Fresh calls for a switch to metric road signs

[Gilps]

Personally speaking, anything likely to both confuse and annoy Murph can only be a good thing.

 

Little Englander Annoyance Scheme

 

Call for metric road sign switch

 

Campaigners hope metric signs will be in place for the 2012 Olympics

 

Britain should set an early date for converting its road signs from miles to kilometres, a report by the UK Metric Association says.

 

The imperial signs are a "confusing" exception as most of the UK officially operates in metric measures, it claims.

 

It says conversion would make it easier to calculate fuel consumption and enable more finely tuned speed limits.

 

However, the government insists it has no plans to make the switch, which would be a "waste of taxpayers' money".

 

The UKMA says conversion of road signs was originally intended as part of metrification when it started in 1965 and should have been completed by 1973.

 

But it was put on hold in 1970 and never restarted.

 

Irish example

 

UKMA chairman Robin Paice said: "The Irish have shown how easily, safely, and economically it can be done. The British government should just get on with it."

 

Ex-Labour leader Lord Kinnock, who is backing the report, says the UK's imperial signs contradict its modern image.

 

In an introduction to the report, he says: "Our imperial road signs are perhaps the most obvious example of the muddle of measurement units in the United Kingdom.

 

"They contradict the image - and the reality - of our country as a modern, multicultural, dynamic place where the past is valued and respected and the future is approached with creativity and confidence."

 

He said the conversion could be completed in time for the 2012 Olympics if the report's recommendations were followed.

 

But the AA Motoring Trust said a "key flaw" in any planned conversion lay in the fact that car speedometers still mainly measured miles per hour.

 

Paul Watters, head of roads and transport policy at the trust, said: "A move to make UK road signs metric will take far longer than five years.

 

"Any precipitous changeover will create confusion, danger and anger, particularly where misunderstanding leads to prosecution for road traffic offences, such as speeding."

 

The trust said a solution could be to have signs showing both measurements during a transition period of a number of years.

 

A spokeswoman for the Department of Transport said it had "absolutely no plans" to change the signs - a move which she said would cost several million pounds.

[Des]

Gimme a P! Gimme a C! Gimme a G! Gimme an M!

[matty]

I don't actually see the point of this.

[Stevie H]

it's yet another nail in the coffin of the great british independence. first it was camembert, then stella artois, then volkswagen, one by one our great british traditions are being chiselled away.

[Noel Street]

I don't actually see the point of this.

 

i think the point is at the end of a eurocrats dagger stuck firmly in murphs back

[Cobs]

I think we should rename them the Score and Dozen Olympics and tell Kinnock to F*ck off!

[matty]

i think the point is at the end of a eurocrats dagger stuck firmly in murphs back

 

Any sharp object would be appreciated, that's for sure.

 

if everyone just remembered that a kilometre is 5/8 of a mile, there'd be no need to change the signs.

[Guest sniffer]

I think we should rename them the Score and Dozen Olympics and tell Kinnock to F*ck off!

 

Anything suggested by that two-time loser Kinnock deserves all the derision it gets.

[Tosh]

Great

 

More excuses to dole out speeding fines

[Kvarme Ate My Food]

f*** that

 

it'll almost double the length of my journey to Liverpool

[SkippyjonJones]

I'm scared. what'll happen to my air miles?

[Eskimo]

Something in one of the papers saying the cost could be as high as £70-80m to replace all road signs....Personally I could think of better uses for the money..

[Spion kop]

it does make liverpool futher away form manchester though.

[stressederic]

Something in one of the papers saying the cost could be as high as £70-80m to replace all road signs....Personally I could think of better uses for the money..

 

Me to.

 

That said most of mine involve boats, jets, and a race around the world.

[Falconhoof]

They did it in a certain state of Australia, can't remember if it was Tazmania or Queensland. Anyway, they decided to just leave the signs as they are but say the numbers were now Km rather than miles. The journey still takes the same time.

[Spike]

there's a fella round our way that makes his own additions to signs and all of them say Duckboy and then give an approximate distance to where Duckboy lives from the sign

[Benitez]

there's a fella round our way that makes his own additions to signs and all of them say Duckboy and then give an approximate distance to where Duckboy lives from the sign

 

 

First the stories about the wierd kids at your school....and now this

[Spike]

I escaped lightly methinks

[Guest Ant]

Im sure der wer plans to switch Metric in 2010

[fyds]

it's yet another nail in the coffin of the great british independence. first it was camembert, then stella artois, then volkswagen, one by one our great british traditions are being chiselled away.

Did you know as part of war reparations after WWII, Britain was offered VW and the already designed beetle - and turned it down. 'No-one will ever buy an ugly car like that' said Lord Beaverbrook...Gawd bless 'im....t**.

 

KMPH would be good - annoy Murph and other silly buggers and stop European Lorry Drivers having accidents on the A2/M2 as they leave Dover.