Retired policeman thinks out of the box to check speeding

DURHAM // A retired police officer from Durham, northern England, said he had been able to put a check on speeding cars in his village after attaching to a pole a bird box, which resembled a speed camera. Bill Angus, 64, said prior to this initiative, drivers regularly flouted the 48kph speed limit in the area, and that his continuous complaints to the traffic authorities since 2000 about the speeding phenomenon fell on deaf ears. "We have got a lot of residents who have cars on driveways at the front of their homes so they have to reverse out onto the main Sunderland Road and you can look left and right and think it's clear but then in a split second someone is flying down at 60 or 70mph (97kph to 113kph). There have been quite a few near misses," Angus told the Belfast Telegraph last week. "Everyone around here thinks it's brilliant. My son and his family came over from New York and they just couldn't believe the difference and it's all down to this bird box."