Everyone complains about the roadworks in Perth. And I understand. This month alone you can enjoy a road closure on York Place, another on Caledonian Road, temporary traffic lights at King's Place, more temporary traffic lights on Dundee Road from Queen's Bridge, and a slip road closure at Broxden for anyone who thought they'd escape by heading south.

But I'd like to make an unpopular argument. Roadworks are good, actually. Roadworks are the glue holding this city together.

Think about it. Where else in modern life do you sit, quietly, side by side with your neighbours, sharing an experience? Not online. Not at the shops. Only at a set of four-way temporary lights on King Street, where the green phase lasts eight seconds and the red phase lasts long enough to learn Gaelic.

Last Tuesday I sat at the lights on Dundee Road for 22 minutes. In that time I got to know the man in the car next to me. His name is Gordon. He's a retired plumber from Kinnoull. We discussed his hip, my sister's divorce and the St Johnstone back four. By the time the light turned green, we'd agreed to go on holiday together. We're going to Oban in May. Our wives are furious. But that's the magic of roadworks.

Before the works on Caledonian Road, I didn't know a single person on my street. Now we all walk to work together, in single file, along a temporary pedestrian route lined with orange barriers. It's practically a procession. Last week someone brought a piccolo.

My only fear is that one day the roadworks will end. One day the cones will be lifted, the signals switched off, and we'll all go back to driving straight past each other at 20mph, strangers once more.

So please, Perth and Kinross Council, Scottish Water, SSE, BT, whoever you are: don't stop. Dig up George Street again. Close the Queen's Bridge for a fortnight. Replace a manhole cover on Atholl Street, then replace it again, slightly to the left.

We need you. We need the cones. Without them, what would we even have to talk about?