M25 roadworks - get a grip

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I'm sorry but anyone who lives or works outside of the "golden sphere" that is the M25 has had to deal with road/motorway closures and sudden changes in route/planning for decades.

Why do we have to be subjected to this as "national news"?

FFS they close motorways every weekend in North West, Yorkshire, Midlands, Wales, Scotland and elsewhere on a regular basis.

Some of the responses here are cheering me immensely

I think the North/South thing is a red herring. Any busy stretch of motorway that is going to close for whatever reason needs to be broadcast widely in order to limit disruption as far as possible. The fact that there was a shit-show on the M6 a while back means that perhaps the authorities have learned from that and trying to prevent a repeat.

I don't live anywhere near the M27 but when there were weekend closures on there a few years back, I welcomed the advance warnings about it as I had visits planned in that area.

Round here the fields are just being paved, we're losing acres of farmland and woodland to developers, green belt is rapidly being lost and our infrastructure is not fit for purpose.

The scale of what's happening at j10 is huge and it's not just about existing traffic issues.

Thank you, yes I remember that well. I feel so so sorry for anyone caught up in those closures. That was just dangerous. I think one of the issues with that one was, it was publicised as if it was a bog standard local closure with a few tweets and online articles but not much else. A lot of people travelling back from holidays in Scotland or The Lake District had no idea about it. I think that did show the need to share news about complete closures of motorways as widely as possible.

Firstly - it's 8.35 on a Saturday morning. It will get busier. Secondly - isn't it good they publicised it so that some people will be avoiding those roads unless they need to? Thirdly - it isn't just people travelling from Gatwick to Heathrow, of which I imagine there aren't that many.

Please don’t infer that I don’t have shit public transport in London, you seem a little silly to believe that London does not have rural parts have a look on a map. Sweetie if you want I can send you the bus timetables.

"Sweetie?!"

Gosh, the OP and @Tilkyghg6366 will spontaneously combust when they read that Tom Cruise has hired helicopters to transport cast and crew to the Mission Impossible film set in Surrey!

Zone 6, Kent London border.
Nearest tube is 15 miles away

I am using the same tone as who I was responding to.

This is the sad reality of the M25, unless you live near it you don't understand the impact of it closing/being shut.

Yep! I live on a main road about a mile from one of the junctions on the north section and if there is an accident on the M25 our area is gridlocked with traffic trying to find a quicker route. I can literally look out of my window and tell you whether there is a problem on the M25, because the road outside is solid in both directions.

I feel a great deal of sympathy for anyone living on the route of the diversion. I just hope a lot of people who are due to make unnecessary journeys decide to stay at home instead (but I know they won't - people are remarkably selfish/stupid).

Most people in this country never have and never will use Heathrow.

I live near to junction 17 of the M6! Absolutely hell and worse since it became a ‘smart’ stretch of the motorway!

I agree with this. It’s heartbreaking to see the surrounding trees and green areas that have been destroyed. The area is renowned for flooding as well and they’re also building houses …
It’s a joke.

Rubbish. Its one of the busiest airports in the world and even if they don't, much of the stuff they order online will do, or come through Dover and then via the M25 to wherever they live. And nobody living in the South West is driving to Manchester to get to the US or the Middle East or Australia.

But then the people suggesting the M25 is irrelevant to them probably don't fly either.

"Most people in this country never have and never will use Heathrow."
Do you have a link for that statistic?
And how is it relevant what proportion of the country;s total population do or do not use it? The fact remains that Heathrow in particular is one of the busiest airports in the world and therefore many thousands of people using it this weekend will be impacted. Doesn't matter where they live.

It's funny how roadworks seem to bring out the worst of people's parochial short sightedness. Presumably the OP was equally disgusted when the channel tunnel closures were on the news, or when the baggage conveyors breaking down at Heathrow one July was top story?
An extremely busy section of a very busy motorway close to our capital city and Europe's busiest airport is closed in the daytime for the first time in its 40 year history to accommodate a massive road improvement project. Take out your obvious dislike of London for a moment , OP. Doesn't that sound like a story that merits news coverage? People need to avoid the area, and not just the folk who live right by it.

We've got care and support responsibilities that mean we use the M25 every weekend because we're the nearest. The usual less than 4hr roundtrip this weekend will add 8hrs plus to the travel time with the workarounds (if they work).

As it is, there's someone we can't now visit at all.

I get that we are the traffic but these journeys are not unnecessary and can't be deferred.

The BBC coverage verged on hysterical with Charlie Stayt and Naga Munchetty gasping at the shots of an empty M25 🙄.
Ok it’s going to inconvenience many people but comments like ‘I had to do my shopping yesterday because it’s going to be impossible to leave the house Saturday’ are just farcical.

This is the type of top quality discussion Mumsnet was famed for - facts, research, it’s got it all!

Do you actually know why they are removing trees and what they are doing?

Let’s also have a shout out for the poor people of Cornwall who have faced endless signalling issues since the new improved (lol) version came in two weeks ago. Barely a train went through Cornwall yesterday from Penzance towards Plymouth/London. That’s a whole county who couldn’t move: weddings, meetings, weekends away - all disrupted.
And then we wonder why there isn’t regeneration in Cornwall. The transport is shocking and everyone drives causing traffic jams everywhere.

I've just been looking at the pix of the work and the deserted carriageways

I just wish one of the race organiser companies had put on a "Run the M25" event
Though it might have been a bit tricky to get to the start/end points!

Totally this, I often think 'I know I'm the problem' but sometimes there is literally no other option.

https://www.getsurrey.co.uk/news/surrey-news/wisley-airfield-development-5-key-27943591

' the borough council’s local plan, which allocated the site for up to 2,000 homes and removed it from the green belt.'