Roadside memorial bouquets

I think this is a tradition among young people. Young drivers and/or their passengers are often killed in road accidents and their contemporaries mark their deaths with flowers, ribbon bows and other stuff.

Surely, if they were your loved ones, you would put the flowers or whatever on their graves or memorials. Why on the side of the road? I suspect quite a few of these flowers are placed by people who have no connection whatsoever with the accident victim.

Risking their own lives as they do it.

How do they manage to put them on motorways?

I find roadside memorials very distracting when I'm driving.

I have seen people dicing with death to place flowers in the centre of a busy roundabout. Surely the dear departed would not wish to be the cause of another accident.
A local dangerous bend has a rose bush planted, which is always attractive and better for the environment.

Not the same thing, but I have been surprised to see flowers still in their cellophane wrapping in our village churchyard - surely people know better? (Obviously not, on second thoughts)

I have made it clear to my DSs that if I should die in a road accident they are not to mark it in any way. I feel that I would rather be commemorated properly with a bench on our lovely hills or something else appropriate. I don't object to others doing it if it makes them feel better but think it should be biodegradeable.

Placing flowers as a mark of respect and memory of a loved one is a lovely thought but why hide the flowers? Plus, of course, if the wrapping is removed the flowers fade and return to the earth naturally. The cellophane seems to be left for months - I don't think anyone likes to remove it.

Flowers are the most natural way of expressing sorrow, grief and sympathy. When they are spent they return to the earth from where they came.

Teddy bears, plastic, photo frames, wind chimes on the other hand....

Agree absolutely. Flowers - yes, cellophane wrapping, teddy bears and other tat? NO.

Apparently there is evidence that bunches of flowers, teddy bears, etc. put on trees, walls and lampposts to commemorate someone killed in an accident also cause accidents because drivers slow down to have a look. I think some police forces remove them but I'm not certain.

Nfk

I do agree with you.

However there may be a reason why they are there. Perhaps it's somebody's loved one and they were killed whilst a long way from home. Maybe they cannot return to remove them and they just get raggy.

I don't think after a respectful period of time and the flowers have become to look in an obviously poor condition it would be unjustified to remove them. I think that way because the effect and reason is actually lost at that point and they actually look like an unkempt grave and that in turn can make the lovely thought appear hollow.