Broad Lane / A45 Junction

One man in hospital after three-car smash

I passed through it today, not pleasant! Even though the lights are on green you need to proceed as though there are no lights and be on the lookout all the time. I don't know who this is supposed to benefit? Maybe the council can't get hold of any buildings to demolished so they decided to start attacking the road system. The thought of doing it in rush hour traffic as a cyclist is not nice.

I must say, I passed through this junction four times over the weekend (twice Saturday and again Sunday) and although I approached with some trepidation, it went well. I don't know whether the sequence of the lights have been changed but it appeared to me, travelling on the A45 to/from the Birmingham direction, that while the lights were in my favour, traffic coming round the island to my right had been halted by further lights on the island. Maybe others might be able to comment on their journeys?

Tony S, Same as you we passed through a few times last weekend from all sides with no trouble other than waiting for the lights to change, I've one of them small cameras that fits at the back of the car mirror to record you journey all the time in short clips there's 4 clips here of the A45 as we passed through on the way to the Crem if anyone would like to look

I was travelling Broad Lane/Broad Lane.

At about 1:30pm this afternoon there was just a standstill of traffic leading back to at least the Windmill turn-off by Allesley Park. Used to only see that very occasionally at rush hour when there had been a crash on the M6 or something. Been a common occurrence since they changed it, though I had put some of it down to the work. Used to use the Buckingham Rise entrance to get onto A45 all the time. Not gone near it for a few months now - quicker to go round the back and come out by Sainsbury's.

Hi all I was listening to one of our members, speaking on Breakfast wireless this morning with Annie Othen. It is also my opinion that a green light that does not mean clear is an unsafe compromise. The councillor Ann Lucas, made reference to motorists should not be driving on "Auto Pilot". That itself makes the provision of the traffic lights nonsensical, as that is exactly what they are designed to do. We are used to having to wait to turn right off traffic lights for clearance, but most of us are used to that, but even that manoeuvre is a cause of many accidents. We are a tick-box natured society nowadays, so I am a great believer that red should mean stop & green should mean go. No compromise please, Anne Lucas! Only my opinion, but road junctions in general is one area where we should be able to rely on the maximum degree of auto-pilot. That is the whole purpose of traffic lights at junctions. I don't mean driving with our eyes shut, but to be given a green light when the exit is not clear is fraught with risk. Maybe Ann Lucas might benefit if she was to work with a team of risk-management, as well as understanding "Critical Path Analysis". PS Oh, by the way, when is the Ricoh station going to open, Ann, after telling us that it would be opened before Christmas on the same breakfast show several months ago? I have added that question/comment so as to demonstrate that what you tell us is unreliable, Ann Lucas!

I agree. The whole point is supposed to be to make the junctions as easy to traverse as possible by removing as many potential problems and hazards as possible leaving a driver to concentrate on a few core things. This is not 'driving on auto-pilot'. The argument seems to be "if we make it more complicated the safer it will be because drivers will be concentrating more" which is a total nonsense. For most people driving is a means to an end. Something that has to be done, often when you're tired and weary either going to work early or on the way home. Often people have kids in the car and they can ruin your concentration just on their own! There are so many islands in Coventry where lanes don't actually go anywhere - they just circle round and round the island - and ones where peoples lane discipline is awful. RRJ3 springs instantly to mind. I did suggest turning into the 'rainbow roundabout' - each lane given a different colour to make it clear which lane goes where.

The worst thing about the council's theory is that they are using this junction as a live laboratory experiment with human lives.

No Osmiroid the island has been constructed because hospitals are in need of organ donors (no Philip not that sort of organ)

Changes to be made - Telegraph report

It is my considered opinion, that if that woman had a brain, she'd be dangerous. Sadly, I suspect that she might just be being lined up to replace that other harridan Lucas. - May God help us if she does!

A lot has been mentioned of driver error at the new roundabout, but it should be remembered that nobody "only" drives at this junction and the same drivers manage to safely negotiate the other junctions in and around Coventry. In the same way that good design can reduce accidents, bad design can increase their likelyhood. It should be remembered that no driver is perfect and sees everything all the time. Good design minimises the lielihood and consequences of driver error. With this in mind I have had a look at the design of the junction:- Department for Transport "Local Transport Note 1/09" states that: " 3.1.2 It should be noted that very small roundabouts (including mini and compact roundabouts as described in TD 16/07 Geometric Design of Roundabouts (HA, 2007)) are not suitable for signalisation, but successful designs have been prepared for normal roundabouts with inscribed circle diameters as small as 50 metres". The inscribed circle diameter is the outside diameter of the roundabout carriageway, which at the A45/Broad Lane junction I estimate varies between 27 and 41m due to the oval shape of the roundabout. I estimate that traffic making a right turn onto Broad Lane will only see the traffic lights on the roundabout 20m before the stop line (actually less as they are hooded). This is less than the stopping distance of 23m at the (temporary) speed limit of 30mph. The stopping distance at a more reasonable 20mph is 12m which only leaves one second for the driver to spot the traffic lights before they have to respond to them. This is on a roundabout where the driver is expecting under normal conditions to have priority and will be concentrating on the other traffic. They won't necessarily be looking for the lights. I think there is something fundamentally wrong with the roundabout design, as is evidenced by the accident rate, and that unfortunately the Council will be forced into a re-design at the ratepayers expense. As an aside - Why does the roundabout have "Give Way" signs and a double dashed line at the Broad Lane entrances rather than the official single dashed line? Peter.

Hi all Maybe we expect too much of our elected councillors. My comments have been critical of Rachel Lancaster, but she is not a civil engineer. She wants to improve scenarios of our living, but restricted by funding restraints, relying on info that she has been given. True, I have heard her voicing herself on local wireless, where what she said has not happened, but that might not be her fault, but maybe she needs to hit hard on those that have misled her & expose them.

I agree - people do expect too much of councillors and politicians. But that's because people (include the politicians themselves) believe the illusion that they have power. They're essentially there to the spokesperson and public face, and the scapegoat if necessary. It's much easier to vent frustration at a panto villain than have to look into the incredibly complex inner-workings. Would you really put someone with no history, background or training of economics in charge of the entire financial and economic future of your company? Or someone without a knowledge of planning and design in charge of that department? Or a non-military person in charge at the MoD, giving them the keys to all manner of hardware. And any of these people can then be swapped around or replaced willy nilly on the whim of an individual? Of course you wouldn't. It's easier to blame the monkey, while the organ grinder hides in the shadows without anyone having any idea they're even there.