Wobbly lines blamed on map crease

Council bosses blame a crease in a map for the wobble

The reason why a village road was painted with bizarre wobbly lines has been revealed - a crease in a map.

The wildly-swerving lines that have caused bemusement in East Boldre in the New Forest should have been straight, road safety bosses now say.

Hampshire County Council has admitted a crease in the plans confused a worker who read 4.8m as 4.3m.

Workers were removing the lines on Friday in order to replace them with more conventional straight ones.

The lines puzzled drivers passing through the village

Council spokeswoman Kirsty Gunner told BBC News Online: "We believe the map was folded and that caused a problem with an eight being read as a three."

On Thursday, the council admitted that a "misinterpretation" of the road width had led to the lines weaving in much further than they intended.

The lines were intended to narrow the road and slow motorists down by making them think about their driving.

They were part of a pilot scheme to reduce speeds on the 40mph road so that a further reduction to a permanent 30mph limit could be carried out safely.