After miles of smiles on the A140, rubber-neckers made it a no-go for motoring editor Andy Russell.

The A140 between Ipswich and Norwich left me with mixed memories over the past few days.

The first was miles of smiles after I let a retro Nissan Figaro out into the flow of slow-moving traffic.

The occupants of the immaculate emerald green Figaro were a mature, but clearly young-at-heart, couple who had the soft-top roof panel down and were enjoying the warm late afternoon sunshine.

Their enthusiasm was so infectious that I found myself following them for several miles even though they were often doing little more than 40mph – it was so much fun.

The next day I was on the Norwich Southern Bypass approaching the A140 turn-off when traffic in both lanes of the carriageway ground to a halt before trickling along slowly for the best part of a mile. Must be a big accident I thought.

And when we finally reached the scene there was a car well into the field of cereal but, judging from the ‘Police Aware’ tape on it, it had been there for some time and the traffic hold-up had been caused by passing motorists slowing down and ‘rubber-necking’.

What made it even worse was that a couple of cars were parked on the verge, their drivers exchanging details, having had a minor shunt in the slow stream of traffic – the whole thing was so unnecessary.