Dover Ferry Queues
- Thread starter chroniclard
- Start date
I never said it doesn't have any effect, I said to draw the conclusion that as Data Analyst over here called it - "significant portion is due to the B-word" was incorrect.
Literally Google Black Saturday for yourself. If we are going to blame Brexit, maybe pick an event that doesn't correlate with the typically busiest day each and every year.
black saturday dover - Google Search
www.google.co.uk
How about 2012.
And 2011
www.kentonline.co.uk
www.dover.uk.com
Ferry traffic into Dover comes to standstill
Traffic heading for Dover is severely congested after eight-mile queues built up as bank holiday travellers headed for the port.
www.bbc.com
Dover lorry park
M20/A20 non-roadworks... (Page 2) | Dover Forum on Dover.UK.com
www.dover.uk.com
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Bug One said:
I stand corrected. I either missed this post or glossed over it in the multiple back-and-forth.
That’s fair enough. As above, my impression from both of your posts was a denial of any effect.
I think @Devilman has even revised the “significant” claim since that post, and I never used the word significant — so at this point, what are we even arguing about?
How about 2012.
And 2011Ferry traffic into Dover comes to standstill
Traffic heading for Dover is severely congested after eight-mile queues built up as bank holiday travellers headed for the port.www.bbc.com
Dover lorry park
M20/A20 non-roadworks... (Page 2) | Dover Forum on Dover.UK.com
So essentially, we haven’t learned anything in the last 10 years — and that was without the pressures of the B word — we’ve had plenty of time to put contingencies in place but as I described in my edit above, nothing was being done to manage the situation last weekend (except to close the motorway junctions, which appeared to make things worse).
I believe my wife would give you a right telling off for insinuating that nothing was being done (she did me earlier). I'm told the Port Authority Police we're all out managing traffic in Dover as was the Kent Residence Forum (whom I'd never heard of before this) on the routes leading into Dover.
Disaster strikes? Who you gonna call?
From nuclear disasters to flooding, pandemics and even dead whales, meet the agency tasked with getting the county back on our feet.
I believe my wife would give you a right telling off for insinuating that nothing was being done (she did me earlier). I'm told the Port Authority Police we're all out managing traffic in Dover as was the Kent Residence Forum (whom I'd never heard of before this) on the routes leading into Dover.
Disaster strikes? Who you gonna call?
From nuclear disasters to flooding, pandemics and even dead whales, meet the agency tasked with getting the county back on our feet.
They must have all been in Dover and ignored Folkestone then.
I’m sure it’s far more complicated than I’m giving it credit for. All I have to go on is my experience as a passenger on Sunday morning. From where I was sitting (stuck in my car
), there was very little police presence, and those that were there didn’t seem to be doing much, certainly not where it was needed (at the roundabout leading into the Eurotunnel terminal).Can you tell that I’m slightly aggrieved by the experience?!
Soldato
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And the roads are often rammed the other side of the Channel during peak holiday season.
The busiest driving days on the roads in France
Avoid traffic congestion in France - The weekends and other days of the week when traffic will be particularly dense on the French motorway network,
about-france.com
Having been effectively on the front line from Friday through to Sunday, there are 2 main reasons for the delays and it all began Friday.
1. French PAF not manning enough booths for hours. They can claim Sat/Sun were better but the damage was done Friday.
2. An HGV crushed a truck on the M20 northbound just before Junction 12 right outside the tunnel. This caused both lane closures due to air ambulance needing to land. Delays ran into hours, I think it was roughly 4.
Now the tunnel had almost caught up from the PAF delays by the time the M20 re-opened. Then I think it was almost 2000 vehicles then descended on the terminal. Now like an airport, many people would have missed their booked train. Being the summer holiday the tunnel is running at full tilt, there is no magical extra capacity that can be allocated. Bearing in mind we are running Freight, Tourist, Eurostar and other freight at the same time through the tunnel, seperation of trains is at roughly 4 minutes. Much like the ferries, we cannot magic up extra trains/boats.
Bookings on Friday were circa 6,000 vehicles, Saturday 10,000 and Sunday 7,500. Increased booking numbers is exactly the opposite of what you need when trying to reduce a backlog. Then highways decide to operate Stack and close the M20 to protect Dover/Tunnel from heavy HGV traffic. Which then causes the many thousands of people to try and get to the Tunnel via the A20 and local roads, grinding everything to a halt.
Now extra passport checks may or may not add a small amount of extra time per vehicle due to the Brexit changes. But in the grand scheme of things in relation to this incident. It is a drop in the ocean.
1. French PAF not manning enough booths for hours. They can claim Sat/Sun were better but the damage was done Friday.
2. An HGV crushed a truck on the M20 northbound just before Junction 12 right outside the tunnel. This caused both lane closures due to air ambulance needing to land. Delays ran into hours, I think it was roughly 4.
Now the tunnel had almost caught up from the PAF delays by the time the M20 re-opened. Then I think it was almost 2000 vehicles then descended on the terminal. Now like an airport, many people would have missed their booked train. Being the summer holiday the tunnel is running at full tilt, there is no magical extra capacity that can be allocated. Bearing in mind we are running Freight, Tourist, Eurostar and other freight at the same time through the tunnel, seperation of trains is at roughly 4 minutes. Much like the ferries, we cannot magic up extra trains/boats.
Bookings on Friday were circa 6,000 vehicles, Saturday 10,000 and Sunday 7,500. Increased booking numbers is exactly the opposite of what you need when trying to reduce a backlog. Then highways decide to operate Stack and close the M20 to protect Dover/Tunnel from heavy HGV traffic. Which then causes the many thousands of people to try and get to the Tunnel via the A20 and local roads, grinding everything to a halt.
Now extra passport checks may or may not add a small amount of extra time per vehicle due to the Brexit changes. But in the grand scheme of things in relation to this incident. It is a drop in the ocean.
Soldato
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- Rollergirl
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Soldato
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You hadn't heard about he EU directive forcing the UK population to vote Conservative?What does this mean?
It was a response to the concept that voting Tory and voting Remain are synonymous. Two things. And, I'll start by making it clear this entirely opinion based, and no - I don't have any data.What does this mean?
Short term, the last election was dominated by Brexit. I suspect many traditional Labour voters voted Conservative to ensure their vote to leave was carried through. With both Labour and Conservative making their positions clear, only the Lib Dems and SNP will use re-joining as political candy in the next election.
Long term, I predict that the EU will have increased political influence over member states. I see the EU as it stands as quite a socialist organisation, which may have influenced some to vote remain within the EU in order to force socialism on the UK. 'Tory scum' n all. However there's no guarantees the EU won't change over the coming decades. So I personally feel we will be better off working alongside the EU, rather than under the EU.
Either way, it's all conjecture - as are all predictions of the future - and probably a bit off topic for this thread.
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Alrighty then. 
Threads probs done, now entering the twilight zone of political wanging.
Threads probs done, now entering the twilight zone of political wanging.
People came into the thread frothing and didn't like the answers, that's why it went off on a tangent.Alrighty then.
Threads probs done, now entering the twilight zone of political wanging.
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Will we have rejoined by then to alleviate the queues?
Soldato
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We took back control and got Brexit done. Happy days, we got queues, we Brits love queues.
I noticed the above when I read the articles. Problem with comparing them as far as I can tell is you don't know the rate at which they're clearing people (NB - not how long people were queuing for). That's really the metric you need to decide how big an effect brexit is having.From those links, 2015 was due to the migrant crisis and French strike action, and 2016 was due to increased security following the terrorist attacks in France. Neither were “normal” service.
2017, 2018, and 2019 don’t seem to have been too bad — certainly doesn’t appear to have made national news from the searches I’ve conducted, but correct me if I’m wrong.
2020 and 2021 are outliers due to Covid.
What’s the excuse for 2022?
Note that neither @Devilman or I are saying it’s exclusively due to Brexit, but you two are apparently adamant that it’s not having any effect whatsoever.
*Edit* one thing is for sure, and those 2015/16 articles highlight the point; more could be done by the UK police and highways agency to manage the traffic when it does build up. It’s not exactly unexpected and from my experience at the weekend, there was little to no “management” other than to close roads/junctions.
Entrance to the Eurotunnel site on Sunday was via one gate, accessed off a roundabout on which all other routes converged. So what you ended up with was four points of the roundabout in absolute gridlock, tailing back for miles, and no one managing the situation on the roundabout itself. There were plenty of police cars, some just turned up, turned around and ****** off. If they had someone at each point of the roundabout letting one or two cars though at a time, there would have at least been some movement for eveyone, but clearly that was too sensible an option.
I couldn't actually see a distance in miles that people were queuing for at the weekend, one of the articles I read speculated how long the queues might get, but unlike the older articles saying queues for X miles, I saw nothing. That could serve as a rough guide.