Porter Ponders: Is Wigan congestion deliberate?

It has been reported that Wigan has one of the worst congestion issues in the country. Is this deliberate, if you drive through the lights and past the Range heading to Tesco you are stationary at each set of lights rather than moving on. The solution is not rocket science, change the timing on the lights so as to keep cars flowing in either direction, cross traffic can still cross at normal, just at intervals that do not hinder the dual carriageway traffic. But wait, low and behold there is an air contamination sensor on a lamppost near the entrance to the Millgate Car Park, a stones throw from traffic that is not moving due to the lights. Is this a Labour Council/mayor ploy to reintroduce the CAZ or even a pay per mile tax? It all harks back to global warming, perceived by many, but I remain unsure that the UK has that much affect on climate change, but we will have to wait and see. Not forgetting the loss of traffic lanes for the underused, I am being generous, cycle lanes.

Meanwhile in South Korea a lithium battery factory caught fire, killing at least 23, pumping out toxic chemicals on the surrounding area and into the atmosphere. I always thought of South Korea as being a safe place for technology, but as we know over here, many house fires are caused by lithium battery issues, plus electric vehicle fires are becoming commonplace, so a factory making them going up in flames should cause alarm bells to ring. There are many such buildings under construction in Europe, I just hope they have better safety measures. I will always say that vehicle power future is Hydrogen, no not like the bomb, do some research.

Last week, after work, I took a walk around Haigh Hall, to see how things are progressing and to film for the next Wigan Watch on YouTube. There was a light shower, but it was a rather nice evening. After filming I decided to carry on walking, through the estate and along the road towards the derelict Bridge pub. Then I had a bright idea of using a footpath to cut through, long story short, I ended up in a field with no obvious way to the road, rather than walk across the field, I’m no Thereas May you know, I walked around and what a mistake that was. Horse flies had a field day, pun intended, I got bit so many times and now have many lumps n bumps in parts I know not how they found, eventually I got back on the road, over the bridge and walked back along the canal. While going past Haigh Golf Course I saw two men, I assumed related, the younger putted his ball into the hole and the older then walked, quite a distance to where his golf ball laid, I had passed at this point but then heard the younger man getting very excited as the ball rolled across the green. Cheers from both of them as it, I assume, went in. The older guy running to the younger both celebrating like they had won the Ryder Cup, I felt like I had witnessed a lifelong memory being made and continued home, with a wry smile.