White Lines

  

White Lines

Did you know white lines were ‘invented’ by the Romans who would place white painted stones in the middle of carriageways in busy market towns to control traffic? 

Whatever did the Romans do for us, eh? 

It was ‘re-invented’ at the advent of urban congestion in early Victorian times. Believe it or not London, Norwich, York and Bristol were so congested due to lack of lane discipline, there were queues through the busy centres.

The use of white lines has moved on somewhat since then. 

Solid white lines should never be crossed on a motorway, nor hatched areas. 

But wait. The hard shoulder has a solid white line. And service vehicles park on hatched refuges for safety.

Solid white lines should never be crossed on highways either. Well, the central white line shouldn’t, those in the channels and those outlining hatched areas only outline a feature. Oh and hatching on highways can be crossed too.

Confusing? Well you probably work in the industry, so have at least a basic understanding of it. Imagine the average driver.

But do we really need all these white lines? Currently I wonder whether local authorities all got bought a ‘Whitelining machine’ by Santa over the past couple of years. Wherever there’s an empty black space, it gets filled with hatching. Have a look and ask yourself, ‘Is that needed?’ or ‘What are they trying to advise me?’ After all, hatching on most roads are advisory, and do not stand-up in courts as a mandatory direction under regulations.

What is the point of this hatching?

Why is a traffic lane filled with hatching?

Then, imagine all the way back to Victorian times. White lines were put down to allow persons to pass on each other’s right-hand side. So we’ve had 4 or 5 generations to learn about white lining. It’s in our psyche. So do we need all of them? Certainly hatching in the middle of roads is not needed unless it’s advising you of a right turn bay coming up. It should not be used to separate opposing traffic as the hatched area becomes a no-mans-land, and could be used by both vehicles at the same time travelling towards each other. In Poole hatching is not used on approaches to central refuges, and it looks very smart and tidy – and works. In Wiltshire, on low speed straight roads, no central markings are used, and it slows vehicles down.

We know what side of the road to drive on. Even the ‘Johnny Foreigner’ understands it. Having no white lines slows vehicles down, and brings back eye contact and human interaction. Sure you’ll get the odd idiot who may crash, but we shouldn’t always design for those with a lack of driving skills or common sense.

So let’s try and encourage councils to take up white lines, or at least when they resurface, to redesign or at least reconsider whether all the white lines need replacing. 

Let’s follow Wiltshire and Poole’s examples, it looks nicer, and slows vehicles down, and no one wanders onto the wrong side of the road wondering where to drive.

Well there’s probably always one. Line or no line!

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New Group Structure

New Group Structure

Find The Engineer is proud to announce it has been merged into First National Recruitment Group Ltd.

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Call 0845 021 2-4-6-8 

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Interview With Bloodhound SSC

Interview with Bloodhound SSC

Find The Engineer Presents the 1000mph Car!

    

The British have held the land speed record for 70 of the 112 years of its existence. These cars epitomise the highest possible levels of technology for their age and the very high speeds achieved represent true pioneering and engineering excellence. The current record is held by Richard Noble’s Thrust SSC driven by Andy Green. Now, there is a new challenger from Bristol who is looking to break his own record. Richard Noble, again, is heading up the Bloodhound SSC project.

Find The Engineer’s Mark Ralph caught up with long time friend Mark Elvin, who has worked in the past for Westland Helicopters, Williams F1 team and then designed race transporters for F1. Now a Bloodhound design engineer, Mark is designing many parts of the vehicle including its famous fin.

“This is by far the best job I’ve ever had. It’s truly mad! It uses all your brainpower and knowledge as an engineer to overcome huge hurdles on aerodynamics as well as looking to keep the vehicle as light as possible lightweight and on budget – which varies.”

The Thrust SSC car driven by RAF pilot Andy Green was the first land vehicle to break the sound barrier, establishing the first ever supersonic land speed record at 763.035mph in October 1997. A record which still stands.

Richard Noble who ran the Thrust SSC project decided to build the Bloodhound SSC to break his own record stop the Americans from taking it & above all, to act as a showcase for engineering as a career “You see”, continues Mark “1000mph on land is the next Concorde moment”.

The car is named after the Bristol Bloodhound missile, which could do over Mach1 in 2.6 seconds from takeoff & shares the same chief aerodynamicist, Ron Ayers.

As an iconic engineering programme it is run through schools, with the hope it will stimulate a new generation of engineers. “I have been to auto shows and events, including my daughters’ school and the excitement from everyone you talk to is immense.”

The research element of the programme to produce the first 1000mph car has taken far longer to develop than expected but now the Bloodhound team has a safe and viable design for the world’s first 1000mph 133,000hp car.

With companies, schools, universities and colleges taking part, the team plans to build and roll-out in late 2013, UK runway testing early 2013 in preparation for low speed test runs in South Africa late 2014 (up to 850mph, taking a new land speed record in the process) & the full fat, 1000mph runs during 2015.

The car (yes it has four wheels and a steering wheel – of sorts), uses a formula 1 car engine just to power its rocket oxidizer pump, a hybrid rocket  and an EJ200 jet engine from a Typhoon fighter plane, but the Bloodhound SSC shape is completely different to anything seen before. The car needs to minimise the cross-sectional area to minimise drag, whilst remaining ‘lift neutral’ at all speeds to ensure the car stays safely on the ground.

“In the design, packaging of all the components including Andy (the driver) has been a difficult issue. He and his cockpit have ended up just under the EJ200 intake, with the cockpit external shape being a part of the all important intake shock management structure. Andy has lost out on comfort value there, but that’s one of the compromises that have been necessary in developing a Mach 1.4 car.”

Land-speed record cars have had big fins to ensure good stability. But too much fin means a car which will severely be affected by increased drag and not enough fin means that the car will be directionally unstable. The designers believe that Bloodhound SSC will have excellent directional stability.

So will they do it? If you spend a short time with any of the team you will be convinced they will easily break 1000mph. “My only worry is not if we will reach 1000mph, but what I will do after this. Where can you go from here?”

Good point Mark, so what do you do when you’re not travelling the UK or making the fastest car in the world?

“It’s difficult to unwind, but normal stuff. Sleep! Beating you on the Xbox, swimming, cycling, be a husband to a lovely wife & being a taxi in a normal car, to my two lovely daughters.”

The Bloodhound SSC team are touring the UK and were based near the SS Great Britain in Bristol – in a shed! Now they are in large premises in Avonmouth near the Severn. 

Visit their website for updates. www.bloodhoundssc.com

Call us today on 0845 021 2-4-6-8

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