Driving in Australia
A Wee Rant About Road Works
I’ll slow down… if there really are road works ahead.
Yes, yes, I know that roads need to be repaired regularly so they stay safe to drive on. I also know that we need to keep the guys and girls working on the roads safe and that we shouldn’t just roar through road works at our usual speed. However, there are times when seeing those “road works ahead” signs up ahead really makes me see red.
I particularly see red when I’m on my pushbike and the road works people have decided the bike lane is the best place to put out their warning signs, forcing me to either nip into the main stream of the traffic or onto the footpath. However, there are times that even when I’m behind the wheel of a car that those road works signs arouse my ire.
Not that I’m complaining about the road works themselves. I don’t mind slowing down when something’s actually going on or there really is something I need to take care with – lots of busy people, a single lane or stacks of loose gravel. If there’s one of those traffic controllers with a stop/go sign on a pole, I’ll give them a friendly smile and wave, or even say hello if I’m close enough – after all, traffic controlling work is one of the most mind-bogglingly boring jobs out there, although it’s probably better than it was 25 years ago, seeing as one could now probably listen to a podcast or audiobook on the smartphone through one ear. And I’d much rather see a real human employed for traffic control duty than one of those temporary traffic lights that keeps going at night and will hold up a huge line of cars for no reason whatsoever thanks to its internal programming.
The problem happens when the road works warning signs are the only type of road works out there.
You know how this scenario goes. You’re travelling along and you see one of those temporary warning signs on the road up ahead of you, so you slow down. However, as you get closer to where the signs are, what do you see? Do you see bulldozers and bitumen mixers? Do you see sweaty guys in high-viz with power tools jackhammering the road surface open? Is there a massive hole in the road or similar amusements?
Nope. The only thing that you can see is maybe a single road cone marking where the road works have been… and beside that sits a tiny little patch of loose gravel over where they’ve repaired a pothole. Alternatively, all you can see is a few spraypainted marks where they’re going to repair something. Or possibly, there’s a half-done kerb on the side of the road that they’re going to finish off when it’s stopped raining or when the weekend is over. Or the road works are taking place on a side road that intersects with the road you’re driving on (but don’t affect the road you’re driving on, except indirectly).
You have to ask yourself sometimes: are the warning signs the first things that they put up before beginning a job and the last things they take away? Honestly, I’m convinced that the road signs go up as soon as they’ve decided to fix something on the road and stay there until they’ve finished the paperwork to sign the job off after it’s done.
And then they wonder why people don’t like to slow down when they see those signs. Haven’t they all heard the fable of the boy who cried wolf? You’d think that they’re trying to condition us to ignore the road signs. I know for one that my reaction upon seeing those road signs is “What road works where?” I’m probably not the only one who gets into the very bad habit of not quite slowing down to the temporary speed limit when seeing these signs.
Dear road workers, us drivers appreciate all your hard work, we really do, and we don’t want to put you in danger. However, you guys need to do your bit. Let’s do a deal: you put the warning signs up when you’re actually working on the road, not three weeks beforehand, take them down when you’re finished and maybe even lay them facedown during the weekend if the road isn’t actually hazardous. It can’t take you that long to put them up and take them down. In return, we’ll pay much more attention to the signs and really will slow down to 80, 50 or 30 as the case may be, and we’ll probably be nicer to you when we drive past.
Particularly annoying road works signs I have seen over the years (with specific locations removed) include:
- The ones on a large chunk of main road that could only be fixed on a sunny day… and the road signs went out in the rainy season when sunny days were few and far between. They stayed there for at least three weeks with no sign of action on the roads before the work began. I’m not sure when they came down, because by that stage, I’d found an alternate route on a minor road.
- The traffic control light that stopped a major highway for ten minutes (I was counting) just so they could set up a line of road cones. Honestly, after having waited that long, I was expecting to see something major going on! Couldn’t they have maybe set them out in small batches rather than letting a long line of traffic build up?
- Not quite so annoying this time: the sign warning that road marking was going on ahead. We’d kind of guessed, as the tank of yellow paint had sprung a leak and there was a thin trail of yellow in the middle of the lane near some very new, very white centre lines.
Right, that’s my rant over. Now it’s your turn. What’s your worst experience with road works and pointless signs? Have a good old grizzle in the comments and let us sympathise with you.
Indicate, Mate. That'd Be Great.
In surveys of the things that annoy drivers, it’s always in the order of over eighty percent that respondents say people nott indicating that rates as an annoyance. Yet, in any city or town, in any Australian state or territory, you’ll find people that either use their indicators or use them correctly as being of the minority.
In NSW a very common transgression is not indicating when crossing a merge lane, along with non indicating when pulling away from the roadside. Here’s the legislation in NSW:
(2) The driver must give the change of direction signal for long enough to give sufficient warning to other drivers and pedestrians.
(3) If the driver is about to change direction by moving from a stationary position at the side of the road or in a median strip parking area, the driver must give the change of direction signal for at least 5 seconds before the driver changes direction.
In fact, the legislation even specifies what needs to be done: “How to give a left change of direction signal. The driver of a vehicle must give a left change of direction signal by operating the vehicle’s left direction indicator lights.” Naturally this applies for the right hand side of the car too. Note also the time requirement: at LEAST five seconds. Even more confusing is when to use an indicator if a road curves and also has an exit at the apex. Far too many DON’T indicate at the apex or actually indicate as they follow the road….and don’t need to indicate.
Complicated stuff, right? So why are there so many drivers that don’t indicate? Don’t indicate for more than one or two blinks? This also coincides with drivers wrestling their cars from lane to lane almost as if they’re being blown around like a leaf in the wind. Is there something wrong with a gentle, easy, merge along with enough indication?
Roundabouts are another bugbear and these, too, are easy to deal with.
(1) This rule applies to a driver entering a roundabout if:
(a) the driver is to leave the roundabout at the first exit after entering the roundabout, and
(b) the exit is less than halfway around the roundabout.
(2) Before entering the roundabout, the driver must give a left change of direction signal for long enough to give sufficient warning to other drivers and pedestrians.
(3) The driver must continue to give the change of direction signal until the driver has left the roundabout.
And:
(1) This rule applies to a driver entering a roundabout if the driver is to leave the roundabout more than halfway around it.
(2) Before entering the roundabout, the driver must give a right change of direction signal for long enough to give sufficient warning to other drivers and pedestrians.
(3) The driver must continue to give the change of direction signal while the driver is driving in the roundabout, unless:
(a) the driver is changing marked lanes, or entering another line of traffic, or
(b) the driver’s vehicle is not fitted with direction indicator lights, or
(c) the driver is about to leave the roundabout.
Note 2.Rule 117 deals with giving change of direction signals before changing marked lanes, or entering another line of traffic, in a roundabout.
Note 3. Rule 118 requires a driver, if practicable, to give a left change of direction signal when leaving a roundabout.
I could count on one finger the amount of times this is seen on our our roads. What’s more troubling about the lack of indication Aussie drivers do is just how SIMPLE it is to indicate. Cars are designed, engineered, and built with many factors of safety, including how easy it is to access the indicator stalk. They’re literally at your finger tips. So what causes drivers to not uses them? Pride? Arrogance? Stupidity? Laziness? Distracted whilst wearing earbuds (a stupidly non-illegal rule!)?
Clearing Up The Myths About Biodiesel
Biofuels are widely touted as being a solution to the dual problems of (1) limited fossil fuel supplies and (2) too many carbon emissions. In a nutshell, biodiesel is produced by taking crude oil from a source that isn’t a fossil fuel (i.e. not rock oil or petroleum oil) and doing all the chemical this and that to refine it so it can be used in our cars… or at least our diesel-fuelled cars.
However, there are a few rumours out there about biodiesel that are putting off a few people from giving it a go or adopting it.
Myth #1: Biodiesel will drive up food prices.
Facts: The thinking is like this: if we use, say, corn or sunflower oil to make biodiesel, this means that land that is currently used for growing food will be used to grow biodiesel feedstocks, which means there will be less food around, which means that food prices will go up. Even if crops aren’t competing for land, they may have to compete for fertiliser and water. This is a valid concern but we don’t have to choose between growing corn for our cornflakes and growing corn for oil. This is because biodiesel comes from a variety of sources. The good oil can be produced by algae that grow in septic tanks using grotty water that you’d never use on food crops. It can be harvested from the nuts of jatropha trees that grow on land that is no good for food crops. Waste oil and grease from fast food outlets (yep – all the oil from frying Kentucky Fried Chicken is good for making biodiesel) can be turned into biodiesel. They also use tallow sourced from animals – all the fatty bits that the butchers and slaughterhouse folk chop off a carcass because we don’t want to eat them can go for biodiesel as well as soap. I dare say that they could use the oils from the “fatbergs” found in sewers if they wanted to. It’s a case of being clever and using a range of sources to source the feedstocks for biodiesel, not just a few.
Just to throw a new twist into the food versus fuel debate, a lot of the corn grown in the US ends up as the ghastly corn syrup used to sweeten soft drinks and add to the obesity problem (corn syrup is also used to make the fake blood used in movies). Speaking for myself, perhaps it wouldn’t be a bad thing if we used less corn for making us fat and more for powering our cars!
Myth #2: Biofuel is still just an experimental fuel and hasn’t been tested properly.
Facts: There are whole scientific journals dedicated to biodiesel and biofuel research, covering everything from test cases looking at how well putting a fleet of buses onto biodiesel cuts emissions through to finding great new strains of algae that produce more biodiesel-suitable oil. So it’s certainly been tested and isn’t experimental. Of course research is ongoing – the same applies to methods of agriculture and medicine. Regarding whether it’s still a bit dodgy and uncertain whether you can put it in your vehicle, biodiesel had been tried out and it works just fine.
As a matter of fact, when Herr Diesel first invented the type of internal combustion engine that bears his name, he ran it on what we’d call biodiesel sourced from peanut oil. The engines had to be modified a little to take fossil fuel-sources diesel instead. So biodiesel is actually the older option and isn’t as new as you think.
Myth #3: You can only put biodiesel in a specially designed diesel engine.
Facts: While some car manufacturers – notably Mercedes-Benz about 10 years ago – trumpeted the fact that some of their models could run on biodiesel, the fact is that any diesel engine can run on biodiesel. However, it is true that because biodiesel is more of a solvent, it will loosen old deposits from the tank and pipes inside your engine, which means that you’ll have to check and change the filters more often at first if you make the switch to biodiesel. Apart from this initial clogging issue, any diesel engine can run on biodiesel. You can use biodiesel straight (known as B100) or a blend, depending on what’s available and what takes your fancy.
Cars that were made before 1993 can have problems with biodiesel, as the rubber pipes can’t handle this. If you like the idea of biodiesel and have an older model vehicle (and don’t want to take the opportunity to upgrade to a new car), then replacing the rubber hoses will do the job.
Obviously, you can’t run a petrol engine on biodiesel. Owners of petrol-powered cars should look at ethanol and ethanol blends if they want a biofuel alternative to fossil fuels.
Myth # 4: Using biodiesel puts out just as much exhaust and pollution as regular diesel, so you’re not actually cutting down on emissions by using biodiesel.
Facts: For a start off, when it comes to cutting down on carbon dioxide emissions and other greenhouse gases, remember that producing the oils for biodiesel tend to come from plants and algae (and some animal fats in the case of waste oil from food outlets). While the algae or the corn plants or the jatropha trees are growing the oil-bearing seeds, they are quietly using the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, so across the whole lifecycle of the biodiesel, this does mean fewer emissions and a smaller carbon footprint than fossil fuel-based biodiesel.
Secondly, a few tests run in the USA found that biodiesel exhaust doesn’t contain as many nasties so it burns cleaner. As far as I can make out, it’s kind of like the difference between wood smoke and coal smoke. Biodiesel exhaust doesn’t have as many sulphates, hydrocarbons or carbon monoxide, or as much particulate matter. This means that biodiesel reduces the amount of black smoke coming out of your diesel engine.
Some people claim that the exhaust fuel from cars running on biodiesel smells like hot chips and makes them feel hungry, especially if the biodiesel in question has been recycled from the stuff from fast food deep frying vats.
Myth #5: Biodiesel lowers your car’s performance.
Fact: OK, this one does have some basis in truth. If you put in 100% biodiesel into your engine, it won’t perform quite as well as if you used 100% petrodiesel or a petro-bio diesel blend. However, we’re only talking a 5–10% reduction in performance. This means that you will notice a difference out on the race track or if you’re pushing your car to the limit – or possibly towing a very heavy load. However, for the average run about town picking up the groceries, dropping off the kids and going to work, you won’t really notice the difference.
My suggestion for a compromise here would be to use a petro-bio blend when towing but straight biodiesel for everyday driving.
The Splatometer.
Some of us might be familiar with the car care product “Bugger Off” – a really useful product that cleans insect splatter off the front of your car with ease. In Australia there still seems to be plenty of insect life around but wildlife experts have been warning about the decline in insects for decades. I’m not sure if you’ve noticed any decline in bug splatter on your windscreen over the last decade or so?
In areas of intensive agriculture, more-so cropping, the use of wide scale insecticides has diminished insect numbers. Vast areas of the Australian Outback doesn’t have this problem, with little cropping present in remote areas. But, where crop farming is intense, the use of insecticides is definitely reducing the total insect population. The fall in insect numbers in Britain has reached troubling numbers that even motorists are noticing that their windscreens are clear of squashed beetles, flies, moths etc. In Britain, a trip in the middle of summer once required the cleaning of the front window regularly, but now the glass is largely clear. Richard Acland, of Chepstow, in Monmouthshire, Britain said he believed insecticides on crops were wiping out the world’s insect life, adding: “This is why cars are not bug-splattered anymore.” Entomologists actually call it ‘the windscreen phenomenon,’ and statistical surveys reveal that the phenomenon has been noticed across Europe.
After extrapolating data from a mile of highway in Ontario, a researcher from Laurentian University, Canada calculated that hundreds of billions of pollinating insects were probably being killed by vehicles each year in North America. She suggested that the increase in vehicle numbers is also contributing to the decline in worldwide insect populations.
Another research institute in Harpenden, England, has monitored insect populations using traps across the UK for more than 50 years and there has been evidence that insect numbers have really declined. Experts mostly blame intensive agriculture and the use of pesticides over the past 50 years being attributed to this occurrence. They did point out, however, that the loss of insects from vehicle windscreens is well-noted but actually demonstrating it is tricky.
In 2004 motorists were asked to attach a ‘splatometer’ to the front of their cars – a piece of PVC film to collect insects, to see if they were declining. The results showed that there were 324,814 ‘splats’ recorded, which worked out to be an average of one squashed insect every five miles. It would be beneficial to run another of these experiments to see if numbers have declined further or not. One thing that might throw the data, however, is the increased aerodynamic shapes of new cars travelling the roads. The reality that cars have changed shape over time, and are now far more aerodynamic, would also result in fewer insects actually being hit squarely on the windscreen and causing a splat.
Cars and insecticides are an insect’s nightmare. Less insecticides and more shapely cars has to be a good thing for life on planet earth! Have you noticed less insect splats?
Level 2, 9 Help Street