A LONG time ago, when Ford Cortinas and Vauxhall Vivas still roamed the earth and a gallon of petrol cost seven shillings (that’s 8p a litre, by the way), there was a mysterious place in Middle England where all roads seemed to disappear.
On the maps they called it the Gravelly Hill Interchange.
It’s still there today – although generations of travellers know it better as Spaghetti Junction.
Half a century has passed since it appeared on the landscape, and by now we have become motoring sophisticates, no longer confused by junctions and slip roads, not impressed any more by flyovers and underpasses, undaunted by jams and contraflows.
Some say Spaghetti Junction was the first of our modern motorway woes. Some call it a monstrosity – others think it a masterpiece of design and engineering.
If I had my way, a giant banner would unfurl above it, stretched over all the lanes across its highest point (which is 80ft above ground, incidentally), proclaiming ‘Welcome to Spaghetti! Europe’s First And Finest Multisectional Junction! Opened May 24, 1972’.
It would be nothing less than a national monument, instantly recognisable by sight and by name, all over Britain and beyond. The Stonehenge of our age, you might say…
Some 5000 years from now, I like to
