Why do the French....

[Captain Jack]

...have such quiet roads? Went over to Belgium last weekend, which the Pug did without any problems as always, and as soon as I got off the ferry in Calais, I thought I was in a different car! At erm.. some speed, I could barely hear the tyres - just the pottering of the engine. Even the "noisier" tarmac was quieter than the standard gravel we get over here. Belgian roads were also better, but not as quiet as the French ones.

[Welly]

We have a 'quiet' tarmac here too, new road surfacing uses a smaller aggregate size and the surface layer is almost porous allowing some sub-drainage and absorption of tyre noise some would call it 'soft' tarmac.

In France most of the roads are paid for by tolls aren't they? therefore the money isn't syphoned-off elsewhere like it may be here and not invested in the roads.

Spanish motorways are super-smooth too, again 'tolled'.

[Captain Jack]

Our "smooth" roads are verrry few and far between. Most of the repaved roads in the South West literally have loose gravel thrown on it and uses passing cars to "flatten" it down, causing stone chips on windows and paint... along with a 20mph limit. What idiot came up with that idea??

Regarding the tolls - isn't that replaced by our tax discs?

[Doggy]

Only about half of French motorways have tolls, (& in many cases there's a decent, free, alternative route).

Generally, I don't think our European cousins have the same volume of traffic to deal with, but they probably look after them better.

They've go street lights too.

[steve_earwig]

Rather than spend months with contra-flows, traffic lights etc. in France the road repair gangs are massive, well-co-ordinated teams which usually do the repairs over night. And don't stand around leaning on shovels having a fag...

[Captain Jack]

Rather than spend months with contra-flows, traffic lights etc. in France the road repair gangs are massive, well-co-ordinated teams which usually do the repairs over night. And don't stand around leaning on shovels having a fag...

Now how can we encourage that sort of workmanship in UK? It reminds me of Russia here sometimes. They dig up a MASSIVE hole over there (width of the road), run out of money and then leave the hole in the road for months on end.

[Welly]

And don't stand around leaning on shovels having a fag...

Rumour has it that near me that a certain Supermarket paid £30,000.00 to a contractor engaged in bridge repairs (which were discouraging their shoppers) to "get a move on". Sure enough that job *suddenly* was finished ahead of schedule, all done, swept up and gone

See we can work hard but the MONEY is the driving force.