A little perspective...

Yes folks, even I have room for a serious post now and then.

I'm often heard to rant (blog or otherwise) about the delights of my daily commute to Scunthorpe and back; it's not an exciting journey at the best of times.

The middle of January saw a significant chunk of the journey reduced to a single lane for essential re-surfacing of the M180 and replacing the central reservation barriers with concrete ones. No, I don't know either. Anyway, only a few weeks to go before it's over.

I also recently discovered completely by accident that the sliproad I use to get home has been closed for a few weeks for barrier repairs which means I have to go home through all of the town traffic in Scunthorpe. To say nothing of how much I love being in the town itself. Oh, I did - nothing.

Tonight, I crept out of the office a few minutes early to miss the traffic and found the A18 out of town somewhat more congested than usual. At this point I heard Sally Traffic on Radio 2 say that "there is major congestion around the M180 and the police advise that you avoid the area completely". Kind of difficult when it's the main thoroughfare home. As more reports came on the radio and I had not moved for 40 minutes, it became apparent that the entire area for several miles around had become gridlocked and showed little sign of clearing.

Ho-hum. I do know the surrounding areas quite well and while the thunder clouds were being held at bay, I thought I'd take the really scenic route and spent the next two hours traversing the winding country lanes across the wolds, encountering numerous more road repairs taking place. I do sometimes wonder if there's any truth in the rumour that the local councils and Highways Agency see the end of the fiscal year approaching, realise they have surplus budget left and dig like there's no tomorrow.

Anyway, I arrived home over two hours late and switched on my mobile to find to messages from well-wishing friends warning me of the delays (not that I had much choice but facing some of them), but I also found out that there was at least one fatality as a result of one of two major accidents that were at the root of it all.

So, despite the fact that there were hundreds of us silently raging inside our cars in the region this evening, I can't help but think of the people who are probably still waiting for someone to arrive home, thinking they are just running a couple of hours late...