Traffic light signals in Coventry

Where were the first traffic lights installed in Coventry? Travelling to school in the fifties, I can remember them at Gosford Green, Far Gosford St, & I can remember them being installed at the junction of Clay Lane & Walsgrave Rd, replacing the halt sign. Traffic lights have encroached upon us almost like robots. I remember junctions in Coventry that were regularly controlled by a policeman on point duty, like at the top of Bishop St., & sometimes at the bottom of Warwick Rd. Please be gentle with your replies, as I am retiring for the second time at the end of this month. Someone once said that getting old is when there is more to look back on than there is to look forward. I hope they were wrong! I love reading the posts on this lovely site.

I don't know where the first traffic lights were, but I'm sure there was a roundabout at the Holyhead which was replaced by traffic lights maybe in the fifties. I also remember the policeman in his black & white box at the top of Bishop Street. When I was about 10, I used to approach the busy junction on my bike, he would stop all traffic and wave me over to his box. He'd chat for a minute or two then stop the traffic again so I could continue. I hope you have a happy second retirement Philip - with lots to look forward to!

Two of the first sets of traffic lights that I can remember were on Barras Lane at the junctions with Holyhead Road and Hill Street/Coundon Road/Abbotts Lane. They were there around about 1950, certainly before the point duty policemen at Warwick Road and Bishop's Street were replaced. The ones at the Holyhead road junction had a box on a pole at the rear of the pavement on the North East corner inscribed with the word "REVO". If you opened it there was a manual control button, preusmably to allow police overide control. If you pressed it, the lights would change. Not bad for a seven year old schoolboy! I also remember that the set at the junction with Barras Lane and Spon Street/Windsor Street was certainly there before 1952. I remember going into town on the Number 5 Coundon bus before 1949, but I don't remember any traffic lights. There may have been some, but I don't recall any. However, I was only four then, so I might have missed them.

Spon Street/Barras Lane/ Windsor Street junction looking towards town from Spon Street:

A brilliant picture, Dutchman! It's just as I remember. You can see how busy the traffic was.

That photograph brings back some memories for me, Dutchman. From 1959 to 1969, I lived in a flat above Green's Chemist in Spon End. I worked at Alfred Herbert Ltd, and every evening and at lunchtime on Saturdays, I would catch the bus into town and then walk home along Spon Street.

Thank you all so much to you all for your replies so far. The picture is brilliant. I remember a bus conductor telling me that bus crews had requested traffic lights to be installed at several locations in the late fifties, but had been told that just a simple set of lights for a junction would cost over £6k even in those days. Picking up on a comment from Greenman, the chemists called Green's, was that the same chemist called Green's that had a shop at the very end of Hertford St., near to Warwick Rd. church? I bought a reflecting telescope from Green's in 1965.

The same Green's as the camera shop in Market Way

Thank you so much.

Here's a question: With the recent removal of traffic lights at various junctions in the city centre, is it now possible to drive from somewhere on the city boundary to the city centre without encountering any traffic lights? ps. I don't have an answer. pps. By city centre, I mean either the Council House, Cathedral, Trinity Street or the market roof car park. Also pedestrian crossing lights don't count.