Motorway gantry 'smart' messages...why wrong so often?

[Gafferjim]

reglard said:

I just ignore them , unless they are attached to a variable speed tax camera.

You ignore one with a red circle around the speed, or with a red X, and you will find yourself paying more 'road tax'

[mcdjl]

Gafferjim said:

MIDAS

Anything with "QUEUE" in the message has been set by automatic sensors in the c/way. This is called MIDAS. (Motorway Incident Detection And Signalling) go and look it up. Midas settings don't need a patrol to check the area, they'll normally clear themselves in time
The system will not allow step downs of speeds greater than 20 mph, so if you've seen a 30, there will have been a 50 prior to it.
MIDAS checks the sensors approx every 4 minutes, to clear the setting, it needs to have counted a specific number of vehicles passing over the sensor at the posted speed or above it, it will then either lift the speed setting or clear it.

Often Midas can be triggered by one complete moron that decides to change lanes and everyone has to brake harshly, knocking the average speed of traffic down, we've all see / been in one of these ghost traffic jams. It will take a while to get back up to normal. It can also be after a stoppage, ie a rolling block to clear the c/way of debris or a stranded vehicle, it can then take up to 30 mins or more to get back to normal.
A busy motorway will jam solid at about one mile / minute should traffic come to a halt for whatever reason.

In bold....so it never clears if theres a speed camera near by. And we wonder why these things cause problems.

[robinessex]

MrGTI6 said:

Wills2 said:

They're utterly useless.....

Pedestrians in the road slow down!......no there isn't

Incident slow down!...............no there isn't

Animals on the road slow down!...............no there isn't

That was just a selection of the incorrect signs I've witnessed recently on the motorway.

It would be nice if they displayed a message along the lines of "KEEP LEFT UNLESS OVERTAKING".

Although that assumes that lane-hoggers can actually read, so probably a waste of time.

They have done that. Watched a dozen cars on the M25 go under the sign and STILL STAYED IN THE MIDDLE LANE OF A VIRTUALLY EMPTY MOTORWAY.

[Flumpo]

Gafferjim said:

reglard said:

I just ignore them , unless they are attached to a variable speed tax camera.

You ignore one with a red circle around the speed, or with a red X, and you will find yourself paying more 'road tax'

This is a clear example of why the system doesn’t work. If some people don’t have faith in the system and ignore it, one day there might actually be a pedestrian walking down the middle of l3 and it’s going to end in tears.

I follow the instructions, but I’m starting to be in the minority.

[chopper602]

Gafferjim said:

MIDAS checks the sensors approx every 4 minutes, to clear the setting,

The time to clear settings has recently reduced from 4 minutes to 2 minutes (after the queue has cleared, it will wait for 2 minutes before clearing the message signs and signals)

[Wills2]

Gafferjim said:

Loads of stuff about why smart motorways aren't smart or fit for purpose

Explaining why something is crap doesn't excuse it.

[Digby]

Gafferjim said:

Often Midas can be triggered by one complete moron....

Nice to know we have a system in place that can be set off by a single person and that this in turn will cause lots of lovely congestion. It actually explains a lot.

[A500leroy]

what happens when we have the auto speed recognising crap in a few years time, will it be able to look up at the gantry and see 40,50 40,30,60 50 ? and will it confused if lane 1 is 40 l2 is 50 and l3 is 60?

[Section 8]

robinessex said:

They have done that. Watched a dozen cars on the M25 go under the sign and STILL STAYED IN THE MIDDLE LANE OF A VIRTUALLY EMPTY MOTORWAY.

I saw that myself today. Under the keep left unless overtaking sign and people just stayed in the lane 2 and 3 of the 4 lane motorway.

The fact the car in lane 3 was being undertaken by the one in lane 2 goes to show people just don’t give a st or they were too busy texting to even see the sign.

[eldar]

I drove up the M6 today, and it is clear that the system is starting to get a bit old, and maintenance is slipping a bit. The gantry says L1 50, L2 50, L3 the display is blank , L4 50. Is the limit for L3 50mph or 70 mph?

[DickP]

Hi,

Don't the camera equipped gantries have additional cameras to the left so as to take a photo showing what speed was shown as you go under the sign?

If that is the case, then would you not be able to argue the sign was blank?

Thanks,

[WarrenB]

eldar said:

I drove up the M6 today, and it is clear that the system is starting to get a bit old, and maintenance is slipping a bit. The gantry says L1 50, L2 50, L3 the display is blank , L4 50. Is the limit for L3 50mph or 70 mph?

The 'smart' section of the M62 was like that yesterday. Very few of the gantries had all the displays working.

[reglard]

Gafferjim said:

reglard said:

I just ignore them , unless they are attached to a variable speed tax camera.

You ignore one with a red circle around the speed, or with a red X, and you will find yourself paying more 'road tax'

Yes they are often wrong, and I tend to look ahead to see if there is an obstruction.

[wazztie16]

DickP said:

Hi,

Don't the camera equipped gantries have additional cameras to the left so as to take a photo showing what speed was shown as you go under the sign?

If that is the case, then would you not be able to argue the sign was blank?

Thanks,

I believe they do, not that I'd trust them to work, mind.

It's not like the basics always work properly.

[Speed Badger]

The reason they display messages such as 'pedestrians in road' or 'report of debris' etc when there is nothing, is that they want to calm the traffic at that point a little bit due to stacking traffic 20 miles down the road. Lots of algorithms work out that stuff and tell the operators where to enforce a calming to help traffic flow miles away.

The reason they are bks is that people would barely pay attention if it just went to 50 mph or 60 with no reason attached, but stick a 'pedestrians milling around on the motorway' on there and the majority will slow a little bit, which is enough.

[eldar]

Speed Badger said:

The reason they display messages such as 'pedestrians in road' or 'report of debris' etc when there is nothing, is that they want to calm the traffic at that point a little bit due to stacking traffic 20 miles down the road. Lots of algorithms work out that stuff and tell the operators where to enforce a calming to help traffic flow miles away.

The reason they are bks is that people would barely pay attention if it just went to 50 mph or 60 with no reason attached, but stick a 'pedestrians milling around on the motorway' on there and the majority will slow a little bit, which is enough.

After the 393rd occurrence of a sign warning of a non existent hazard, people may decide the warnings aren’t 100% credible and ignore them.

[reglard]

Flumpo said:

This is a clear example of why the system doesn’t work. If some people don’t have faith in the system and ignore it, one day there might actually be a pedestrian walking down the middle of l3 and it’s going to end in tears.

I follow the instructions, but I’m starting to be in the minority.

So if pedestrian gets run over does the sign change to debris in the road?

[jhiker]

'Incident ahead' - OK, but how far ahead - 2miles, 20 miles? - and is it serious...
'Lane closure ahead' - really, which one? Give us a clue and we can start moving over...
'Jnc 16 - 20mins' - absolutely useless unless you know how far it is or you're planning to come off at that particular one..
'Bin your litter' - words fail me..

[jhiker]

..and as for this, yes it is!

[anonymous-user]

jhiker said:

'Bin your litter' - words fail me..

Really
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/spring-clean-fo...
One of many but it's very difficult getting through to thick filthy barstewards who don't care.