In message , Ret.
writes




I repeat, however, that it is the intention of traffic police always to
get normal traffic moving again as quickly as possible. To suggest that
they block off major routes for no good reason is a nonsense.

I'm sure that, in most cases, it is nonsense.

However, I understand that one of the reasons that the police close
roads which have no obvious 'physical' reason to be closed, is that they
are now initially treating many more accidents as potential crime
scenes. Until they have investigated and looked for evidence, the road
will remain closed as long as deemed necessary. I believe that this was
the reason given for the prolonged closure of a long stretch of the M5,
a couple of years ago.

And, certainly on some occasions, I am not totally convinced that the
police are in the slightest way concerned in the effect of their road
closure has on surrounding traffic. I was recently caught needlessly for
over an hour in a situation where there had been an incident, and the
police had closed the road. This resulted in a queue of traffic well
over a mile long trying to get into town - but nobody was moving. But
was there any police presence at the tail-end of the queue, preventing
motorists from joining it, and diverting them? Of course there wasn't!
--
Ian