T-plates suggested for tourists on Scottish Highland roads
Tourists driving in the Scottish Highlands are being encouraged to place T-plates in a bid to reduce accidents on the road. The signs are similar to L-plates but have a green letter T, with the word “tourist” on the bottom. They are intended to show to others on the road that the driver may not be as familiar with the roads in Scotland.
This comes after Transport Scotland warned of an increase in crashes caused by “inexperience of driving on the left.”
The T-plates were created by Kingussie-based hotelier Robert Marshall. He said he thought of it after his own “awful” driving experience while in Tenerife that “completely stressed out my head.”
“Just reaching roundabouts, junctions, just starting the journey initially,” he said, “I was on the wrong side of the road, every control and dial was in a different place, and I just was screaming at my partner ‘I wish these people knew I was a tourist’.”
He also said he had personally seen how stressful driving can be for visitors and hopes the plates would help. “It’s a simple idea but it’s one that’s really started conversations about road safety,” he said.
Road safety campaigner with the A9 Dual Action Group Laura Hanser helped launch the plates and said that she has already seen results while testing it on the roads.
“I went out on a single carriageway at 50mph,” she said. “I would let different vehicles catch up with me. You were very aware of a couple of seconds until they acknowledged that and there was a definite pull back… in acknowledgement that that plate was on your car.” She expressed hope that the plates would help create space that would allow tourists to “acclimatise to their surroundings, to the car and to the environment that they’re in.”
Transport Scotland told the BBC that the plates are legal to display.
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