In 1914, William Rees Jeffreys, the Secretary of the Road Board, set about commissioning the traffic surveys that would later allow the road network to be classified. This work was quickly halted by the start of the First World War. Henry Maybury restarted the work in 1920 as Director-General for roads in the brand new Ministry of Transport, having been Chief Engineer of the Road Board when the original surveys were started. Provisional numbers were allocated within a year, and the final numbering scheme arrived in 1922-23. It is essentially the same system we use today.
White lines in Ashford accoeding to Shell Book of Firsts - "Idea originated with County Alderman Cox, a farmer who used the road regularly, though not at that time a motorist" - work carried out by County Surveyor...