Secrets of The Motorway - M2
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- Опубликовано: 3 сен 2022
- #motorway #infrastructure #m2
We're back in Kent to look at it's other motorway, the M2. It was supposed to be a glorious motorway from London to Dover, but it isn't. So what's the deal there then. As well as looking into the history of the M2 motorway, we'll be pointing out some of the things you can see and do along the way.
Did you know there's a theme park where you can drive diggers.... what about the 208mph speed record. Nice bridges... karting, abandoned roads, it's a complete mess of subjects that is sure to entertain.
In this series we aim to explore what our motorway network is hiding. As we drive along at the 70mph..ish...we simply just wouldn't be aware of what we're missing. This series aims to uncover some of the hidden secrets our motorways have to offer.
Find us on Twitter - @JonShenanigans
Facebook - Auto Shenanigans
Many thanks to:
Roads.org.uk
Pathetic.org.uk
Sabre-roads.org.uk 
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You nailed the completely accurate description of Sheppey - an island with 2 prisons and no police station.
There are 3 prisons on the Isle of Sheppey.
Hello, How the devil are you!? I hope you enjoy our little trip along the M2. Shout out to Network Rail security (no rules were broken) and anyone who saw me waving like an idiot on the Medway Viaduct. We did a few takes of the end shot and naturally anyone driving past would have wondered what amount of crack had been ingested... here's a guy who's waving to nothing at 9.30am. If you need to get to Dover, go down the M2, it's better than the M20. Thanks for watching, same time next week? x
I stumbled across this channel and thought who in their right mind has a channel talking about motorways...? neverless, I clicked on it ( only cos I had clicked on every other channel and was bored ) to my surprise I was sucked into the informative content and your unique blend of serious presentation seasoned with just the right amount of sauce. Have to say I'm hooked and look forward to watching this enthusiast talk about not so boring motorways... Great stuff, very informative. A big 👍🏻.. subscribed...
Awesome, thanks a lot, welcome along!
@@AutoShenanigans I have been a fan for a long time so to see you on a reply is the best
Brilliant vlogs John good lad
I agree it sounds so wrong on paper but is so right in film John does it so well!
This is weirdly addictive
Canterbury resident here - another little known fact about the M2 is that particularly on 2 lane sections, the inside one is invisible to those traveling along it.
At least it must be, as everyone sits in the outside lane 🤦
The only people that use lane 1, and it's mostly coastbound J5-6, are those that hover about at 55/56mph forcing lorries into lane 2 while they dither about
John Surtees lost his son Henry in a motorsports accident in 2009 and founded the "Henry Surtees Foundation. The Foundation's projects included work in education, air ambulances, transfusion service and medical training, also providing notably help for young people in motorsport. Buckmore Park is the karting circuit where Henry got his first taste of go-kart racing.
I’m local to buckmore park and every year they do a 24hr race and they always let a few people drive the old surtees f1 cars( Because the surtees family own the track)
My young nephew works with the kart team there. Absolutely loves it.
1:21 the van and the car just left this dimension
Wow! How did you spot that! Amazing observation
😂😂
Great, just what i needed, another weird RUclips channel to watch. Can't wait to learn a bunch about UK roads. A friendly pig sent me. (:
Same here!
But it's not just a pig. It's the messiah.
Thanks for watching!
Strangely fascinating, could linger on the maps and images a fraction longer so we can grasp what they were
Gotta admit, those drone shots of the viaducts are pretty awesome
When you asked it how it felt, I thought the concrete pillar gave a solid response...
nicely done
I live on the Isle of Sheppey and have my whole life. You are completely right about those of us who live here.
In the 80s and 90s, every friday night hundreds of single soldiers stationed in garrisons all over Northern Germany would jump on the luxury double deck Transline coaches and head for the Belgian ferry terminals.
In the early hours of Saturday morning all these coaches would meet up in Farthing Corner services.
Everyone would debus (now seriously worse for wear due to drink) and swap coaches for whatever onward destination in the UK they needed.
Often an unconscious Scotsman heading home to his family in Glasgow would wake up half way down the M5 heading for Plymouth.
So, Farthing corner holds a soft spot in my memories and will never be known as Medway services to me or countless other ex servicemen.
I've never been in the military myself but I love that anecdote
He's right about Sheppey. I've visited and safe to say I won't be returning.
Absolutely LOVE the reference to Sheppey.
😂😂😂
Yea mate that’s some funny ass shit!
I think digger land needs further investigation.
It's great fun!
I grew up in Calais and the first time i drove to London after getting a driving licence, i used the A2 /M2 .
I stopped at Medway services but the exit is so badly signed that it's easier to find the secret exit because simply going straight gets you there.
I did that by mistake, had never heard of backdoor exits at the time and wondered for a few seconds why there was a whole TOWN in the service station.
Joking aside, i eventually found junction 4, got back on the m2 and continued on my way.
I visited the Isle of Sheppey once. The tribe wasn't unfriendly, but I left the place feeling depressed and dejected.
I did the same - the tribe looked at me and my car strangely, and I was glad to get back on the road again…
I've stricken it from the bucket list since the pile up started on the bridge in 2013.
@@londonlore5881 Sounds like Wales 😂
Lol you’re not alone
Isle of Sheepy
Great to see Buckmore Park still given the recent threats of becoming an Amazon Warehouse
That's quite an accurate description of Sheppy.
Was that award set in stone?
That’s a rock solid comment!
Thanks John, I just remember when the two main parts opened around 1963-65 Wimpey's built the stretch from the Medway bridge to the Stockbury Viaduct, and Laings built the viaduct to the Faversham end, when I was 19 in 1979 I worked for Wimpys on the Canterbury bypass or A2 Harbledown to Bridge. until then all the traffic from the M2 to dover went through Canterbury, Gridlock. great videos thanks.
Joe
Awesome, something decent to watch.
Nice one, thanks!
Always love the mention of the inclusion of Saabs!
John, your aspirations have grown enormously this year! 100K subscribers to you 6 months ago was unimaginable. Congratulations on your rapid growth into a niche interest.
Yeah... aim big I suppose! Thanks for watching mate
@@AutoShenanigans BTW, I live in Canada but grew up in Brighton and enjoy the snippets of history and geography. Thanks!
My favourite motorway! Junction 6 was where we put a survey camera down a drainage pipe and encountered a seriously pissed off badger. How he managed to get in there we never did find out.
There are some huge soakaways draining the motorway, mostly in the hard shoulders/verges but some way off the route. One is 120m away - never could figure that one out. Quite a few of the locations are unknown so god only knows what the state of them is like.
They show up on the original 1964 plans but those were drawn with the chainages set to . . . furlongs (five furlongs are just under 1km) and are pretty poor microfilm prints.
About 7 years ago the MAC working for the Highways Agency (so few years, so many name changes) was the Balfour Beatty/Mott MacDonald joint venture. Motts allowed the drainage design team to run down so they could outsource the work to their own engineers.
The young engineer the gave me for the J6 to J7 study was very keen but inexperienced.
Now I've said the existing soakaways are huge; they've been there since 1964 and the motorway hasn't changed that much so I was surprised when she said that they needed to build EIGHT new ones each 6m x 6m x 8m deep!
And where was she going to build these? Under the hard shoulder and lane 1 of course!
When I asked how long she thought we would have to completely close the M2 for she said "But there are two lanes, can't we keep the traffic flowing on lane 2?"
Not while you've got an 8m deep excavation alongside, no.
Her other claim to fame was in her innovative suggestion for pipe materials.
Essentially there are two types of drainage pipe associated with road drainage - ordinary ones which take the surface water runoff and perforated ones which take away any water in the soil to stop the road structure collapsing - think of a pipe with lines of holes along the top. Water seeps in and then runs away down the channel - at least that the theory.
Conventionally in the UK we use plastic, clay and concrete pipes but she wanted to lay 1500m of perforated STAINLESS STEEL.
I told her she'd have to get what's known as a departure from the HA as we never use stainless pipes underground.
"But there are some there already!" Really? Where?
She told me the chainages and I dug out the video footage. At the start of each recording there's a clapper board stating where, when etc and it clearly said "225mm PVCu" (plastic)
When I asked her why she thought it was stainless steel she said "Well it looked so nice and shiny!" . . . because it was wet perhaps?
Sorry for the long ramble but I love telling that story!
Bet not many people read that! Funny tho!
I think it would be a crying shame if this series didn’t continue with exciting episode ideas like- “secrets of the uk’s major trunk roads”
“Secrets of the A38”
“Secrets of the A303”
Etc…..
Isle of Sheppy indigenous tribe is a pretty good description! 😂 Some escaped to Sittingbourne apparently...
Went for a family holiday to Devon when the kids were little, ended up at another branch of digger land. Superb memorable day, toddlers operating heavy machinery. Brilliant. Highlight was the mrs driving a huge tractor thing around a track. Me and the kids sat on a hand rail in the back of the cab, and the lad in charge of tuition sat on the door grab handle. First big bump the door flew open with him sat on it, almost ejected himself under the rear wheel. Luckily he managed to grab something mid exit but it was touch and go....
Sounds amazing!
A perfect episode, fuller's teasel, epic drone shots, big concrete bridges, a bit of trainspotting and abandoned slipways.
I have never been so interested in motorways, I now find my self pointing out stuff when I go along them!
My wife is so lucky!
She most certainly is! This channel directly benefits your loved ones...
I would go to Newcastle from the Bristol region each year so I would take interest in the interchanges like driving the M5 under the M4, past the M50 onto the M42, follow North away from the M40, over the M6 then North East away from the M6 Toll, A42 from Tamworth junction, M1 North, then North West away from the M18, under the M62, North East along the Bradford bypass to the A1(M) all the way to junction 64 before it became the A1 again with the A19(M) spuring into the City and the A19 from Sunderland joining.
Fun Fact - The M2 is the only motorway (that is, an 'M' road, not including A(M) roads) in the country that doesn't join directly to any other motorway, because it's just a chunk in-between two parts of the A2.
It is! Very true, it literally serves little no purpose it seems.
@@AutoShenanigans I think the irony is you have the A2 at, for a good chunk from Dartford down to J1 is 4 lanes, yet there are parts of the M2 that are only 2 lanes. You would think it would be the opposite!
@@AutoShenanigans one more comment like that and I will unsubscribe. Before the M2 all of the traffic to the Kent coast had to travel through Strood, Rochester, Chatham, Gillingham, Rainham, Newington, Sittingbourne and Faversham plus some villages along the route on the A2, hardly any of which was dual carriageway. Same for the way back.
Try that now even with the M2 there and you will see why the M2 is so important.
Well done for the success of this series
Thanks, it was quite a surprise!
Man, that MW2 music really caught me off guard on a channel about motorways of all things. Nice video!
Same. ROACH!
Funny! This could have been a very dull video but actually, fast paced and interesting. I don’t think I’ve every used the M2 but still interested watching. Well done folks!
The Isle of Sheppey - that notorious accident in the fog on the A249........
Sir. Your humor is amazing. I enjoy it. Keep it up.
Thanks mate
I moved to Sheppey at a very young age (luckily my parents came along too to look after me) and we lived there for 10 years, but finally managed to escape. To be honest though, compared to where I live now (Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent), Sheppey is a paradise and I'd love to be held captive by the tribe again. I shared your video on the Sheppey History Facebook group, so prepare for some Swampy grief! :D
I agree Hanley is just bad
Ah crap.. I'm in for it now.
Dude, you're awesome and I hope you reach your goal. I'm the daughter of a civil engineer (who worked on the North Circular in the 1980s and finished off his career renewing Reading's sewage treatment, as well as working on Kings Cross, all for Taylor Woodrow/Vinci) and these videos make me wish I'd followed in his footsteps. I now live down in Basingstoke and loved your M3 video. Keep 'em coming!!
Welcome along, thanks for watching
I could watch these all day and I have lmao
Thanks for watching mate.
Good timing, I've just made a tea. Going to drink it and watch this...
Good tea? More of a coffee man myself.
@@AutoShenanigans It was thanks Jon. Those Medway Crossing drone shots were next level.
Never realised how interested in motorways I am, thanks for confirming that I’ve turned into my dad🙄
I subscribed the day I first found your videos and then spent a couple of weeks of spare time watching all your stuff. Now it's a regular Sunday afternoon treat to watch the latest offering. Thanks for all your hard work Jon (and the transport manager). See you next Sunday.
Awesome, thanks a lot! Enjoy your week whatever you get up to.
PMSL, you ain't far wrong about Sheppey, it does seem like you've strayed into a long forgotten backwater. Not exactly Shangri-la, but you get the picture.
If you do steay onto the Sheppey Bridge, and find that it is too late to turn around, just DON'T WIND DOWN YOUR WINDOWS! and KEEP MOVING (til you find a roundabout)
Watching this made us both howl with laughter. The concrete appreciation society made us think of me saying it wouldn't surprise me if there was a wheelie bin appreciation society. You can just imagine them taking pictures and posting them up with the title, 'Check that moulding', or, 'Check those wheels!!' along with a selfie of said bin and their, 'Like us on Farcebook', 'TikToss' and 'Shitter'.
But then this is the country where you can get, not just 'train-spotters', but 'bus-spotters'. (There was a bus-spotter in Wolverhampton where we originally come from, and he would stand there with his little book, watching the buses, single and double-deckers and coaches passing through the bus station and noting them down. It was obviously fascinating. I saw him every day, come rain or shine, when I was attending college and for some years after. Now that's dedication!)
We were particularly impressed with the footage of the design process, which was obviously done with CAD (Crayoned Angry Design). Either that or the designer had Tourette's. Lots of thought went into the process. A total inspiration. That should be shown in the Tate Modern.
Love the Sheppey reference but also did you know about the farthing corner service station mosaic? It was there on opening of the service station, However it's since disappeared as an upgrade to where the WHSmith is seems to have covered it up.
Absolute BEST-EVER interview with a concrete bridge pylon on record!! 🎬🏆 (…and very cinematic ending, too!)
It may also be the only concrete interview. Not sure why!
A friend recommended your videos and I am so happy he did. I love the cheeky presentation of highway infrastructure, history and other interesting facts. I love your style and have been watching 2-3 videos a day to get them all in. There are so many humorous moments in this video especially, including asking the viaduct supports for their comments after winning the Outstanding Merit in the Use of Concrete Award. Hilarious! I would love to see you lend your style to some of our roads here in the USA. Thank you so much for all your hard work in creating these videos. Great job!
I love the reference to your Saab. Lovely cars, never beaten
The concrete society is how I came to work near North Berwick as an 18 year old from the very west of Wales. My college lecturer met my large farmer/employer at one of the concrete society’s undoubtedly exciting conferences. This was back in 1976. Exciting times where the mobile phone was something only found on the telly program ‘Lost in Space’ and the small portable calculator was only widely available as expensive battery-guzzlers a couple of years earlier. An era of Mk1 Ford Escort, Cortina Mk3 and Morris Marina, not forgetting the Austin Allegro.
We probably can forget the Austin Allegro though...
Do they throw parties?
@@nathanw9770
I’ve been told that custard companies throw better parties. ;-)
Awesome video
Nice one thanks
Great video. Greetings from Australia.
Great, thanks. I’m often on the Eurostar and the view over viaduct over the Medway is a delight especially if it’s sunny. Just a few seconds of peaceful river life and then gone. There’s a good shot of it at the end of the video
"Nearly as fast as the Saab" 😂😂
Nearly.
This series has been amazing so far! I don't live far from the M2 but have never been able to find old 1990s maps of all 7 junctions. Still a great road. I remember walking down the old sliproads (now a footpath) from the A228 to the Medway Viaduct, which I believe was the old coastbound entrance/exit. All I know was they removed those old sliproads during the upgrade of the M2 at J2-J3. I hope to find those old maps one day!
I forget the copyrights on maps, its 50 years I think before they become "public domain" so for 90s stuff we'll have to wait a little longer. Libraries probably hold some of them and I'm sure there's an archive somewhere that would gladly take your money in exchange for some maps. Thanks a lot for watching!
From Lazerbig
great to see you, thanks for coming along.
Interesting fact is that M2 is the loneliest motorway in England with no other Motorway conmection 😢😅
Junction 5 looked like somebody's first attempt at an intersection in Cities: Skylines
thats my local interchange 😭
A249 junction is just mad thank god they’re upgrading it
I came to your channel through suggested videos, watched two of yours and subscribed straight away. I like your relaxed style and the fact you're not afraid to swear a little - love it!
You must put in a *lot* of hours of research, recording and editing and it shows 😎
Nice one, thanks for watching mate!
Kudos for name checking Darren.
View of the railway and road. Long silence while John looks. Great comic timing.
The bridge that carries you over The Swale on to the Isle of Sheppey is well known for being the scene of the biggest multi car pile up in the UK…. Some 100 odd cars in 2013 due to the steep incline, bad fog and therefore obvious blind spot on the bridge!!!
Only saw a video on that the other day on another channel
@@xr6lad Plainly Difficult?
I loved the reference to Darren the pothole inspector from Cheshire West. 😆😆😆
I’m surprised the rest of the M2 hasn’t been widened yet.
Good to see Darren still hard at work 😂
He's as busy as ever
I knew a concrete expert who would never change his method of working: he was very SET in his ways ! Interesting video as usual, keep at it.
Just brilliant! Unlike Isle of Sheppey inhabitants…
Used to used the M2 back in early ‘ 90’s travelling between Harrow, Aldershot and Canterbury for work … seem to recall you could get a good speed up in it back then without legal harassment … with a friend driving, of course!
I've subbed using the button specifically for that.
Oo yes there's one of those too, many thanks.
Redo your introduction but after the car passes you've disappeared hahhaaa so disappointed you didn't do this!
Im not clever enough to think of such things. I might try it when the opportunity arises.
Quality content, cheers
Cheers mate
Sat watching the video, when it got to the bit where he says 'Remember that.... rain?' I looked out the window to watch it tipping down outside. 😁😁
Yes... that might not age well, it's pissing it down here.
Commendable drone footage, Master John!
Congrats to the responsible body. 😉
You were one of the few channels I subscribed to after a single video... Mostly so I could hear the "how the devil are you? Did you have a good week?" each week!
Sorry, I think we let you down this week.
@@AutoShenanigans I got the "how the devil are you"... good enough ;)
Like a lot of people I stumbled on one of your videos, and have subscribed and watched loads of them now. It is criminal that you don’t have more subscribers. Keep up the great work, love the humour and the ‘cheesy’ music. Keep going like you are and I’m sure all those subscribers will appear.
Nice one, thanks for joining us!
Erudite and confident delivery of some fascinating knowledge. Subscribed.
I went to do as you commanded - I already was!. Seriously th, I was born & grew up in Kent. I remember being given a book when I was about 8, in 1959. This book described how ‘highways’ in future would incorporate innovative junctions which they called’clover leaf junctions - and like your mention of the right curves. In 1959 I was about eight years old. So two very exciting events (for a prep sch boy in Kent. These were the E-Type Jaguar and secondly the opening of the first section of this M1 motorway. You may imagine this is fairly mundane stuff, but remember that back then the black slash across a white circle meant you coul go as fast as you liked. One of my neighbours dad had a Mark Ii Jag, which with the 3.8 or 4.2 litre engine could easily do !ton up’, and he used to quite often along PemburY Road, just past Tunbridge Wells, but 150mph? No, only the e-type could & did reach that speed on the new motorway.! Most cars in those days had trouble getting over seventy.
Used the M2 for a while when living down there and agree with your views on it's layout . Gotta say the script for this episode is the best so far, I've been telling anyone I know to watch these.
Why have I just subscribed to someone talking about motorways? Probably because he asked so nicely. 😮
Hooray! Welcome along.
And the wit and humour is worth coming back for alone
Love these videos so much mate, keep up the hard work, love watching these so much
Nice one, thanks for watching.
5:52 Much respect for perfectly aligning the 'present day' and 'removed' photos of junction 3, making it possible to use the full stop (period) and comma buttons to move frames directly from one to the other, and back again, to compare the many differences between the two.
Ah well, I've recently learned you can export images from Google Earth.. makes it a lot easier to get them to match up etc! I'm so far behind the times... this is new to me yet i gather has been in existence for years.
Oh my god the ending is incredible
Thanks mate
I get to use the M2 a lot from SE London and it's always surprised me as the A2 goes from a 4 lane A road with hard shoulder, to the M2 which eventually goes down to 2 lanes. They must regret not making it at least 3 lanes in the first place now, it's horrific if there's a lane closed.
There does now appear to be barriers for those access roads at Medway services, not sure when they were installed
Before the construction of the second medway motorway bridge you had the strange situation where you travelled on a two lane motorway towards London and when it changed into an A road it widened to three lanes.
Auto shenanigans is my guilty pleasure
This channel is genuinely fantastic - hilarious and informative. I'm hooked every new video - looking forward to more!
Thanks a lot mate!
John mate ur comments on the “indigenous tribe” of the isle of Sheppey has got me pissin myself!!
Easily the funniest thing u have said on camera!! 👍😎
hehehehe, a lot of Sheppey residents didnt see the funny side :D
A mate managed an office on Sheppey for a while... Everyone was related, except one chap, who was from Stroud.
When I lived in Kent and went to Sheppey, most of the people there looked like inbreeds.
Stroud or Strood?
The end sequence was actually very picturesque, another fab insight, thanks Jon (looking forward to the M18 whenever it happens!)
Sheppey is North Kent's version of Lydd
Hearing the shepard betrayal song from modern warfare 2 activated my fight or flight response
Made my wait at the doctors surgery very pleasant. Really enjoyed this one John. Thanks.
3:50 "good, that's one less loose end."
Can't wait to hear what you have to say about junctions on the M50 that are basically a gap in a fence. They really did things differently with the early ones.
I might have to use that as a quote.
Does anyone else watch Jon's videos with Google Earth open, following where he goes in the videos, using the historical imagery to see how things have changed when he mentions changes? No? Just me? Ch-Ch-Ch-Chip 'n' Dale, Rescue Rangers
Your use of the MW2 soundtrack in this is wild 🔥🔥🔥
Laughing my way through this - thanks John!!!!
Your doing a great job John, I hope this channel goes on to be as large and well developed as something like Grand Tour! Best of luck, and rock on! :)
We're building up to it. We need a bit more of an amazon/bbc budget.
@@AutoShenanigans imagine how many eggs you could get to roll down that hill in Bristol
The part about Sheppey had me in stiches!
It's funny cos its true. Probably.
@@AutoShenanigans Having spent many a miserable weekend there as a child, i can confirm you're correct. Keep up the great work!
Another wonderfully daft video. Thank you!
Brilliant! A very good episode.