On Sat, 25 Jun 2005 18:29:05 +0100, Mrs Redboots
wrote:

Martin Underwood wrote to uk.transport.london on Sat, 25 Jun 2005:

And it felt wrong not having a
red-and-amber "get ready to go, put the car in gear/drive, take the
handbrake off" phase to traffic lights, but I gather a lot of Europe is like
that.

France certainly is; Germany is more like us. Not sure about any other
European countries,

Quick answer to two threads (since I am resident in Spain).

In Spain, the registration number stays with the car throughout its
life. Since 2000, when the system changed, there is no way of
telling where a car was first registered. This was a deliberate
decision by the Spanish authorities. Before that, the first letter
(or two) denoted the province of registration. You can tell its
rough age from its registration, as they are issued consecutively,
but there's no easy direct correlation.

There's no red/amber at Spanish traffic lights; however we have a
great many flashing amber signals - proceed but give way.

And to get slightly back on topic, give me the Valencia metro over
the London Underground any day!




--
Bill Hayles

http://billnot.com

"Bill Hayles" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 25 Jun 2005 18:29:05 +0100, Mrs Redboots
wrote:

Martin Underwood wrote to uk.transport.london on Sat, 25 Jun 2005:

And it felt wrong not having a
red-and-amber "get ready to go, put the car in gear/drive, take the
handbrake off" phase to traffic lights, but I gather a lot of Europe is
like
that.

France certainly is; Germany is more like us. Not sure about any other
European countries,

Quick answer to two threads (since I am resident in Spain).

There's no red/amber at Spanish traffic lights; however we have a
great many flashing amber signals - proceed but give way.

I've often wondered whether we should adopt flashing amber more widely in
the UK: eg overnight at junctions which are very busy in the rush hour (and
so need conventional red or green aspects at those times) but which at night
have so little traffic that a red light (if the lights happen to be left for
traffic at right angles) can delay you. Give everyone flashing amber at
night and adopt "roundabout rules" (priority to traffic coming from the
right), perhaps? Over here, the only place where flashing amber tends to be
used is at pedestrian lights, as a longer-than-normal transition between red
and green.