In message , Annabel Smyth
writes
On Sun, 27 Jun 2004 at 17:36:35, Dave Liney wrote:

As the price of fuel
on motorway service announcement signs is no longer displayed, presumably
because of the effort required, it isn't something I'd rely on happening.

They seem to manage in France.

Talking of which, why can't we have what they have in France and
Germany, where only every other service area has petrol and food, but
the intermediate ones have a place to park, with picnic tables and loos
and possibly/probably telephones and a local information board?
"Les aires de repos", or "rest areas", a wonderful idea and one which I,
too, can't understand why we've never repeated here.

In fact, in France at least, the proportion of these to "full blown"
service areas is much greater, maybe four or five to one. Indeed,
large scale service areas are actually few and far between in France; I
know as I frequently used to have to find the blasted places to keep
groups of 49 people on British coaches happy!

We did, in fact, once have a single, solitary "aire de repos" in
Britain. It was called the Brent Knoll Picnic area and was on the M5
in Somerset, in the shadow of the hill of the same name. It's now been
converted to a "full blown" service area called "Sedgemoor".

Okay, so they have
those, too - and some very nice ones, like the Aire du Baie de la Somme
near Abbeville
I used this recently for the first time. It is - as you say -
wonderful, not least because of its setting.

--
Ian Jelf, MITG, Birmingham, UK
Registered "Blue Badge" Tourist Guide for
London & the Heart of England
http://www.bluebadge.demon.co.uk