Roger Rabbits with Jim Bunny

One road cone, two road cones, three road cones, four…

“Hey, Pointy Head! What you doin’?”

“Being a good shepherd, a guardian of the people.”

“You’re a road cone. Getting in the way, causing disruption, creating bad feeling, stressing us out. And costing us. And there are far too many of you!”  

“Excuse me, I am doing God’s work – creating a safe passage past these roadworks; ushering motorists safely to and from their places of employ, schools, supermarkets etcetera, etcetera. Bless us. Also I’m keeping our road workers safe. Bless them. And bless us road cones again for turning some good coin for the contractors. Now excuse me. My calling calls.”

Nothing worse than a jumped up, holier-than-thou, dollar-driven road cone overstating its importance. To make it worse, there’s another million or so of him – or her – or whatever pronouns a road cone chooses, cluttering the country’s roads.

“Wayne Brown reckons you road cones are a nonsense, out of hand and beyond necessity. He wants you legislated to undo the financial damage you cause.”

Seventy road cones, eighty road cones, ninety road cones more…

That sanctimonious road cone apparently prompted a wee hissy the other morning. Tipped a local right over the top. A case of excessive cone syndrome he told me. He let road cones affect his better judgment. 

There were road works at the bottom of his street and a big, brash, red sign indicating the lane leading onto an arterial road into the CBD was ‘CLOSED’. The same big, brash, red sign was reinforced by legions of road cones that weren’t there yesterday but seemed to have been procreating overnight. They were shoulder-to-shoulder around the intersection, like bugs on a rug, just sitting there, all pointy and arrogant and looking costly.

It was about 5.45am apparently – and the only people up and about was our frustrated commuter, a couple of cat burglars and a homeless person having a bottled breakfast on the reserve across the road. They say they checked to ensure there was no traffic about and then made a dash through the road cones down the wrong side of the road – a modern day ‘forlorn hope”, because things could have gone horribly wrong and kind of did.

Our commuter says a road worker appeared out of the gloom, shouted his indignation and objection and whacked his wing mirror as he whizzed past. It could have turned out worse, but thankfully didn’t. He feels bad now and unreservedly apologises to that roadworker.

It’s easy in hindsight but our malcontent motorist says had they read of such behaviour in the court news they would have said “dumb ass.” Well, our ‘dumb ass’ is not advocating anarchy, and they tell their story as a warning to others about impatience and irrational reaction around roadworks and road cones.

180 road cones, 190 road cones, 200 road cones. That’s ten score…..

The motorist did have an option – a detour which added about five minutes and a couple of kilometres to the trip into town. Not much of an inconvenience you might say; but do that three or four or five times a day. Every time they turned out of their drive the big brash red sign kept telling them ‘ROAD CLOSED’, and he interpreted that to mean “Naff off. Take the long way. Road cones rule.” It’s about time, petrol, nuisance value. It all adds up.

380 road cones, 390 road cones, 400 road cones, no more…

At one new pedestrian crossing in Tauranga there were 400 road cones. Plus 80 barriers. How do I know? Well, I counted them – roughly, because it’s a bit like counting spilled 100s and 1000s. They’re everywhere!

“So 400 – that’s cone overkill isn’t it?” observed one very observant observer. “A bit excessive. Surely more than is required.” And the fact those 400 road cones didn’t make her feel safe driving through the roadworks is backed up by research. A national transportation study found 70 per cent of us felt driving around was more unsafe due to the increased number of road cones. And a clinical psychologist extrapolated that finding by suggesting road cones are “symbols of what has gone wrong, of anger, helplessness and fear”. They might even cause road rage because they irritate.

And they cause us to be impatient and do silly things because just where road cones merge the traffic into one lane at our roadworks, I noticed little piles of busted car bits.

And this from a more aesthetically minded colleague: “Road cones seem very popular, so it’s a shame they only come in one two-tone colour option.”