebody has done research into motorway traffic, and found that it obeys the laws of waves - you know, the situation where the traffic is slow and bunched together, and then becomes faster and more spaced out...? I have noticed this quite often - especially on the M25!!

AndyF

If you are driving on a dual carriageway (particularly at night) and are the only car for miles, you will invariably catch up with a slow moving 40 ton lorry just as the road becomes single carriageway and no overtaking!!!

Did you guys ever hear of Murphys law?

Furthermore, if you risk life and limb by driving like a maniac and getting past the lorry JUST before the road turns back into a single carriageway, there will be another one just round the next bend.

when you loose something and you know that you've only lost it around the house and that it'll eventually turn up so you don't buy a new 'whatever' and then it's been 3 damn weeks and still no sign of it so you think maybe it was lost else where, so you go and buy a replaement and take it home and then you use it for the first time, second time thus rendering it impossible to return to the shop.. and then the one you lost turns up in a place you swore you looked in.

My Dad used to swear there was a secret society of tractor, milk float, hippy bus, caravan etc drivers whose duty in life was to place themselves at the front of queues of traffic having prizes for the longest line they could form.

I thought this was just fanatasy till I moved to my current home.

On the way to work there is a two mile strech of sort of dual carriage way, going to work whilst seperate from the on-coming twolane side, it is only single lane ie no overtaking (cept nutter bikers like me) frequently there will be tailbacks. On my bike I can get to the front and often it's a tractor doing 5 mph. BUT and here's the proof often in the opposite, oncoming carriage way is a tractor doing 20-30 mph.

I am convinced that they see if the can cause a traffic jam, turn round do the two mile stretch and re-join their own jam.

CH

I ride a motorbike, and never, ever see a policeman, until the first time I go to the corner shop without a helmet on.