Ban smart motorways

[Newton472]

Amazing these cost saving idiotically unsafe motorways are still being rolled out.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9160075/L...

How many more deaths have to happen before they can this utterly retarded ‘smart’ motorway programme?

[Mark V GTD]

Bonkers - IIRC Shapps claimed he agreed they were dangerous but does not seem to have actually done anything about it

[2Btoo]

They are nothing more than a way of trying to squeeze an extra lane out of the existing motorways at minimal cost.

The UK BADLY needs more motorways but smart motorways are not the way to do it. However the govt won't spend the money necessary to build more roads so we need to suffer such stupidies.

[BroadsRS6]

Until we reduce the demand for road space, compromises will be made in order to allow more traffic into the same area of tarmac.
Start reducing the need for ever more/wider roads and bypasses and road upgrades.
How we do that is open to much debate, various opinions on this have been mooted for ages.

[anonymous-user]

Is the innate black tarmac road unsafe?

Or is the dimwits and feckwits using it and running into stationary objects sometimes provided by other feckwits standing in live lanes swapping details?

[BroadsRS6]

I am not too keen on it, but an MP friend of mine said road pricing is inevitable fairly soon. That will, rightly or wrongly, remove a LOT of vehicle journeys.

[Crafty_]

The last thing I heard was that the part time ones were banned - full time only and that no new smart motorways would be opened until an enquiry in to their viability had been completed. I think that meant no new "conversions" would be started.

The motorway most local to me is still undergoing conversion, seemed to pause for a while due to shutdowns etc, but its actively being worked on now. I wonder how long it will be before there is a death on it..

[BroadsRS6]

A 19 year old lass died in the Birmingham area, went straight under the back of a newly-parked lorry which had run out of diesel. Tragic doesn't come close to describing that.

[Yodafone]

I am not defending smart motorway's but part the problem is how cars are over loaded tech that is distracting.

For example on 2001 Volvo S60 you can find all the controls by feel, now you have massive touch screen on current one with touch controls.

Yes too many buttons can also be distracting but it can be made simple as show on example above.

[kambites]

2Btoo said:

The UK BADLY needs more motorways

I think one can perhaps better argue that the UK badly needs people to drive less, or at least drive less in the rush hour.

[dcb]

kambites said:

I think one can perhaps better argue that the UK badly needs people to drive less, or at least drive less in the rush hour.

Use of motorways is a useful proxy for economic activity.
Less driving means we will be poorer in the future.

The UK having one of the worst motorway networks in Europe doesn't
help pay £200 BN for a pandemic.

[randomeddy]

speedyguy said:

Is the innate black tarmac road unsafe?

Or is the dimwits and feckwits using it and running into stationary objects sometimes provided by other feckwits standing in live lanes swapping details?

[swisstoni]

randomeddy said:

speedyguy said:

Is the innate black tarmac road unsafe?

Or is the dimwits and feckwits using it and running into stationary objects sometimes provided by other feckwits standing in live lanes swapping details?

You know that. I know that. But it happens.

[anonymous-user]

kambites said:

2Btoo said:

The UK BADLY needs more motorways

I think one can perhaps better argue that the UK badly needs people to drive less, or at least drive less in the rush hour.

What like the chap on the other thread who drives a 100 miles a day to the office because it suits his life etc etc it needs a change of mindset ?

[MB140]

kambites said:

2Btoo said:

The UK BADLY needs more motorways

I think one can perhaps better argue that the UK badly needs people to drive less, or at least drive less in the rush hour.

Yes but the U.K. badly needs a better public transport system that runs on time, is convenient, reliable and makes financial sense to the user.

I’m RAF so get an armed forces rail card 1/3 off basically and unless I travel by myself the public transport network rarely makes sense on at least a couple of those points. If me and my Mrs travel together and she gets the dependents rail card also 1/3 off then it very rarely makes sense to use public transport. Also bare in mind I have 2 train stations within 10 mins walk of my house so have no car parking to pay for at the train station or taxis to and from the stations and I just walk.

If I can’t get it to make sense financially with those circumstances and discounts (and I do try to use trains where possible) then for the average person it must be more expensive than taking a car most times.

Of course there will be places like London with congestion charging, pollution taxes etc and better than average public transport links it would make sense. But for the average of the country he car is still the best solution.

I also note that we should be making less journeys as Kimbites suggests. I’ve just been issued with a laptop that now allows for remote working so apart from when I fly or plan for flying a lot of my work is done remote. It will however be interesting to see if this remote working is so common once cv19 is done and dusted. I can see them having us all sat at desks at work using the issues laptops.

Edited by MB140 on Monday 18th January 21:30

[DoubleD]

swisstoni said:

randomeddy said:

speedyguy said:

Is the innate black tarmac road unsafe?

Or is the dimwits and feckwits using it and running into stationary objects sometimes provided by other feckwits standing in live lanes swapping details?

You know that. I know that. But it happens.

Agreed that it's the people and not the roads that are unsafe.

[anonymous-user]

BroadsRS6 said:

A 19 year old lass died in the Birmingham area, went straight under the back of a newly-parked lorry which had run out of diesel. Tragic doesn't come close to describing that.

I'm seeing a similarity here.
1. 2 dozy blokes crash and swap details in live lane, inattentive person kills them. Wife blames road layout.
2. Dozy bloke runs out of fuel, inattentive person kills themself driving into back of stationary object.

Meanwhile on A500 vehicle runs into stationary truck in lay-by kills occupants.

Meanwhile elsewhere bloke drives into stationary truck in Layby and kills himself. Wife blames road layout.

Am I doing this right yet ?

[anonymous-user]

A friend of my sister broke down in a horsebox on the M27 near a coned off area where some workmen were. She asked if they could move some cones to get on the bit that used to be hard shoulder so the horsebox wasn't in a live lane. "Nope" was their reponse.

[Terminator X]

Newton472 said:

Amazing these cost saving idiotically unsafe motorways are still being rolled out.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9160075/L...

How many more deaths have to happen before they can this utterly retarded ‘smart’ motorway programme?

It is / was to reduce pollution as the EU were or could have issued the UK with huge fines. Unsure if brexit solved this "problem" ...

TX.

Edit - as well as the extra dangerous Lane.

[Driver5324]

2Btoo said:

They are nothing more than a way of trying to squeeze an extra lane out of the existing motorways at minimal cost.

The UK BADLY needs more motorways but smart motorways are not the way to do it. However the govt won't spend the money necessary to build more roads so we need to suffer such stupidies.

We really don’t need more motorways. We need less cars. Induced demand is really a thing.