not be annoyingly nitpicky but I am a tiny bit obsessed with how the drive Sam takes in the pilot for Life on Mars between Maya being kidnapped and him being hit by a car seemingly just makes no fucking sense (at least to me) so here I am. Trying to make sense of it.
First indicator we get for location is this shot here
that is Medlock Street Junction and more specifically Sam is in the very left hand land so he's NOT getting on Ring Road. Sign is shown here in 2008.
Now immediately after this, Sam is seen turning and then straightening back, looking to be on a roundabout. This still makes sense for the journey he's taken as the road he turns onto does come out onto the roundabout that is the Cambridge Street junction, shown here
Now, the turn Sam makes does fit it with him going round the North side of the roundabout. We get this still after the turn
I did try to find what building that is in the background and it is possible that is New Medlock House which is student accom for MMU but I am no where near even 50% sure. Another thing to note is Sam's position, there is at most one lane between him and the roundabout here so he is again not positioned to turn onto the Ring Road, as shown here only the outer most lane is going onto the slip road
The inner two lanes go around the roundabout and shown here, the inner most continues on the roundabout and the second opens up to either continue or turn off onto Higher Cambridge street
And Sam is shown to steer to his left before the shot changes to a closeup of him in his car so presumably he has gone 270° around the roundabout and come off onto Higher Cambridge Street like this
However the rest of scene of him driving and the fact this would actively take him away from where he stops suggest otherwise. First off we never see Sam go under the Ring Road so this then means he's actually merged onto the slip road lane, pretty late as well. Like last possible second. Which yeah, makes sense, he's distracted. Him then going on the ring road is supported by the fact that during the closeup shops we don't see him majorly steering and on the shots we can't see the wheel his movements don't show him turning either, he doesn't lean a whole lot like someone does when turning a bend.
This is where I am now gonna bring up where Sam stops. Nameless Road. The road just doesn't have a name but it is a one way road, and following that, can only be accessed by Baring Street and comes out onto the A6.
Now in this screenshot you can't actually tell that the road is one way but from 2011 streetview from the road Sam would've been coming from you can see the no entry signs
So at Cambridge Street he joins the Ring Road to then get off two junctions later. Now where Sam is getting off, there is obviously no proper road going ahead so the exit road has three lanes, one going left, two going right so Sam must be in the centre lane/the left lane of the right turning lanes. And with this the journey makes sense, instead of turning right he just continues onto the one way, there isn't owt to stop him, any vehicles thats could pose an issue wouldn't be moving cos the lights to turn right would be green and they'd be going across two sides of a dual carriageway. So all in all this is what the route looks like
with him at the very end cutting across to go the opposite way on a one way.
This also means that the driver that overtakes him, cuts him off and causes him to break just straight up also did that going completely the wrong way on a one way after not turning right like they should've done.
Anyway thank you for coming on this journey with me chat, tata for now
