Cause of failure which knocked out every Peterborough traffic light revealed

The cause of the ‘unprecedented’ failure which knocked out every traffic light in Peterborough causing chaos on the city’s roads has been revealed.
There were queues at Rhubarb Bridge as a result of the failureThere were queues at Rhubarb Bridge as a result of the failure
There were queues at Rhubarb Bridge as a result of the failure

Some traffic lights were out of action for more than 24 hours following the failure on Friday afternoon.

There were long delays during Friday Rush Hour on some of the busiest junctions in the city, including at Rhubarb Bridge, Hampton, Fletton and in the city centre as engineers tried to work out what had gone wrong.

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While some lights were fixed on Friday, the network was not entirely back on line until 6pm on Saturday.

No traffic management was deployed across the city during the problems, with drivers urged to take extra care and remember who has right of way - despite some four way crossroads, such as the one at London Road/Fletton High Street being out of action.

Today a Peterborough City Council spokeswoman said it had been an unprecedented situation’ and additional, temporary, lights were not brought in because of the way the progression was happening through the sites, and the city centre was prioritised.

The spokeswoman said; ““We are pleased to report that all the affected traffic lights were restored to working order shortly after 6pm on Saturday evening. Once the solution was identified and tested, the remaining sites were corrected with those in the city centre being prioritised.

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“We are confident that we know the reason for the shutdown; the communications network became overloaded resulting in several sites shutting down across the city, something that has not been experienced here before.

“We are continuing to investigate further, but we are not envisaging any repeat issues at this stage.”

A Cambridgeshire police spokesman said there were no reported incidents on the city’s roads as a result of the failures.