Motorway cantilever sign
A blue overhead sign suspended over the motorway from a post on the left, showing an upcoming exit and the following text.
Exit destinations: A534 Congleton, Sandbach.
Forward destinations: Preston, Liverpool, Manchester M6.
Junction number: 17.
Someone working for the Ministry of Transport in the early sixties must have thought it was a brilliant idea to put service areas right next to junctions. It categorically wasn't, but that policy left us with places like Sandbach, where the sliproads for the services and junction 17 are much too close to each other.