Inconvenienced by the temporary lights on the Ridgeway

Network Rail were busy clearing vegetation from the railway bridge and repointing the stonework.

They were allowed to have these lights outside the rush hour.

On Monday last week I drove northwards over the ridge in the morning and there was a short northbound queue and a huge queue in the other direction stretching back to way beyond the signalman's house, now called Swallows Rest.

On Tuesday morning I thought it best to go via Martinstown.

On Wednesday morning I joined the northbound queue short of The Royal Standard and once through the lights I realised there was no southbound queue at all!

When I returned in the afternoon, lo and behold, I did not stop at all, straight through on a green light and passed a long, long northbound queue.

Obviously the lights urgently needed readjusting.

So I rang the County Hall number under 'traffic lights' and a very pleasant lady told me that it was Network Rail's responsibility and she would have a word with the project manager.

I went over the ridge again today and the two queues seemed to be about the same length and the green light was lasting for 40 seconds in each direction.

It does seem to me that there needs to be a better check on these temporary lights when put up on such a key road.

I have been frustrated in the past when lights have been put up giving a green for only 15 seconds in each direction causing enormous jams.

There have been examples of lights in Preston and on the Portland Beach Road causing tailbacks into Weymouth when there was no queue in the opposite direction.

So thank you nice lady at County Hall, but who do we ring out of hours when these lights go wrong?

Terry Putnam, Springfield Road, Weymouth.