THOSE POACHED EGGS.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 13, 16 January 1926, Page 9

THOSE POACHED EGGS.

POPULAR "DISH" WITH MOTORISTS. APPROVAL REPLACES OPPOSITION. BUT THEY SHOULD BE LIGHTED. When those j-ellow bosses with the white rims made their first unheralded appearance at certain busy street intersections it was a foregone conclusion what the facetious would dub them. Poached eggs was the only possible ' nickname. A nickname they were bound to possess. It may be the most useful thing that was ever invented, it may even be sacred—it must have a by-name. Our first impulse nowadays is not to find out the raison d'etre of a thing, but what we can call it to make the world laugh. That is one reason why our humour is so much more artificial than that of our fore-runners. But humour or no humour, the colour and shape of the bosses made them easy prey to the humorisks. And then the first motorist who struck one in his wholly unjustified but daily habit of cutting the corner called the thing something much shorter than poached egg. When you have been used to having your own way, and you even resent being asked by the police to move to the kerb when you block Queen Street footpath while you greet some long lost friend from the country, you are not the sort of person likely to welcomo anything that savours of restraint. Moreover the spread of wealth and the spread of the motor habit have put on wheels many people who may have never even patted a hors_e or guided anything more vehicular than a wheelbarrow. You cannot pick up the lore of the road in five minutes; and the pursecapacity to purchase the right to let forty-horse power loose by a push of your foot does not (unfortunately) bring with it the skill of jehu, nor the consideration for others which was characteristic of former generations when the road was still the main way of getting about the country. So it was perhaps natural that the "poached eggs" or "silent policemen" to give them their other name, should incur the displeasure of the motor fraternity. But all that is charged, and the wisdom of the Auckland City Council traffic authorities in introducing the idea has been thoroughly vindicated. No one would go back to the old style, and do away with these yellow hemispheres with their ring of white. It seems human nature to cut corners, but there is not a more dangerous habit among all the bad habits that careless motorists develop, and the careful drivers all know the peril. With a silent policeman in the middle of a street intersection you have a guide as well as a reminder in making the correct turn, and even motor owners, who were formerly lukewarm or antagonistic now recognise the fairness of the whole business of sane regulation, of which the silent policeman is one phase. A very good illustration of the usefulness of the silent policeman is to be seen in the big open space in front of the Town Hall. Formerly it was a standing puzzle to the motorists themselves, and an invitation to the reckless and roadhog. There was so much uncharted space that you never knew from what direction a speedy motorist would appear next, and some of the gentlemen coming down the steep Queen Street incline were a positive menace to life and limb. To-day that yellow mound gives every one "centre," to use a cricket term, and what was formerly an acre of asphalt, where the tracks were only to be guessed at, is now a comparatively , safe locality for the mere pedestrian. This silent policeman is the only one which is lit up at night. The electric light cables are laid under the asphalt from the footway, and as the glass boss is protected by a semi-circular iron grating there is no fear of it being broken. This lighting of the silent guides is what is wanted to complete their usefulness. As a mater of fact, until they are . all lighted they are a positive danger at night. One motorist who drew attention to this side of the question, said there was not the slightest doubt that a recent fatal accident at the entrance to the Domain Drive, Parnell, was caused by a driver striking the silent policeman on a dark night, and being cannoned into a post. Motorists agree that all silent policemen iv such places must be lighted, and no doubt the City Council will continue the policy • which it inaugurated when it lit the guide in front of the Town Hall.