Coventry City Council ditch traffic lights at busy ring road junction

The layout at the junction of Radford Road and the ring road has been changed to improve traffic flow



Traffic lights at one of the busiest junctions on the ring road have been removed for good.

On the roundabout underneath junction nine of the ring road, four sets of traffic lights have been turned off to improve traffic flow.

All traffic signals were removed after a trial period back in May, despite complaints made by pedestrians and it being made harder to cross the road.

The traffic lights at the junction of Radford Road and the ring road have caused tailbacks during rush hour which sometimes stretched back past Barrs Hill School, causing queues to get on to the ring road.

But now, it is hoped the new road layout will improve traffic flow.

A council spokesman said: “Following a request to look at how traffic flow could be improved at this specific junction we undertook a trial switch off to see the impact on the road network around junction nine (especially Radford Road).

“The following measures were implemented on May 18, 2016 for the trial switch off of signals at junction nine of the ring road in the city centre:

• The Traffic Signals and pedestrian crossing signals were switched off
  
• Signal heads and push buttons were bagged up
  
• ‘all out’ boards were put up on the primary poles

“All the signals were switched off until Monday, May 23. During this period Urban Traffic Control received a high number of calls from pedestrian complaining how difficult it was to cross the slip roads.

“However, the traffic flow was considerably improved with no signals in place.

“Therefore, the decision was made to remove the traffic signals but retain the signalised pedestrian crossing facility at the slip roads.

“This had still improved traffic flows at this junction and provides pedestrians with a safe route to cross the slip roads.”

Let's hope that this 'improvement' works better than many others that CCC have been responsible for over the last few years.