Ambitexto

These lights in the road have no battery, wire or bulb.

• A glass lens and a mirror send your headlights straight back to you.
• Every tyre pushes the stud down past a rubber wiper, and rainwater washes the glass.
• In the wartime blackout, orders reached 40,000 a week.

The road is not lighting your way. It is giving your own light back.

Words for the text

cat's eye

A small light in the road.

headlights

The big lights on a car.

mirror

You see your face in it.

rubber

Soft, like a car tyre.

dome

Half a ball shape.

The opening of the text

Lights with no power

Drive along a country road in Yorkshire on a winter night. There are no street lights, and the hills are black. You can only see what your headlights show you.

But down in the road, a long line of small lights shines ahead of you. The line goes over the hill and round every bend. It shows you the road before you get there.