I’m impressed. To be honest, it’s rare I find myself praising the ‘paperworked to within an inch of their life’ police.
Even the top blokes that caught the evil little swines who broke into my flat did so more by luck than judgement.
So hats off to the Volvo patrol car driving up the M23 a few weeks back, addressing a bugbear that dates back further than my driving licence and one that’s been the subject of countless rants in the pub, in email conversations and in previous blogs.
Said Volvo would cruise up behind drivers committing the most irritating of automotive crimes, give the a little flick of blue light and then, when the driver had shifted left out of the way, pull in front with the flashing pixelated message ‘USE CORRECT LANE’.
It completely and utterly made my night. Because the patrol car was speeding up to the next ‘victim’ (a word I use laced with irony as anyone too dumb or arrogant to follow the highway code doesn’t deserve victim status), then slowing down to make a point, I could see it happening time and time again from my cruise-controlled 70mph position in the correct lane. It was heart-warming to see a focus on bad driving that causes congestion, irritation, increased journey times and in extreme cases road rage.
I’d have liked to see a fleet of half-a-dozen Battenberg-styled Volvos pulling over the worst middle-lane offenders and pointing out the error of their ways, maybe even with the addition of a fine for driving without due care and attention for failing to spot that big wide lane they should have been using.
So well done to Sussex Police for a little bit of common-sense education.
