Drivers cause the gridlock

THE M.E.N. report regarding gridlock on Regent Road in Salford is both educational and ‘laughable.’

Might I point out that, when drivers complain about being stuck in traffic - they are the traffic.

Also, the UK harbours (on footpaths, highways, byways, and motorways; car parks; forecourts; showrooms etc) enough motor vehicles to stretch, bumper-tobumper, from Manchester to the (melting) North Pole, three-abreast, ie a motorway to global warming.

Craig Kenny, who drives from Salford to Prestwich (three miles?) rants: “I had to crawl back, it took me 40 minutes. It is like the traffic in Mumbai - it is barmy.”

Then, Dr Natalie Brunt, driving from Chorlton towards MediaCity, (Salford Quays), said: “It took me 55 minutes to get from one end of Regent Road to the other.”

What is barmy is that drivers habitually complain about the restructuring of the UK’s roads, which have essentially been designed (necessity being the mother of invention) to stop our cities becoming like Mumbai: ranked, fourth most polluted megacity in the world, where nine in 10 people breathe bad air.

Surely, every ‘sick-to-death’ driver, not least Dr Brunt, knows that between 28,000 and 36,000 people die in the UK every year, from breathing ‘bad air.’

As for Mr Kenny taking 40 minutes to crawl back, 45 years ago it would take me no more than 40 minutes to cycle 11 miles from Radcliffe (past Salford Quays) to Ashburton Road, Trafford Park, with a fastest time of 29-minutes. And, under 25 minutes to cycle from Manchester Cathedral to Radcliffe Cenotaph/Town Hall. Member of Lancashire RC, cycling club, aged 70